DA, DepEd, NNC bring back “Gulayan sa Paaralan” program

CEBU, Philippines - The Department of Agriculture (DA) and the Department of Education (DepEd) in cooperation with the National Nutrition Council (NNC) are reviving the “Gulayan sa Paaralan” program in all public schools in Central Visayas.

The revival of the program was announced yesterday during the AGIO Forum held at the Department of Health regional office.

Grace Dagala, representative of DA, said that they will be giving “pinakbet” seeds to DepEd for the latter to distribute to different schools. This is in line with the Nutrition Month Celebration.

The seeds will be planted by the students in their respective school gardens and will be grown for them to consume later on and even gain profit out of the vegetables they have planted.

DepEd representative Grace Espos said that they will encourage elementary and high school students to plant these seeds and integrate it in their Technology and Livelihood Education (TLE) subjects. Espos said they will give instruction to elementary teachers to teach the children on how to properly plant the seeds.

Dave Bargamento of NNC-7 said that most of the children now no longer eat vegetables because of the many fast food chains that serve instant food.

Bargamento believes that this is one of the reasons why Cebu ranked number one in malnutrition rate for pre-school children as of 2012.

The statistics show that Cebu has 7.66 percent malnutrition rate. The figure is higher than that of Negros Oriental which used to be the number one in the previous years. Negros Oriental's malnutrition rate last year was only 7.13 percent. It is followed by Siquijor with 6.56, and Bohol with 5.87.

Among the cities and municipalities, the City of Naga ranked number one with 10.95 percent followed by Bais City and Guihulngan with 9.62 and 9.32 percent, respectively.

The three agencies believe that with the revival of the “Gulayan sa Paaralan” program, many students will be encouraged to switch back to eating vegetables and even grow their own vegetable gardens in their respective homes.

On the other hand, Dagala said that DA's challenge today is the problem on white corn production in Central Visayas. Dagala said that this is happening since there is already a low demand for white corn and that there are already lesser lands intended for agriculture.

Dagala said that they are asking the assistance of the Provincial Agriculture Office to encourage the farmers to plant more white corn.

Dagala reiterated that they are promoting the Food Staple Sufficiency Program so that there will alternative staple food that will be eaten by the people in case another rice and corn crisis will happen, just like in 2008.

She said that the LGUs must take over in running the food markets in their respective localities and should not just rely it on the cooperatives, so that there will be sustainability of the said project. — (FREEMAN)