How to Pronounce Hortensia Collection

II. Community Service Plan Discussions About the Locality General Santos City, located in the 12th region in South Cotabato, or popularly known as the Tuna Capital of the Philippines, is currently identified as a growing city in terms of population and economic development. With a growth rate of 2.01% a year, the General Santos City population as of 2021 is approximately 669, 924 residents. However, taking into account the downside of this growth, pollution and garbage generation also become rampant more than ever and need to be controlled in order to protect our health, the environment, and marine life. One means to address this problem is by conducting a coastal clean-up drive as a community service plan in the city. One of the coastal areas that need to be addressed in the city is the Queen Tuna Park, formerly known as Lion’s beach. It is a public beach with no entrance fee, thus, mostly enjoyed by local residents during breaks and weekends but this may also have become a beneficial factor to its current state. It has presently become one of the least maintained parks in the locality and had the worst review from both citizens and tourists due to its filth and full of garbage in the field that led to contaminants such as fecal coliform for several years yet there are still no actions that were taken to successfully alleviate this issue. Figure 1 and 2: Queen Tuna Park, General Santos City Conceptualization of the Plan The community service plan initiative, namely, “Paglikom: Kalinga sa Aplaya”, a voluntary coastal clean-up drive is being proposed in order to improve the welfare of this natural resource that shall be approved by the local government unit. The main goal of this initiative is the mass collection of wastes in the seashore in order to eliminate the waste and the toxic chemicals it brings harm to marine life and to its tourists and recycles most of the waste such as plastics and metals for a better purpose by selling it to the junk shops. This is also a stepping stone in providing awareness regarding the rising rate of land and water pollution and the problem of management disposal in the city, orienting and encouraging the citizens to practice proper waste management and environmental care. This plan shall be composed of volunteers from ages 18 to 50 years old together with appointed heads by the local government unit. Donations and sponsorships will also be generously accepted to provide quality equipment, conduct seminars, and meetings whilst following the protocols for COVID-19, and cover the cost for transportation services and sustenance, together with the accumulated funds by the retail of recyclable plastics and metals and aid by the local government. This project is relevant during summer breaks and vacations so that students may participate without the hindrance of their tight schedules, as well as professionals. Project Timeline Before the implementation - Submit the “Paglikom: Kalinga sa Aplaya” Community Service Plan Proposal to the Local Government Unit and wait for the approval. - Once the approval has been received, coordinate with the appointed personnel appointed by the General Santos City LGU for the said project and formulate a team composed of the project head, as well as its corresponding committees in program, finance and sponsorship, advertising and communications, - The committees, spearheaded by the project head and program committee shall have a meeting for raising concerns, assign tasks and responsibilities, and plan on the timeline of events for the said program. - Communications and Advertising committee shall make use of social media platforms to inform citizens about the said service plan with objectives such as: providing environmental awareness and looking for volunteers of 18 to 50 years of age, as well as in assistance for the Sponsorship committee by looking for potential sponsors and donations ideally a month before the implementation of the project. - Finance and sponsorship committee shall work hand-in-hand with the accumulation of funds through sponsors, donations, aid by the LGU, and funds to be acquired through the collection of recyclable materials. - Once the registration form for volunteers has been filled, with a minimum number 30 participants, another meeting shall be held for the conduct of seminar on environmental awareness, emphasizing the The Republic Act 9003, also known as the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000, as well as giving instructions and precautionary measures for the volunteers and members of the committees. - Finance committee shall procure the necessary materials for the event such as garbage bags, gloves, face masks and shields, and other necessary tools. - A week before the implementation, consultations and final preparations shall be administered. Communications and Advertising Committees shall amplify the initiative in the social media platforms, as well as acknowledge the sponsors of the said project. As well as communicating with the beneficiaries for updates and development of the project. During the Implementation - On the agreed date and time of the project, members of the committees and volunteers in the initiative program “Paglikom: Kalinga sa Aplaya” shall meet in the Queen Tuna Park. - Program Head shall ensure that the standard protocol for COVID-19 and safety equipment is being worn and exercised, as well the attendance of the people are complete. - Advertising committee shall make a documentary all throughout the event. - Sustenance will also be given to the members and volunteers during the event. - The implementation shall start and will last until 5:00 PM. After the Implementation - After the implementation, participants of the initiative program, “Paglikom: Kalinga sa Aplaya” shall receive a certificate of appreciation as an acknowledgment for their volunteer services. - Documentaries shall be posted in the social media accounts of the project, along with the acknowledgment for all the participants, committees, sponsorship and partners, and the local government unit in making the project successful. - Election for a new set of officers for the next date of the project shall take place, participated by the committee members and participants of the event. - Communications Committee shall make a survey in order to gain ideas on how to strengthen the project and provide ways to improve its implementation. III. Conclusion The project, “Paglikom: Kalinga sa Aplaya”, emphasizes the word “paglikom”, meaning to collect, as collecting the garbage and waste on the shores of the Queen Tuna Park in General Santos City is important, especially to the beneficiaries in the local community. Before the public beach was degraded, it was initially the number one spot for Generals (citizens of General Santos City) to unwind together with family and friends and this project is designed to restore its value. This also contributes to the improvement of marine life in the beach park and the creatures living there. This can spread awareness of how we should take care of our environment so that we will not make the same mistakes twice that led to the degradation of our natural resources. Through this project, residents can recognize the importance of Bayanihan in order to achieve a large goal which is not only attainable by physically doing the voluntary work in the clean-up drive, as there are some people who cannot do so, but also in simple ways such as proper waste disposal and segregation, apply the 3 R’S (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle), spreading awareness, and by being educated in the most basic principles of being a productive and responsible Filipino citizen- which is to be a steward of the environment.

