| The SONA Report: Promises
vs Performance
President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo delivered the government’s
accomplishment report on last year’s State of the
Nation Address and mapped out new directions in this
year’s SONA at the Congress. Here is the President’s
commitments in her SONA of 2001:
Agriculture
• P20 billion AFMA budget yearly: Under the 2002
General Appropriations Act, P19.486 billion was allocated
for AFMA. For CY 2001, at least P13.825 billion was
allotted or 69% of the P20 billion required by the AFMA.
• Reduce rice prices from P18 per kilo to P14
per kilo: Rice prices were reduced after NFA provided
P2 billion in rice subsidies within the year.
• Deploy 1,000 rolling stores: NFA was able to
deploy 1,510 rolling stores.
• Complete MALMAR irrigation project by September
2001: The MALMAR project was completed as promised.
However, about 78% of the target land area were actually
irrigated.
• Create one million jobs in four years: So far,
273,000 jobs were created for CY 2002 as reported by
the One Million Jobs Office. Overall, jobs generated
in the agriculture sector—including seasonal jobs—totaled
852,000 in CY 2001.
Agrarian Reform
• Distribute 200,000 hectares of land including
ancestral domain titles for indigenous people: In 2001,
DAR distributed 104,261 hectares and 36,300 hectares
from January to July 2002.
Banking
• Make microfinance a cornerstone in the fight
against poverty and increase microcredit borrowers by
300,000 poor women: Three micro finance-oriented banks
in Rizal, Davao City, and Metro Manila have been licensed
and four more to operate in Muntinlupa, Catanduanes,
Cainta and Bukidnon are currently being evaluated. About
275,969 new women borrowers were provided microcredit
amounting to P595.82 million from July 2001 to April
2002.
• Set up an asset management company: The SPAV
bill version in the House has been approved on third
reading but the Senate has yet to approve the measure
on second reading.
Education
• Upgrade math and science teaching in basic education:
The basic curriculum has been modified to reduce the
number of subjects from eight to five subjects while
increasing student contact time for science and math.
• Increase the number of textbooks per student
(Grades 1 to 4 and 1st and 2nd year high school): As
of April 2002, 22.4 million of the 33.3 million textbooks
were procured, 8.8 million of which were delivered to
schools nationwide. The target is at least 46.4 million
books.
• Provide P1.5 billion to hire more teachers:
Congress approved P1.98 billion for the hiring of 20,000
teachers for school year 2002-2003.
• Construct a school building
in every barangay by 2004: DepEd has identified 1,612
barangays without an existing school. At least 1,005
schools are currently under construction.
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