So, who are HOTS in Bohol 

TechVoc Week's Jobs Fair? 

TAGBILARAN CITY, Bohol, August 24 (PIA)— She never expected fate to finally be kind to her. 

Twenty-one years old Mariel Tocmo of Datag Sur, Balilihan has too many frustrations as a job seeker, she could not stop from thinking today was no different. 

A graduate of Corella National High School, Mariel admits her family has only enough to get by, not comfortably. 

“My father died, and being the youngest in the family, it is just about time I help,” she timidly shared in a chance casual conversation. 

As she was saying this, hundreds of job seekers were also in different processes of proving to the 6 international and 8 local employment agencies present during the Jobs Fair at the Bohol Cultural Center, that they have just the right skills for the job needed. 

A job fair offered by Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) to commemorate the National Technical Vocational (TechVoc) Week, other government agencies pitched in to elevate the TESDA skills bridging into a full scale employment event. 

With the Department of Trade and Industry, Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) JobStart and the Provincial Government through the Bohol Employment Placement Office (BEPO), the one day Jobs Fair hoped to reduce unemployment and push for economic productivity for people of the employable age, explained BEPO Officer In Charge Ma. Vilma Yorong during the jobs fair. 

“We are expecting over 800 job seekers today,” former TESDA information officer Jaminel Damolo said. 

Finding a job has become Mariel’s priority. After years of staying at home and helping her 62-year-old mother weave baskets and cope with her quota, the closest she had to getting hired was a promise of a call after every job interview. None came. 

“I am the youngest, my elder brother works as a kitchen staff in a city restaurant, the others have married and taken on families,” she added, detailing about her siblings. 

While waiting for the lucky job call, she doubles up as a basket weaver helping her mother Flavia come up with the weekly quota of 60 baskets a month. This they would sell at P6.00 each. 

“It is a tough work you could easily get hurt as bamboos are sharp and baskets are meticulously done, getting wounded is always a possibility.” 

One time, Mariel availed of a Local Government Unit of Balilihan and Antequera-organized TESDA training for work as contact center agent in Tagbilaran. 

For two weeks, she thought she had fattened her chances of a job. 

TESDA keeps a policy for their accredited Technical Vocational Institutions (TVI) offering the government scholarships to facilitate the hiring of at least 50% of their enrollees. 

Still, Mariel did not make the cut, and her Qualfon chance proved to be tough, the work requirements were hard to come by. 

So today, August 24 should be like any of those times she kept the hope. 

“I did not tell my mother that I would be here to apply for a job, she might expect too much,” she confessed, trying to mask a smile already forming in her face. 

The story of Mariel Fe Tocmo, is almost the same as that of Marchelle Comoylao of Cambu-ac Sur Sikatuna. 

A graduate of Sikatuna National High School in 2014, at 20 years old, Marchelle, despite being the youngest, has been on the look-out for a job that offers her a better future. 

“I have an elder brother who, while waiting for job call, as a seaman, helps my father as carpenter worker. My mother keeps the house,” she noted. 

Now working as a boutique attendant in a Tagbilaran City mall, she has doubled up as a babysitter to her sister’s kids, but that is not what she wanted in her life. 

“It is never easy, I have to find a job to help my family,” she stressed. 

But like Mariel, job seeking in never really easy. To expand her chances, she sought for other skills. 

“I took up cookery through a TESDA scholarship for 2 months, buts still job is elusive,” Marchelle said, modest in a rose pink blouse and striped black and while skirt, coming to chance during the job fair. 

But in a sudden twist of luck, both Mariel and Marchelle were among the 17 others who were hired on the spot (HOTS) by noon time during the one day Jobs fair. 

Both and 10 more were told to report to Mitsumi Danao, an electro mechanics solutions provider combining advanced technologies from a wide range of fields including ultra-precision mechanical components (such as ball bearings), motors, sensors, semi-conductors, wireless communication—and fuse machines and electronics with control technologies. 

