BAYOMBONG, Nueva Vizcaya—Sixteen barangays and three municipalities in this province are expected to benefit from the Social Development and Management Program of the FCF Minerals Corp. here.
Peter Storey, FCF’s general manager for operations, said the SDMP will be pursued with the commercial operations of the company’s gold-molybdenum extraction in full swing this year.
The Department of Environment and Natural Resources Mines and Geo-Sciences Bureau has approved FCF’s allocation of P24 million for the first year implementation of the SDMP.
DENR Department Order No. 2010-21 requires the permit holder mining firms to assist in the development of host and adjacent communities to promote general welfare of the mining communities.
The source of the development assistance is obtained from the allocation of 1.5 percent of the operating expense for the project, 75 percent of which goes to community development.
“This amount will be shared by the host and identified communities based on the stakeholders consultation sometime in 2015,” Storey said.
He said the SDMP will benefit 11 barangays of Quezon town, 4 barangays of the neighboring Kasibu town in Nueva Vizcaya and another barangay of Diffun town in Quirino province. The mother LGUs will also get a share from the SDMP, Storey added.
The implementation of the SDMP programs, projects and activities within the beneficiaries will be closely monitored by the MGB and the Multi-Partite Monitoring Team.
Signing of the Memorandum of Agreements between the company and the beneficiary LGUs is now in the process to facilitate and hasten the fund release once the mining project’s commercial operations stage will be approved and declared by the MGB.
Storey said the gold-molybdenum project is now waiting on the declaration of the MGB “in commercial operation” with the completion of the required support facilities.
