By Rizalie A. Calibo
SIQUIJOR,
March 2 (PIA)— Coordinating Roads and Infrastructure Investments for
Development (CR+ID) project of the Asia Foundation and the Australian Embassy
in the Philippines, in partnership with the Siquijor Chamber of Commerce and
Industry Inc. (SCCII), will focus on tourism and agriculture the priority
sectors for Siquijor province.
This is made as an offshoot of the Provincial Consensus Building
workshop held February 13, 2015 where multi-stakeholders arrived at an
agreement on tourism and agriculture, particularly banana and coconut as the
priority sectors and subsectors of the province.
To help multi-stakeholders trace the movement of goods and
services from the production, processing and marketing areas and identify
Strategic Road Links (SRL) and Strategic Infrastructures (SI) in the province,
the SCCII conducted on February 25 to 26 Value Chain Analysis
Workshop on Tourism and Agriculture (Coconut and Banana).
This facilitates the movement of certain products as they flow
through key market actors such as farmers, traders, processors,
transporters, wholesalers and retailers to be lobbied for inclusion in the 2016
budget, says SCCII Chair Judy U. Booc.
CR+ID, according to regional project coordinator Condrado Pono,
is a successor to the CRID project or Coordinating Road Investments for
Development, implemented over the last two years in five provinces: Bohol,
Cebu, Guimaras, Surigao del Norte, and Surigao del Sur.
It coordinates and rationalizes road investments through the use
of Value Chain Analysis in identifying strategic road links (SRLs) with local
government units (LGUs) and national government agencies (NGAs) adopting a more
regionally coordinated and integrated infrastructure investment program, Pono
added.
It partners with the private sector, SCCII for Siquijor, LGUs,
NGAs that are funding road and infra projects, and Congressmen who are using
their PDAF as well as other legislation to support road projects, he also said.
Last year, the Australian Government and the Asia Foundation
jointly agreed to expand CR+ID in two ways: thematically, to include not only
roads but also key infrastructure with disaster risk and hazard identification,
and geographically, to include all provinces in Regions VII and XIII, as well
as three provinces in Region VI.
The Australian Government’s support enables The Asia Foundation to
provide assistance to provincial governments to complete their road network and
key infrastructure maps, identify strategic roads and infrastructure with the
private sector, and conduct municipal level road investment planning workshops.
Unlike other projects, CR+ID allows local and national agencies to
make their decisions on roads and other infrastructure investments across the
provinces and within the region based on needs, and as determined by a
multi-sectoral coalition anchored on the private sector initiatives.
This, he said, is based on the assumption that improving entire
stretches of strategic road links leads to decrease in transportation cost and
travel time, cost of farm inputs, and prices of farm products, increase in
tourism traffic and increase in access to basic services and that fragmentation
is lessened if strategic road links are identified and there is increased
coordination among agencies to invest in these strategic road links.
CR+ID also works to strengthen the Regional Development Council
for broader participation of businesses and local governments in the realm of
investment programming. NEDA Region VII highlights the importance of investment
in infrastructure, especially on transportation in the updated Central Visayas
Regional Development Plan for 2014-2016.
Pono also said, improving coordination of infrastructure
investments effectively direct investments in areas/sectors where it is needed
most, thereby addressing a more general and wide ranging concerns (i.e.
movement of goods, services and people within the province or within the
region).
Private Sector-LGU partnership, with support of National Agencies,
are key to the success of CR+ID, he said. (rmn/RAC/PIA7-Siquijor)