Except that it came out in the negative, Senator Cynthia Villar's remarks on the proposed P150 million corn research budget of the Department of Agriculture, DA, were right on the money! It incensed her that the proposal took for granted that the senators understood that the sum of P150 million was quite necessary and had to be approved without much ado.
That was the mistake – not Senator Villar's but the budget proposed. It did not adequately provide the answers to the questions: Who? What? Where? When? Why? How? How much? How Long? Even I, an agriculture graduate from UP Los Baños, would not have appreciated the proposed budget without those target objective outputs and accompanying details or reasons behind.
Some smart aleck came up with a note about National Scientist Ricardo M Lantican (image superimposed above) doing research and coming up with a finding that saved the world a corn crisis. Thank you, Dr Lantican, but one robin does not mean a summer – is that single research result all the PH science world can brag about after more than 100 years of research starting in the early 1900s?!
Your research is crazy to me if you cannot explain it and justify it.
That Senate hearing on the P150 million research budget on corn should be a warning signal:
For science to explain itself to non-scientists always!
Even Secretary of Agriculture William Dar said it was a wake-up call.
Even Secretary of Agriculture William Dar said it was a wake-up call.
In the meantime, why has UP Los Baños been able to trumpet to the world only 1 research result, that single corn output? How much funds went into the science of it before a breakthrough was accomplished? All that and more non-scientists must be told and must be able to appreciate:
Otherwise, your budget proposal be damned!
And yes, UP Los Baños owes the Filipinos, who pay taxes that go into the salaries of staff and funds to got into research, much reporting on the results of their research efforts, not just a single outstanding one in 100 years!
The truth is that UP Los Baños niggardly publishes research results in its very few technical journals, and hardly any popular articles on recently unearthed knowledge by research.
So that nobody can say I am talking through my hat, I am volunteering to lead a small group to create a digital library of all the researches that UP Los Baños had done since it started in 1909, yes, providing answers to the questions: Who? What? Where? When? Why? How? How Long? Then journalists like me – and legislators like Senator Cynthia Villar – will be able to appreciate your R&D efforts without so much explaining you have to do.
You cannot assume that other people know what you know. If in the first place, you created the Cynthia Villar Digital Agriculture Library, DALi, the one I proposed earlier (14 October 2019, "PH Agriculture Needs A Senator Cynthia Villar Digital Aggie Library, DALi!" iVirtual Guru, ivirtualguru.blogspot.com), you should not have much problem justifying any proposed budget with any amount anytime!@517
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