Over and illegal fishing among reasons cited

CALBIGA, Samar- Sardines catch in the San Bernardino Strait is now declining and their sizes are getting smaller.

This was the conclusion reached during the meeting of the members of the Fishery Management Area (FMA)7, Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources officials from Region 5 and 8, together with the ocean conservation group, Oceana this town last Sept.30.
The reduction of sardines is affecting fishermen in Northern Samar.

The Northern Samar waters are considered to be part of the FMA7 that covers Sorsogon Bay, Ragay Gulf, and Ticao-Burias Pass in Bicol region, and Samar Sea, Carigara Bay, Maqueda Bay, and Irong-Irong Bay in Region 8.

Among the affected is the Ken Matthew Sardines, the only sardine processor in Northern Samar province that employs about 50 individuals.

Martha Cadano shared that they used to cut sardines in two during processing but now, the entire fish can already fit in a glass container due to the small size of the sardines.
Oceana said that based on their study, the depletion of the fish caught in Northern Samar is due to several factors which include overfishing, illegal fishing, and the weak implementation of the National Sardines Management Plan (NSMP).

However, it did not say as to the volume of decrease of sardines in the Northern Samar waters.
But Oceana said that majority of the fish found at FMA7 needs a management measure for sustainability.

During the meeting, it was proposed to regulate fishing in the area through the implementation of harvest control rule (HCR) by increasing the mesh size of the fish net and its length from 500 meters from the current 300 meters.

By increasing the mesh size, it will ensure that juvenile fish will not be catch while reducing the length will ensure that other fishermen will also able to catch a fish when they go out fishing, Oceana added.

To implement it, a memorandum will be made by officials of FMA7 which will be cascaded to local government units within their jurisdiction to enforce it by enacting an ordinance.
It was also revealed during the meeting that most of the fish catch in Northern Samar are directly transported by fishermen to Bulan, Sorsogon where the volume of fish catch in the seawater of the province are recorded in said province and not in Northern Samar.

To address this, Cadano suggested that a cold storage facility should be put up in Northern Samar so that fishermen will no longer have to sell their catch in Sorsogon.
Cadano added that the lack of cold storage facility also affects their sardine processing because they have to process their catch within few hours or the sardine will be spoiled.
Once they get spoiled, they have no recourse but to give their catch to the community for free.
(ROEL T. AMAZONA)

TACLOBAN CITY – The regional office of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) marked the third year passage of a law institutionalizing the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program(4Ps)on Saturday(Oct.1) by honoring family-beneficiaries of the program.
Among those honored by the DSWD were the families of Mark Anthony Arcayan from Baybay City and Erika Setosa of Tacloban City.

Arcayan topped the licensure civil engineering examination while Setosa ranked number eight for the social workers licensure examination.

The two narrated the difficulties their respective families experienced being poor and the impact of the 4Ps to their families and how the program greatly helped them finished their studies.

Arcayan and Setosa are just some of the success stories of 4Ps implementation in Eastern Visayas, according to DSWD-8 Regional Director Grace Subong.

In the same occasion, the DSWD also bestowed recognitions to various government offices, private entities, and media outlets and personalities for helping in the implementation of the 4Ps.

Among the media outlets honored was Leyte Samar Daily Express and its editor, Joey Gabieta, and writer, Roel Amazona.
A job fair was also held during the same program.
(ROEL T. AMAZONA)

Globe welcomes the passage of the SIM Registration Bill in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. This is a crucial step in addressing the escalating problem of spam and scam messages, which fraudsters use to dupe mobile phone users.

“We are pleased to see swift progress on the SIM Registration bill as it takes a step closer to being signed into law. We also acknowledge the opportunity for collaboration that both houses of Congress afforded industry players, which allowed us to provide our recommendations on the bill grounded on our experience as telco frontliners,” said Froilan Castelo, Globe Group General Counsel.

“We shall await then for the implementing rules of the law,” Castelo said.
As the leader in mobile, Globe has been keenly following developments on the bill, working closely with Congress to ensure the crafting of a comprehensive and future-proof measure.
Globe also stands ready to work with the government in drafting rational implementing rules and regulations that will take into account the immense task of getting tens of millions of prepaid SIM users registered retroactively.

SIM Registration will serve as a major deterrent against spam and scam SMS, as it will finally lift the veil of anonymity that comes with using prepaid SIM cards. The status quo had allowed the prevalence of SMS-aided fraud, with perpetrators largely untraceable.
“We believe that once signed into law, SIM Registration will take us a step ahead of fraudsters and help achieve our shared goal of eradicating scam and spam messaging,” said Castelo. (PR)

TACLOBAN CITY – The local government unit of Naval in Biliran will be hiring five teachers who will handle the special education class.

Mayor Gretchen Espina said that the LGU decided to hire five special needs education graduates to help the Naval SPED Central School to support and help students of the school who have special needs.

Students with special needs are those enrolled with visual impairment, hearing impairment, intellectual disability, learning disability, autism spectrum disorder, communication disorder, physical disability, emotional and behavioral disorder, multiple disabilities with visual impairment, and to those who are orthopedically handicapped, chronically ill, and gifted and talented.

Teaching students with special needs is not easy because their structure of education must be designed to overpower the disadvantages related to their disabilities, and they need to keep pace with the learning process of children who do not have special needs.
Some children with special needs need to have better attention by having a one-on-one teaching session.

The newly hired teachers will start helping the teaching staff of Naval SPED this October.
The school has 45 enrolled students with special needs.
(ROEL T. AMAZONA)

ORMOC CITY-A street vendor was arrested by the Station Drugs Enforcement Team of Police Station 1 of the Ormoc City Police Office in a buy- bust operation about 1:14 am Saturday (Oct 1) at Barangay District 2 here.

Station 1 COP Police Major Rizal Antonio Leung identified the suspect as Reynaldo Mayaki, 51, married and a resident of Brgy. Libertad, of this city.

Recovered from his possession was one sachet containing white crystalline substance suspected to be shabu procured by an operative in the amount of P1,000.

During body search, the operatives recovered from the back pocket of the suspect a coin purse color with different colors that when opened filled with medicines, while on the left front pocket the searching cop recovered P3,200 and in the right pocket the searching cop recovered a color black face mask that once opened contained two more sachets containing the same white crystalline substance suspect to be shabu with an estimated street value of P2,000.

Charges of violations of RA 9165, the Comprehensive Law against Illegal Drugs of 2002, are being readied by the arresting police against the suspect who is temporarily detained at the locked up cell of Police Station 1.
(ROBERT DEJON)