GUIMARAS – More than 50 percent of this island province’s population is 29 years old and younger, according to Gov. JC Rahman Nava. The provincial government has thus crafted a development roadmap centered on the youth.
“We have to focus on our youth, our children. That’s why we call our development roadmap ‘Kabataan FIRST,’” said Nava.
“Kabataan FIRST” will be launched today, May 22, simultaneous with the 31st founding anniversary celebration of the province and the highlight of this year’s Manggahan Festival.
The “FIRST” in Kabataan FIRST stands for:
* Focused tourism, trade, investment, and employment
* Integrated infrastructure development
* Responsive healthcare and social welfare and development services
* Sustainable economy
* Trusted fiscal and bureaucratic management
According to Nava, the goal is to improve the lives of Guimarasnons by creating a better future for the younger generation.
The roadmap’s specifics include improving the island’s ports and access roads, more educational support for the youth, more tour circuits for tourists, enhancing and promoting more Guimaras products other than mango, agri-fishery and ecotourism programs, and responsive healthcare, among others.
One of the banner projects is the establishment of an agri-fishery industrial village in Barangay Sapal, San Lorenzo town, said Nava.
It is where a white copra and RBDO (refined bleached deodorized oil) processing center would be established.
The provincial government is also upgrading the 25-bed Level 1 Dr. Catalino Gallego Nava Provincial Hospital (DCGNPH) into a 200-bed hospital.
Today, the first phase of the hospital’s development will be unveiled – the construction of the four-level Out-Patient Care Center.
“The facility will include diagnostics, clinics, a dialysis center, an ambulatory surgery section and an operating room for ophthalmology cases. All out-patient surgeries diri na,” said Nava.
Another floor will be dedicated to physical medicine and rehabilitation, he added.
The province also plans to improve its two other health facilities, the Buenavista Emergency Hospital and the Nueva Valencia District Hospital./PN