Along with Mitsumi were 8 local companies scouting for new workers to prop up their work force including Alturas Group of Companies, Bohol Quality, Henan Resort, Prescon Philippines, Sherwood bay Resort, Taytay sa Kauswagan Incorporated and Reynas Garden and Haven. 

The Jobs Fair also attracted 6 international companies: East West placement center, FVJ Overseas Placement, Golden Legacy Jobmovers Inc., IUPP Inc., JobsGlobal Employment Services Inc. and Lead Resources Management Corp, bared BEPO OIC Yorong. 

TESDA technical education skills development specialist Rosemarie Banol also assured that the placement companies joining the fair were screened by BEPO and found to be legitimate and are permitted to set up manning services. 

Having gone through months upon months of trying to land into jobs, Tocmo and Comoylao also learned something about the jobs fair. 

Totally strangers from each other, seeing that if both keep off from others, job seeking would even be more daunting. 

Both naturally got into each other’s support and it took them less than five minutes to be friends. 

And one thing Comoylao realized that at the Jobs Fair, if it is the companies who look for workers, the tendency is to make everything easy, compared to when one is in need and applies for a job which the company has no need at that time. 

“Thanks to TESDA, DTI, DOLE Jobstart and PLGU BEPO, we can now be taken off the list of the province’s unemployed,” both quipped, happiness brimming as the eagerness to break the good news home seems hard to overpower. (rahc/PIA-7/Bohol)

WHO are HOTS and who are not? 17 young Boholano job seekers got Hired On The Spot (HOTS) as the TESDA with DTI, DOLE and BEPO offered a Jobs Fair to commemorate the National TechVoc Week. (rahc/PIA-7/Bohol)

Fisheries experts propose strong 

Mariculture investment for Bohol

TAGBILARAN CITY, Bohol, August 24 (PIA)—Bohol may not look far when it comes to seeking a stable supply of cheap fish, it can be easily found here.

Experts at the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) think a strong support to mariculture and engaging big ticket investments along this line would make flooding fish in Bohol literally at arms’ reach.

Now scampering to stabilize what many believe as an artificial manipulation if only to dictate the local prices of fish, the Department of Agriculture (DA) has stepped in.

DA Secretary Emmanuel Piñol weeks ago, promised to treat the situation by bringing in fish from different regions through his department’s TienDA.

TienDA is DA’s version and actualization of the “farmer’s market” concept, by putting up a venue for farmers and fishers to be able to directly sell their produce, and for consumers to be able to access these products at its farm gate price.

Opened at the Bohol Agricultural Promotion Center (BAPC) last August 16 and 17, the first batch of TienDA’s Bohol Fish Market Bohol brought to Bohol a wide option of fish for the Boholano table, marine resources which were priced way below those found at local markets and travelling peddlers.

Data shared during the tow day selling event bared that the fish market allowed nearly 20 tons of cheap fish and sea products to Boholanos.

Further assuring Boholanos that the TienDA is not just temporary supply spiking to disrupt a local aberration in pricing, Sec Piñol announced: August 16-17 TienDA is just the start of similar farmer-fishers and consumers engagements.

Last August 24, the second TienDA Bohol Fish market reopened for a day at the BAPC.

But instead of the bulk of fish supply, local consumers were in for a disappointment: Zamboanga, which earlier assured to bring the huge bulk of fish supply for the one day selling event refused. 

Bohol fish dealers who earlier took a huge supply from Zamboanga did not pay, resulting in the stalling of the supply flow.

Just as BFAR facilities in Calape and Regions 8 and 10, the second Bohol Fish Market managed less than 5 tons, to the dismay of DA officials and consumers here.

It was not known of local officials stepped in to patch the situation, but BFAR fisheries experts said Bohol need not look far.

“We brought in 2.1 tons of milkfish (bangus) from Region 10,” BFAR 10 Aquatechnician Jejomar Grupo said.

The supply, which BFAR 10 arranged to bring in, came from only one source: a fish cage operator in Lopez-Jaena, Misamis occidental.

