THiNK Journalism

Dealing with Covid-19, DoH doctors & UP mathematicians should learn health science from farmers! Agriculture must go on – but the Enhanced Community Quarantine, ECQ, as dictated by doctors and mathematicians, is making it extremely difficult for government to function, private sector to operate, and farmers to grow our food – for all to benefit. Being an agriculturist and a creative science writer, I shake my head when I see how doctors of the Department of Health, DoH, and mathematicians of the University of the Philippines, UP, are handling the pandemic: DoH and UP are handling the Covid-19 crisis not scientifically but only technically! Bad. Dona Magsino of GMA News writes, 13 April 2020, “Philippine Covid-19 Problem May Last Until Jan. 2021 If No Intervention Will Be Done – DoH [1] ”. Ms Dona’s first paragraph: The Philippines' battle with coronavirus disease 2019 (might) drag on for months if proper interventions would not be implemented, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosa

You think Pandemics and Biodiversity have nothing to do with Agriculture? Think again! Coronavirus, pandemics. I google for “pandemics biodiversity” (excluding double quotes) and Google gives me 15 million results. Everybody is talking about pandemics and biodiversity! Like so: “Biodiversity Loss Is Hurting Our Ability To Combat Pandemics” – weforum.org “Biodiversity, Pandemics And The Circle Of Life” – greenbiz.com “Ban Wildlife Markets To Avert Pandemics, Says UN Biodiversity… – theguardian.com “Want To Stop The Next Pandemic? Protect Wildlife Habitats – TIME “Biodiversity And Emerging Diseases” – NCBI Okay, already! In the Philippines, we have right at the upper campus of UP Los Baños the headquarters of the Asean Biodiversity Center, ABC, with Theresa Mundita Lim , as Executive Director. Janvic Mateo writes on “Biodiversity Protection Needed To Prevent Future Pandemics” (26 April 2020, The Philippine Star [1] ) and says, “Lim said the current pandemic highlights the need to mainstr

Searca Tuesday, 28 April 2020, 10:00 AM, embarks on a Southeast Asian voyage of discovering and/or uncovering pieces & sets of knowledge on food security given the global coronavirus outbreak.  It is a webinar series to “ highlight concrete actions in agriculture and rural development in Southeast Asia.” The series to be launched is called “Searca Online Learning & Virtual Engagement,” acronym SOLVE, which is Searca’s “effort to break boundaries, both physical and conceptual, to strategically disseminate just-in-time solutions.” It is ambitious, but the times call for it. Searca Director Glenn B Gregorio says of it: The new normal brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic has firmed up Searca’s resolve to embark on new modalities and use technology-mediated platforms of interactions to effectively deliver context-relevant and valuable services to its stakeholders, including farmers and the public. SOLVE is virtual but the learnings are real. Mr Gregorio said: SOLVE particularly hi

“The New Thinking For Agriculture” espoused by Secretary of Agriculture William Dar/Manong Willie has yet to consider what the rotavator can do to enrich the farmers’ pockets by first enriching their soils! I have a 55-year direct experience with the Howard rotavator in my hometown Asingan in eastern Pangasinan. That 1965, I was instructing the driver of the big tractor not to set the blades to any depth but just drive through the field, and because the Howard rotavator was heavy, it cut into the soil anyway, about 2-3 inches, which is what I wanted. My brother-in-law Lorenzo Casasus, was there at that time; in later years he copied the shallow cultivation with his Kuliglig hand tractor and rototiller. The results? His neighbors could not match his yields even if they tried to copy all his methods – he did not tell them about the magic that his rototiller was doing. What was Lorenzo’s Secret? Because the rotary blades had their tines set against each other, they cut the ground and wee

