Food processing plant to provide livelihood

Ilocos Region folks

NARVACAN, Ilocos Sur -- National Tobacco Administration (NTA) Administrator Edgar D. Zaragoza announced the newly-opened food processing plant here in Barangay Nanguneg, is expected to provide additional livelihood opportunties to the tobacco farming families in the Ilocos Region.

According to Zaragoza, the food processing plant is designed to provide a ready market of all crops and livestock being produced by the tobacco farmers to ensure better income.

“Most of the employed personnel for the operation of the plant were qualified children of the tobacco farmers,” he said.

He said that the P165-million food facility, which is a project of President Aquino, is being managed by the NTA, an attached agency of the Department of Agriculture (DA), targeting to serve an initial 7,700 tobacco farmers in the Ilocos Region.

Last week, Sen. Cynthia Villar, chairperson the Senate committee on agriculture and food, with Ilocos Sur 2nd District Representative Eric D. Singson, Zaragoza, other ranking DA officials, and local government unit (LGU) executives formally opened the plant.

He said the food plant has the equipment to process vegetables and meat like beef, pork, and chicken to meet the quality demand of the domestic and the world markets.