The supply, Grupo, added, is only from one module of a 10 cubic meters (cu m) by 10 cum by 8 meter-deep cage in a mariculture project. The operator owns many modules.

In Bohol, Talibon resident, regional mariculture expert and now Cebu BFAR Fisheries Officer Edgar Delfin, Bohol Fishery Officer Leo Bongalos and BFAR Panggangan Calape Facility chief Dionisio Colantro altogether believe these is still something Bohol can do: take a second hard look at mariculture as a local source of fish supply.

Delfin, whose office monitors fisheries supply in Cebu admit: a fish cage in Tambo Island in Talibon with an investor from Cebu, grows fish and harvests tons and tons but for Cebu markets.

And while the Tambo fish cage is settled in possible Foreshore Lease Agreement, there are instances when local officials can make arrangements that a certain percentage of the regular harvest would be supplied to Bohol markets, hinted Colantro, whose facility in Calape breeds bangus fingerlings for distribution to government and private commercial fish growers and fishpond owners.

Delfin said building a 10 x10 x 8 cum, using bamboo floaters, nets and mooring buoys, would only cost about P150K to P160K, while a 6 feeding regimen a day for 3 months of operation would cost about P500K.

But with a stocking density of 30 fingerlings in a cubic meter, a 15,000 fingerling seeded, at least 30% mortality, a modular cage can still harvest 5 tons.

With multiple modules, an investor with 10-12 modules or a capitalization of P10 million can easily supply 10 tons of fish every month.

Delfin cited the favorable waters and sheltered bays in Bohol as ideal for fish cages and mariculture parks.

Bohol PFO Bongalos also recalled that the BFAR used to put up about five mariculture parks in Bohol, but now, only two have remained, and these are not even sustainable as these are just single modules enough to transfer the technology to local fishers who could be support workers for investments in the area. 

BFAR said these facilities were placed in Maribojoc, Mabini, Candijay, Talibon and Calape.

“We had 5 mariculture parks, but it is sad to say that we have not engaged enough large scale private investors. What we had are small scale investors who could hardly recoup operational expenses,” Delfin lamented, further explaining the economies of scale.

And from these, only in Talibon did an investor, who keeps over 54 modules with alternating fish stocking pattern that a weekly harvest of over 10 tons happen, the bulk of the fish getting to Cebu.

At 29.8% fish sufficiency in Bohol citing Philippine Statistics Authority survey in 2017, an influx of locally supplied fish from mariculture parks, a weekly bulk supply can easily plus stricter marker regulations can dent upon the issue, experts propose.

In Candijay for example, the main bulk of the fishery harvest is dedicated to local markets and only the excess is shipped out, Bohol PFO Bongalos shared.

In fact, there is nothing more Bohol can ask, we have hatcheries that provide over 1.3 million fingerlings in Panggangan, multi-species hatcheries in Sinandigan Ubay, Clarin brackish water nursery and Bentig facility in Calape, BFAR authorities said.

Over this Colantro, who has 38 years of fisheries expertise under his belt proposed more investments in good storage facilities to keep supplies stable even in times of pinch.

He picked emergency harvest situations in fish cages especially amidst threat of impending typhoons, this time, in an oversupply of fish, prices go sagging down, but with storage facilities, everything can be kept to stabilize local prices.

While Bohol boasts of being among the most investor friendly province, questions as to why there are no takers for large scale marine investments, unlike less investor friendly provinces, kept bugging people.

