Brains & Beauty Agriculture

With UP Manila communicator Benito, former PH Secretary of Agriculture Montemayor dreams of liberating Filipino farmers – from what? Facebook sharing of Mr Montemayor: “A Country For Farmers [1] .” The link is to the Inquirer.net essay by Joberson Benito dated 25 February 2020 about what Mr Benito knows as the life of the Filipino farmer especially with the advent of the Rice Tariffication Law, RTL. (According to the note attached to his essay, Mr Benito graduated with Organizational Communication from the University of the Philippines Manila.) So, what does Mr Benito communicate about the RTL? Very little. Because he did not do proper research! This is a UP alumnus speaking, the one and only recipient of the UP System’s award, “Outstanding Alumnus for Creative Writing” awarded 2011 by the UP Los Baños Alumni Association. Singular honor; there is no similar or related honor in the entire UP System. Mr Benito’s essay of 547 words is all prejudice against the RTL but no details. And: ...

I am an Agriculture graduate, BSA major in Ag Education, UP Los Baños, and I so believe that Agriculture remains to be The Major Force that will bring out millions of Filipinos out of Poverty into Plenty – if we believe in the Christian God and follow His commandments.  So: Faith First! Why do I believe that? Because of a biblical promise; it goes back to the times of Jesus: 1 John 3:17 New Revised Standard Version, NRSV How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? 1 John 3:17 New International Version, NIV If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? Actually it is not a commandment – it is a question of faith! That is why I say, “I believe.” The commandments of God are not going to be executed by God – they are going to be executed by us, or not. 2020. It just happens that I am writing this Wednesday, ...

Facebook sharing of Ed Quiblatin:  Time to shift from “egosystems to ecosystems” (per article). Thanks, Ed, I needed that! Paraphrasing Ninoy Aquino, I say, “The Philippines is worth writing for!” Actually, it has been so for me since at least the beginning of 2007, a little more than 13 years ago, when I started blogging for the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics, ICRISAT, based in India, as an international consulting writer for ICRISAT, when now-Secretary of Agriculture William Dar/Manong Willie was Director General. I was writing for ICRISAT countries – but I made sure that I was also writing for the Philippines, directly or indirectly mentioning my country. My perspective has always been bigger than my topic. Yes, once in a little, I do mention my ability/ies relevant to the topics – from “egosystems to ecosystems” per article. That is how I approach this one: “Eight Emerging Lessons: From Coronavirus to Climate Action [1] ” by Otto Scharmer of Me...

ANN says, “Senior High Students Can Barely Write In English: Report [1] ” (20 April 2020, Author Not Named, ABS-CBN News). It is bad news; consultant Karen Brillantes of the Philippine Institute for Development Studies said some senior high school, SHS, students could not write “even a decent English sentence.” (bad English image from vappingo [2] ) ANN says Ms Karen said that “SHS students' difficulty with writing in English was particularly evident in subjects where they were required to produce research papers to pass a course.” As a high school teacher, at Civil Service Professional level, what can I recommend to improve SHS education in my country? This: Take out of the classrooms K-11 and K-12 and bring them to the Internet. That is, teach them via cellphones! Oh, they will all love it. Now they will have a legitimate excuse for walking anywhere looking at their phones. They will be listening to their phones rather than their parents! But: They will have no excuses to produce...

Online Education? Here’s my Test Question:  “Do you think PowerPoint is essentially the creation of slides that you have to master?” If so, you’re not ready to teach! You don’t know the essence of teaching! Susan Gomez shares on Facebook that CNN’s Brian Ries and Meg Wagner have written, “Universities Begin Considering Canceling In-Person Classes Until 2021 [1] ” – and this Filipino teacher thinks it’s a bright idea. Right now, with the Luzon Lockdown due to the coronavirus scare, my daughter Graciela is holding her Montessori classes online and enjoying it. (online image from The Enterprises Project [2] ) Now I speak as a teacher who is digitally & artfully competent. This is a 79-year old sonabagun one-man band who began teaching himself all-digital creative writing, editing, photography, desktop publishing starting in the late 1980s. Yes! Locked in, locked out, lockdown whatever. In this Digital Age, Online Classes should now be the In-Thing! The thing is that college profe...

With the pandemic of the coronavirus, we Filipinos have forgotten corona means crown , such as being worn by each Miss Universe. Beauty & Brains: Gloria Diaz, Miss Universe 1969 and Catriona Gray, Miss Universe 2018 (image from Cosmopolitan [1] ). Brains & Beauty: Husband & Wife (image from amazon.com [2] )   “Corona” also means “circle of light” and thereby signifies “enlightenment.” Explained below, The Brains & Beauty Program wants to turn out enlightened farmers and enlightened coops in countryside settings via a pilot program hopefully sponsored by the Department of Agriculture, DA, now headed by Secretary of Agriculture William Dar/Manong Willie. The thing is that millions of farmers are not getting their beautiful shares of the values they add to their farm produce, being good farmers but bad managers. They are not using their brains when it comes to the business of farming. In fact, farmers do not consider farming a business – simply a way of life! Hence t...

Which do you prefer: rice sufficiency or food security? I am right now reading 2 documents: “Reviewing Rice Tariffication In The Time Of COVID-19: Rationale And Road To Rice Self-Sufficiency In The Philippines [1] ,” which is a very long report by David Michael Marcelino San Juan, uploaded 18 April 2020, some 5,500 words (text only); and “DOF Usec: ‘Agriculture Has To Grow, Or Else, We Cannot Feed Our Own People [2] ’”, a very short news item by Gabriela Baron, published 07 August 2019, only 270 words. About 8 months apart, they are talking about the same subject: rice sufficiency. The author of the long paper misses the point – and so does the subject of the very short news item! The very title of the long paper has the term “Rice Self-Sufficiency.” The title of the short one implies it; in fact, the expert cited, Department of Finance Undersecretary Karl Kendrick Chua (image above) is talking about the Rice Tariffication Law, RTL, saying: Population growth is 1 percent every year, th...