By Pamela Mariz Geminiano/PNA
BAGUIO CITY — The National Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA) and the Philippine Information Agency’s (PIA) regional offices in Luzon are tapping provincial media practitioners to help promote culture and the arts in the island’s various provinces.
“The idea is to mainstream culture and the arts,” PIA-Cordillera Director Helen Tibaldo told the Philippine News Agency (PNA) on Tuesday.
Tibaldo said her office will regularly and continuously collaborate with different media organizations in Luzon, such as radio, television, print media, and even bloggers.
The project’s first leg was done last year in the Ilocos, Cagayan Valley, Central Luzon and the Cordillera regions, as well as Metro Manila, which was attended by about 50 media practitioners.
The second was on Nov. 16-18 in Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal, and Quezon (Calabarzon region).
The third leg will be held on a yet-to-be-determined date, probably in the Mimaropa region, which covers the island provinces of Mindoro, Marinduque, Romblon, and Palawan.
“Ang kultura natin ay dapat nasa pang araw-araw na buhay at malaki ang role ng media to do this (Our culture should be part of our daily lives and the media has a big role here). Our goal is to expose them (media) so that they would come out with regular coverage. Kung may police beat, business beat at iba pa (If there is the police beat, business beat, and others), why can’t we have a culture and the arts beat in the local media? That’s the idea,” Tibaldo she explained.
The PIA noted that no one in the provincial media regularly covers culture and the arts.
“This heritage caravan is to encourage the continuing and balanced development of a pluralistic culture, and to conserve and promote the nation’s cultural heritage” NCCA information division head Rene Napeñas said on the sidelines of the four-day caravan in Calabarzon.
The recently-concluded media tour had heritage and art museums, art galleries and crafts, the woodcarving town of Paete, Laguna, the underground cemetery in Nagcarlan, also in Laguna, and the Angono Petroglyphs in Rizal, the Philippines’ oldest known work of art dating back to before 2000 B.C., as stop-overs.
Napeñas said the project, titled “Culture and Arts Promotion for Luzon”, is an intensive promotional campaign intended to build “a strong sense of nationhood and pride of being Filipino” among Filipinos in this part of the country.
The memorandum of agreement between the NCCA and PIA’s regional offices in Luzon is to ensure that information on programs and activities of the NCCA reaches the public through the media.
