REP. Erico Aristotle Aumentado (Bohol, 2nd District) has vowed to step up efforts to provide even more livelihood projects for his constituents.
This after a recently published Canadian study showed that 10 towns in the 2nd district out of Bohol’s total 46 are the province’s “poorestâ€.
The solon said just like his namesake father and congressional immediate predecessor and former governor Erico Boyles Aumentado who pulled Bohol out of the country’s 20 poorest provinces, the son now resolves to similarly pluck those 10 towns out of poverty.
He said poverty should not be taken lightly as even 67 percent of the Boholanos rated themselves as poor in the Bohol Polls 2015 ran from March 25 to April 17 – up compared to the 62 percent in last year’s edition of the poll.
Aumentado said the study and the poll intensify the need to address poverty. Development cannot set in, he explained, unless the people’s hunger is mitigated and their energies are not consumed in looking for food to put on the table for the next meal.
The solon said he will tap funds from say, the Department of Labor and Employment (Dole) and other agencies with available funds for seed money for short-term livelihood projects.
Farmers cannot wait for a year before properly feeding their families again. Aumentado noted that the last rice harvest was in March. He wondered where these farmers, many of whom are in the second district – being Bohol’s rice basket, will get the money for their needs as the next harvest season will still be in October for the crop planted this June.
In a country that sets June as start of classes, ordinary farmers selling their carabaos at the peak of the planting season is an oft repeated story.
Aumentado said he is bent on improving the lives of his constituents in order to prevent the above scenario from happening again. (JUNE S. BLANCO)