As to its answer, local officials must work harder as the daily influx of tourists all the more put a strain on the local fish consumption, fisheries experts pointed out. (rahc/PIA-7/Bohol)

With the failure of Boholano fish dealers to pay for the first batch of fish deliveries from Zamboanga, the second Fish Market suffered supply deficit that the most supplies that came were bangus from Region 8 and 10 and from BFAR Calape facilities. To be fish self-sufficient, experts now propose attracting large scale investors in mariculture. (rahc/PIA-7/Bohol)

Boholano Provincial Fisheries Officers, from Cebu Edgar Delfin (Talibon) and in Bohol Leo Bongalos (Dauis) oversee the fish market and TienDA, and proposed the putting up of more mariculture as well as stricter LGU regulations as a measure to stabilize local supply and cap the price manipulation that is now becoming evident here. (rahc/PIA-7/Bohol)

BSP says Basic Deposit 

Accounts, need no IDs 

TAGBILARAN CITY, Bohol, August 25 (PIA)—A study cited by the national community managed savings and credit associations bared that only very few Filipinos own savings accounts due to the inability of some to present proper identifications top vouch for the depositor. 

The same study cited the fact that most people who opts to start a small savings find the documentary requirements in opening an account hard to come by. 

Conscious of this, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), through a recent Monetary Board resolution, has instructed its supervised banks all over the country to follow a simplified Know Your Customer (KYC) instead of the hard to come by identification documents. 

By KYC, instead of forcing depositors to produce IDs, identifying the customer and verifying their true identity can now be based on any document or information reduced in writing, including but not limited to certifications, BSP Information Officer Hazel Cultura bared. 

Through Circular 992, series of 2018, BSP through its governor Nestor A. Espenilla Jr., has officially increased access of the country’s unserved and underserved to financial services that also improves financial inclusivity to the poor and the small entrepreneurs, she added. 

According to Cultura, the circular which liberalized customer onboarding in the banking world, formally establishes a new system of identifying customers and verifying their true identity. 

Previous requirement in opening bank accounts says one must submit at least two (2) valid IDs which could be the new SSS or GSIS ID, driver's license, a company ID, school ID, Passport, PRC ID, postal ID, or marriage contract, two most recent 1 x 1 ID picture, proof of billing for water and power or a tax identification number. 

These requirements discourage a small savings depositor who would most often, change his mind and take his small savings somewhere else. 

In 2007, the BSP embraced a more ambitious goal of financial inclusion as a way of bringing the financial system closer to all Filipinos. The overall vision is to build an inclusive financial system where there is effective access to a wide range of appropriate financial products and services. 

But with the requirements in place in the Manual of Regulations for Banks (MORB), unless amendments are introduced, financial inclusion remains a distant dream for the poor entrepreneur or depositor, bankers shared the issue. 

On this, the Monetary Board, which BSP Gov Espenilla chairs, in its resolution 58, dated January 2018, approved the introduction of the framework for basic deposit accounts, BSP said. 

The resolution introduced a new kind of account: the Basic Deposit Account (BDA), one that is designed to promote financial inclusion. 

BDA will enable the Filipinos to receive and make payments, own a facility to deposit, using the same basic functionalities that will characterize ease, accessibility, convenience and reasonable cost for banks and customers, BSP through Information Officer Hazel Cultura explained. 

The BDA’s minimum key features which the BSP expects banks to adopt, include an opening amount of at least P100.00, does not have any maintaining balance, no reserve requirement, does not have any dormancy charges but with a maximum balance of not more than P50,000, Cultura told members of the Association of United Development Information Officers (AUDIO) during a meeting at Jjs Seafoods Village last week. 

For Basic Deposit Accounts which exceed 50,000.00 minimum balance, BSP said the banks should also convert to a regular deposit account. 

Even then, banks can still accept normal Savings Deposit Accounts (SDA) that are withdrawable upon demand and through available bank channels. 

SDA’s include regular savings account, the interest bearing account withdrawable upon presentation of a properly accomplished withdrawal slip with corresponding passbook or by automated tellering system. 

Another kind of SDA is the Kiddie and Teen Savings accounts for children and teens (up to 19) opening with an initial P100.00 deposit and without a maintaining balance. 

