Development Entrepreneurs

The late US Air Force Col John Boyd taught that, in conflict with an enemy, we respond by taking four actions: we O bserve the situation, then we O rient ourselves towards potential responses; we D ecide on a specific response; and then we take A ction. Then we Observe the new situation, and go through the same actions again.   This iterative response pattern became known as the “OODA” loop. Boyd says that if you are able to iterate through OODA cycles faster than your enemy, you will be able to take the initiative and dictate the fight’s tempo.  You will keep the enemy off-balance; when he is not able to Observe your own actions, he will not be able to Orient himself to the appropriate response; his Decisions will come too late and his Actions will no longer be relevant to the changing situation. Keep up the pressure by accelerating your own OODA loops, and eventually you will overwhelm the enemy. Boyd came to this theory from his study of historical and more recent...

In just eight months eight Municipalities of Surigao del Sur progressed from being students of public land titling to being implementors. In January this year they travelled to Maramag to learn how this Municipality in Bukidnon worked with DENR to help their residents get land titles. By August they were already managing their own surveys. They were able to apply what they learned because of the support provided by RTD Paquito Rosal of DENR XIII and because of the leadership of Governor Jimmy Pimentel. Gov Pimentel thinks this titling project will lead to better real property tax administration. Titling would clarify ownership of parcels, increase registration of real property units, increase total appraised value. All of these would lead to increases in real property tax collection. The Governor established a Provincial Land Information Office (PLIO) to monitor the progress of the Municipalities on titling. He also provides 50% of the cost of the needed surveys – the Municip...

Earlier this year (week of January 10 to be exact) I joined a training activity for Region XIII DENR and Surigao del Sur LGU partners. The participants travelled all the way from their place to Maramag because this Bukidnon Municipality is a successful LAMP 2 site, with a solid experience in systematic adjudication. Last month I visited Maramag again. I saw that they had continued titling public lands in cooperation with DENR.  They signed a new Memorandum of Agreement with DENR according to the provisions of DAO 06-2011 and MC 117-2011.  Moreover, they had set up a Land Information Office with two sections, Land Inventory and Titling. At the time of my visit they were preparing to distribute 200 Residential Free Patents.  So far, Maramag has distributed a total of 1,284 patents - 675 issued to men, 556 to women, 8 to spouses, and 4 to joint heirs. I mention these numbers because they tend to show gender equality in titling. As a GIS enthusiast I was pleased...

A s I worked on titling of public lands with local governments and DENR, I didn’t give much thought to how gender mattered in our work. Until a title distribution ceremony in Alburquerque, Bohol, when USAID Mission Director Gloria Steele noticed that most of the title claimants were women. That got me and my friends thinking about whether the percentage of women title holders has increased, what are the reasons for the increase, and whether owning titles has empowered women. Eng’r Rhea Dealca sent me a copy of Kate Dalrymple and Brenda Batistiana’s paper, “Bringing Land and Gender Equity to the Surface” [1] .  In it the authors presented data from the Department of Agrarian Reform and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) from 2003 to 2007, which said that in 2006 women received only 25% of the total number of Certificates of Land Ownership, and only 18% of leasehold contracts (for land areas exempted from agrarian reform).  From 2003 to 2007, women ...