GMO corn farmers in debt

Philippine Daily Inquirer/OPINION/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo From the start, there had always been concern about the havoc GMO-agricultural crops might create in the environment and the adverse health effects they might have on end-consumers. (GMO means genetically modified organisms.) The financial/material aspect—higher yields, more hungry people fed, etc.—seemed to be the redeeming factor. There always had been protests against the “invasion” and...

Read More

Agri-scam versus agro-dev

Philippine Daily Inquirer/OPINION/byMa. Ceres P. Doyo For me, among the shockers related to the multibillion-peso scam and plunder that involved the lawmakers’ Priority Development Assistance Fund, often referred to as pork barrel, is the fact that most of the conduits used were fake or ghost nongovernment organizations that had agriculture and farmers—poor farmers, if I may stress—as the supposed beneficiaries. “Soft” projects, the conduits of these PDAF allocations are called, with the poor food growers as the end-beneficiaries, and us, too,...

Read More

'Human Face,' the book

Philippine Daily Inquirer/OPINION/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo The Manila International Book Fair is ongoing (Sept. 11 to 15) at the SMX Convention Center at the SM Mall of Asia in Pasay City. Among the participants is Anvil Publishing, copublisher (with Inquirer Books) of my book, “Human Face: A Journalist’s Encounters and Awakenings” (2013). There will be as much as 80 percent off 724 Anvil titles and 50 percent off 697 titles. I hope my newest book is...

Read More

Historic 'Cuartel de Sto. Domingo'

Philippine Daily Inquirer/OPINION/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo “This mute sentinel challenges us to peer into the past, (for it) to be appreciated in the present and safeguarded as a legacy for all time. Cuartel de Santo Domingo evokes a quiet strength and historicity yet to be fully told, the steadfastness of whoever held the ground there.” Words from Nonia D. Tiongco, a Santa Rosa City historian and resident. Not a few were curious as to how I got to...

Read More

Marcos victims may get $10 million from from buyer of Imleda's Monet

Philippine Daily Inquirer/NEWS/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo In this photo provided by the United States Attorney’s Office in New York shows an an 1881 painting by Impressionist master Claude Monet entitled “L’Eglise et La Seine a Vetheuil.” AP MANILA, Philippines—Members of the class suit against the estate of the dictator Ferdinand Marcos recently received a “notice of class action settlement” from their lawyer Robert A. Swift through Filipino cocounsel...

Read More

Habiba Sarabi: Rebuilding lives in a once fabled land

Philippine Daily Inquirer/OPINION/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo  RM Awardee Habiba Sarabi, governor  of Bamyan province, Afghanistan. Photo by Ma Ceres P. Doyo   After the land of turquoise blue lakes, awesome cliffs and sweet pomegranates had been turned into a place of terror, violence and death, after the once fabled land of misty valleys, craggy hills and historic monuments had become a battlefield, what is there to do?   “Rebuilding...

Read More