We need a Balance, and the continuing Luzon Lockdown is cruelty against Reason. Canada One says of its own image (above) [1] : Covid-19: Saving Lives vs Saving the Economy: Getting This Wrong Could Be Devastating. Health vs Wealth . I say Canada One is either short-sighted or cross-eyed. Canada One fails to realize a 3 rd choice – the one it itself constructed for all to see! Looking at the balance it built, Canada One sees only an apocalyptic vision. Wake up, Canada One! You do not know you constructed a balance – literally! Meaning? Both sides equal. Which means we can choose both. If we are using our head! Which is exactly what Filipino genius Nicky Perlas sees that I see in his   Open Letter To Rodrigo R Duterte, President, Republic Of The Philippines. And so on one side, Nicky tells President Rodrigo Roa Duterte: Mr President: Given the incomplete and sketchy scientific and global information available to you then, you understandably had no real choice but to lock down the enti

First, there is a hugely important word not found in Secretary of Agriculture William Dar/Manong Willie’s “The New Thinking For Agriculture” and its accompanying “Eight Paradigms,” but it is there: Patriotism . (Patriotism image from CooINSmart [1] ) About it, beloved American novelist & wit Mark Twain says of it: Patriotism is supporting your country all the time and your government when it deserves it. I say patriotic is Manong Willie’s New Thinking, his all-out support for his country in the wide field of Agriculture; and being an obedient cabinet member to President Du30. Senator Bong Go has proposed a nationwide program called “Balik Probinsya [2] ” ( Living & Loving in the Villages , my free translation). Manong Willie publicly supports it. The are no details about Balik Probinsya, but surfing I found that in the time of Noynoy Aquino, already there was a “Balik-Probinsya Program” (BPP)   [3] .” For the BPP, the DA is the first in the list of government institutions comi

You are looking at my PC setup in my bedroom/workroom somewhere in Luzon in this lockdown. With it, I can look out & into so many universes even as I am ensconced in my little room and not allowed to go out.  Did I say I’m enjoying being held up in a room? With my Core i7 14-inch Lenovo laptop and an external 20-inch ViewSonic monitor, yes. When I was being taught, initially, digital writing during the Niños Inocentes Day in 1985, with WordStar 1 , I was only thinking it made my writing & editing sessions so much easier, but it was still work. I never thought I would enjoy working in the digital world – in a few weeks, work became play . You may know that I am already 79, thank God. Question: How can a senior citizen enjoy writing nonfiction, even if there is payment? Isn’t it a burden on the eyes and memory? Answer: On the eyes, yes. On the memory, yes! But that is why you can adjust the text size and clarity in Windows 10 . And no, you don’t have to memorize grammatical rule

With “The New Thinking For Agriculture” for PH Agriculture under Secretary of Agriculture William Dar/Manong Willie, along with “The 8 Paradigms” that comprise it, and being a BSA graduate, you already know my cup of tea. It intrigues me that Bruce Tolentino, a friend of Agriculture, UP Economics, is sharing on Facebook Richard Feynman’s Information Knowledge thesis (above).(wisdom image from Ubiquity University [1] ) As it happens, my ultimate measure of knowledge is its usefulness to society – against the 4 elements of sustainability proclaimed by FAO: technical feasibility, economic viability, environmental soundness, and social acceptability . Then, knowledge must be transformed into wisdom! The ways I see them: Information is any piece of report of what has or have been observed. Knowledge is bits & pieces of information that have been related together to make one sense or another. Sorry, but what is depicted in Mr Feynman’s expression via text, lines and balloons as “know

This is a beautiful sharing by a beautiful lady of the communications office of the Department of Agriculture, DA – Rheeda Abrantes-Cabrera. She knows her Agriculture! Thereby, I can see she is an asset to the leadership of Secretary of Agriculture William Dar/Manong Willie, because nobody else has mentioned companion planting by anyone from inside the DA or outside. No, “companion planting” is not her original idea; but it is her original idea to include it as an important part of Manong Willie’s “New Thinking For Agriculture.”  Of the “8 Paradigms” that comprise the New Thinking, I must say companion planting belongs to Modernization , improving on the planting of any farm or garden crops along with the main crop or crops. Ms Rheeda shares on Facebook the article “ 28 Companion Planting Combinations To Grow The Tastiest, Most Bountiful Food & Beautiful Flowers” (30 September 2019, Editorial Team, Natural Living Ideas ). The E Team says, “Companion planting is one of the best thin