CITY OF SAN FERNANDO, Pampanga – Billions of pesos has been poured to fund the infrastructure and food programs at the North Luzon Agribusiness Quadrangle (NLAQ) of the Department of Agriculture (DA).

In a report to President Arroyo, Secretary Bernie Fondevilla of the Department of Agriculture (DA) said the government is sharpening the competitive edge of NLAQ to attain food security and sufficiency by pouring in billions of pesos to various projects.

Fondevilla said the government has invested in better education for NLAQ students; provided housing projects; extended conditional cash transfers and microfinance facilities to poor families; and expanded the coverage of PhilHealth in the region.

NLAQ covers the Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR), Regions I (Ilocos Region), II (Cagayan Valley), and portions of Region III (Central Luzon), particularly the northern parts of the four provinces of Aurora (north of Baler), Tarlac (north of Tarlac City), Nueva Ecija (north of Cabanatuan City), and Zambales.

The secretary said the projects have already distributed lands to agrarian reform beneficiaries and certificates of ancestral domain titles; developed new and idle lands for agribusiness; and protected mangroves and established landfills, dumpsites and materials recovery facilities.

“We also invested billions of pesos in infrastructure to improve access to the farms in the upland and the coastal area in NLAQ. Alongside these, we built ports and airports as alternative means of travel.

Furthermore, we also built flood control programs to protect farm outputs and power projects to supply the requirement of agribusiness establishments and industries,” Fondevilla said.

He cited the construction, repair or rehabilitation of 7,981 kms of roads and 9,736.44 kms of bridges amounting to P29.46 billion from 2001 to 2009. This is a substantial increase compared to P6.89-billion worth of roads (2,988.85 kms) and bridges (1,651.20 lms) constructed, repaired, and rehabilitated from 1992 to 2000.

Fondevilla said improvements were also done in four priority road projects which President Arroyo launched in 2006, among them the improvement of the P1.96-billion La Trinidad-Mt. Data-Bontoc-Banaue sections of the Halsema Highway; the P3.29-billion upgrading of the 108-km. Bontoc-Tabuk-Tuguegarao Road; and the P2.34-billion rehabilitation of the 120-km Baler-Casiguran Road.