And then there are other savings accounts that offer tiered interest rates depending on the deposit amount, BSP said. (rahc/PIA-7/Bohol) 

BSP’s Hazel Cultura told information officers that the BSP Monetary Board has ruled that IDs may not anymore be needed to start a Basic Deposit Account, to allow more Filipinos to access financial inclusion and start savings deposits. (rahc/PIA-7/Bohol)

National Heroes Day 

was not on Monday 

TAGBILARAN CITY, Bohol, August 25 (PIA)—If you have this luxury of whiling your time in an extended weekend August 27, basking in the holiday sun, frolicking in some unmapped beach of simply in a hammock under the palm-fringed beach, thank a Boholano, who pounded a grand event which would make the first National Heroes Day distinct from a similar holiday in November. 

But did you know that this holiday used to be commemorated on a Sunday? 

The first celebration of the National Heroes Day had then Secretary of Education Cecilio Putong, a Boholano, taking charge to make the celebration grand, after breaking off from a seemingly similar celebration on November 30. 

November 30 then was in the memory of Andres Bonifacio and those who knew how to sacrifice the interests of self and the rich pleasures of living for the sake of the dignity and welfare of the greatest number.” 

This then makes it a duplicate with the holiday on the last Sunday of August. 

It was accordingly in the American Colonial Period that the celebration of the National Heroes day began, a celebration pegged every last Sunday of August. 

By Act 3827, the Philippine Legislature first enacted the holiday into law declaring the last Sunday of August of every year as a national holiday, in honor of unnamed heroes who have braved death, persecution for home, nation, justice and freedom. 

The Act however appears to be a duplicate of the holiday in November 30 by virtue of Act 2946 which celebrates Bonifacio Day and of Filipino heroes. This was in 1943. 

In fact, to make matters even more confusing, then President Jose P. Laurel signed Executive Order No. 20, which set the National Heroes Day on November 30, placing celebrations in Mount Samat in Bataan, which commemorates the bravery of the Filipinos and the Americans who fought it out with the Japanese Imperial forces in Corregidor and Bataan. 

A decade later, President Elpidio Quirino reverted the holiday to the last Sunday of August, and appointed Boholano Education Secretary Cecilio Putong to head the committee to take charge of the National Heroes Da, which at that time fell on August 31, 1952. 

And just as the country got used to the holiday falling on the last Sunday of August, President Corazon Aquino’s Executive Order 292 adopted the Administrative Code which lists the national holidays and special days but presented a manner of modifying these by law, order or proclamation. 

On July 24, 2007, using the provision to modify the holidays, by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s holiday economics to reduce work disruptions by moving holidays to the nearest Monday or Friday of the week, allowing for longer weekends and boosting domestic leisure and tourism, Republic Act 9242 amended the Administrative Code and placed the National Heroes Day on the last Monday of August. 

The holiday has since then stuck to the last Monday of August. 

2019 holidays 

Meanwhile, President Rodrigo Duterte has signed Proclamation 555, dated August 15, 2018 which declared the regular and special (non-working) days for 2019. 

Regular holidays for 2019 are January 1 (Tuesday) as New year’s Day, April 9 (Tuesday) Araw ng Kagitingan, April 18 (Thurday) Maundy Thursday, April 19 (Friday) Good Friday, May 1 (Wednesday) Labor Day, June 12 (Wednesday) Independence Day, August 26 (Monday) National Heroes Day, November 30 (Saturday) Bonifacio Day, December 25 (Wednesday) Christmas Day and December 30 (Monday) Rizal Day. 

Special (Non-Working) Days in 2019 are February 5 (Tuesday) Chinese New Year, February 25 (Monday) EDSA Peoples Power Revolution Anniversary, April 20 (Saturday) Black Saturday, August 21 (Wednesday) Ninoy Aquino Day, November 1 (Friday) All Saints Day, December 8 (Sunday) Feast of the Immaculate Concepcion, December 31 (Tuesday) Last Day of the year, and additional non-working days: November 2 (Saturday) and December 24 (Tuesday). 

Also to be declared national holidays are Eid’l Fit’r and Eid’l Adha, which dates can only be determined in accordance with the Islamic calendar and with the recommendation of the National Commission on Muslim Filipinos to the Office of the President. (rahc/PIA-7/Bohol)