Rehabilitation of Camaligan Regional Fish Port Loses JICA Funding

The Camaligan regional fish port located at barangay Dugcal.

The proposed rehabilitation of Camsur’s Camaligan fish port met a stumbling block with the withdrawal by its funding source.

The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has withdrawn from funding the rehabilitation and construction of the regional fish port (RFP) as it rechannels funding at home in the aftermath of overwhelming devastation brought about by the earthquake and tsunami last March.

Other fish port rehabilitation projects affected are those in the municipality of Sual in Pangasinan and the cities of Lucena, Davao and Iloilo which all rely on the Jica funding. Estimated cost of funding for all the rehab projects was previously pegged at P5 billion.

The Philippine Fisheries Development Authority of the department of agriculture (DA) disclosed the government would be seeking funds from other donors.

PFDA general manager Rodolfo Paz Jr. said the planned undertaking with JICA also included construction of an RFP in Bislig city, Surigao del Sur to help boost fishing production. PFDA estimated construction cost for one RFP to reach P1 billion to P2 billion.

JICA earlier extended to the Philippines a grant in the form of a study on the target projects, Paz said.

JICA also allowed the Philippine government to use the completed study in searching for other countries’ ODAs for the projects, he said.

It must be recalled that the Camaligan Fish Port Complex (CFPC) is the fourth regional fish port project completed by the government under the Nationwide Fishing Port Package I.

Coastal towns along San Miguel bay were also considered as possible site for the fish port, but only Camaligan provided the most ideal location in terms of investment cost, enabling the government to save up to P66M from an original construction cost of P182M.

Original funding came from the Overseas Economic Development Fund (OEDF) of Japan under the project supervision of the Project Management Office of the department of public works (DPW).

The CFPC is located about 1.5 kilometers from the poblacion of Camaligan and four kilometers from Naga city.

From various sources.

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