DAVAO CITY— “Mindanao is gaining the traction of prosperity, peace, and productivity,” Mindanao Development Authority (MinDA) Secretary  Ma. Belen Sunga Acosta emphasized this to be communicated far and wide by communicators in the government and the private sectors.

She made this call for private media practitioners and government information officers to commit to communicate Mindanao as safe, peaceful and investment-ready destination during a gathering just before year 2023 entered.

Setting the direction to communicate a must-see, must-invest in Mindanao, Acosta drumbeat the call to  collaborate in telling stories about the best in Mindanao.

She pointed out as preferable those Mindanao stories “that will not scare businessmen, will not make tourists re-book their flights.  But stories that will debunk old biases, and impress in them a compulsion to visit Mindanao.”

The MinDA chief wanted the tales of suffering  and conflict in Mindanao to become stories of its past as she cited Mindanao to now have gained prosperity, peace and productivity.

Giving a glimpse of Mindanao at present, she said it now has much better infrastructure such as wider roads and better ports, and that its “peace, order and  security have improved dramatically.”

Sec. Acosta also took note of the economic gains of Mindanao which raked in 2021, some 30 investment projects that generated 17,000 jobs

“We have also noted an overall spike in Mindanao export earnings last year. There is a 4% increase of value, with 6.78 billion US dollars in 2020 to 7.05 billion US dollars last year,” she added.

She said Mindanao also has sufficient capacity to provide electricity should there be an increase in power demand while also citing the Bangsamoro governance as a positive factor for Mindanao’s continued growth.

Acosta shared to the media her hopes of positively communicating Mindanao with the forging of ideas and commitments.

Committing to the call of MinDA Secretary Sunga, Officer-in-charge Jeanevive Duron-Abangan of the Philippine Information Agency  (PIA) XI, however  pointed  out some challenges that government information officers have to face.

Government information officers have to situate themselves and define their roles as development communicators  in the midst of fourth industrial revolution (FIRE) powered by digitalization and information technology, she said.

She also pointed out the need for government communicators to brush their knowledge about the history and various cultures in Mindanao in  line with the progress in governance of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM).

Meanwhile, Abangan also cited the need for government communicators to sharpen their skills on  business and economic reporting “because most often we encounter statistics and figures that we need to translate into stories”.

On the other hand,  Sun.Star Davao Publisher, Stella Estremera during the same occasion brought back to awareness among journalists that the “best stories will always be on-the- ground stories.”

“We go to  the communities, talk to the people who are there and get their  stories,” she said while pointing out that these type of stories have made blogger and vloggers shine as they tell stories of people.  (Jeanevive Duron-Abangan, PIA XI)