First, I love learning about different industries and commodities, how they developed over time, often over millennia, shaping world markets and modern political economies (e.g. cotton, gold, salt, cod, petroleum). “The Fish” provides a fascinating introduction to the world of bananas, a fruit that every American today knows and most of whom love on their breakfast cereal or as a mid-day, nutritious snack. Only, as I learned, bananas aren’t actually a fruit and little more than a century ago they were far from common, but rather quite exotic, a true luxury, displayed at the 1876 Centennial Exposition to crowds of gawking onlookers as if it came from another planet. Indeed, according to the author, a banana in 1900 was as unusual to the average American as an African cucumber is today. There’s a lot about the very familiar banana that I never knew. For instance, Cohen explains that the banana tree is actually the world’s largest herb, and thus its offspring, the banana, are technically berries. Even more fascinating, bananas grow from rhizomes, not seeds. In other words, cut appendages continue to grow, replicating the original. As Cohen describes it: “When you look at a banana, you’re looking at every banana, an infinite regression. There are no mutts, only the first fruit of a particular species and billions of copies. Every banana is a clone, in other words, a replica of an ur-banana that weighed on its stalk the first morning of man.” Believe it or not, the story of the banana gets even crazier. If you’ve ever wondered why old black-and-white films joked about slipping on a banana peel even though the banana peel that you’ve long known doesn’t feel particularly slippery, that’s because we have completely different bananas today. In the early nineteenth century, Americans were introduced to the “Big Mike,” a variety of banana that went extinct in 1965. It was bigger, tastier and more robust than the bananas we have today, according to Cohen, and their peels were far more slippery. The bananas we eat today are known as “Cavendish,” their primary benefit being immunity to the Panama disease that wiped out the Big Mike. Again, because bananas are all exact genetic copies, they are highly susceptible to rapid eradication from disease. Second, I’m a sucker for a great rags-to-riches story. The tale of Samuel Zemurray delivers that in spades. He arrived in America in 1891, a penniless Jew from what today is Moldova, and settled in the Deep South. (It may surprise many Americans but the South was far more hospitable to Jews for most our history. For instance, Jefferson Davis had two Jews in his Cabinet; Lincoln had none.) While still in his teens Zemurray recognized a business opportunity where other only saw trash: the ripe bananas that Boston Fruit discarded along the rail line in Mobile, Alabama before shipping off to Chicago and other northern metropolitan destinations. Zemurray was a natural entrepreneur; he had no particular affinity for bananas, it was just the opportunity at hand. “If he had settled in Chicago,” Cohen writes, “it would have been beef; if Pittsburgh, steel; if L.A., movies.” Zemurray quickly turned one man’s trash into cash, renting a boxcar to carry the castoff bananas along the slow rail route through the South, selling his cargo to local merchants at each Podunk rail stop until either his inventory ran out or spoiled. From such humble beginnings did a great international trading company eventually take root, Cuyamel Fruit, named after the river separating Honduras and Guatemala, the heartland of banana growing. By 1925, Cuyamel Fruit Company, the creation of an upstart Jewish immigrant banana jobber, had emerged as a serious threat to United Fruit, the undisputed king of the industry, a company that was led by Boston’s best, the sons of Brahmins. The threat was not because of Cuyamel’s size. In most ways United Fruit still dominated its aggressive rival (i.e. United Fruit was harvesting 40 million bunches a year with 150,000 employees and working capital of $27m, compared to Cuyamel’s 8 million bunches, 10,000 employees and $3m in working capital). The threat was that Cuyamel was a better run business and more innovative, leading the way with selective pruning, drainage, silting, staking and overhead irrigation. “U.F. was a conglomerate, a collection of firms bought up and slapped together,” Cohen writes. Cuyamel, by contrast, was a well-oiled machine, vertically integrated and led from the front by Zemurray, the ultimate owner-manager-worker. Cuyamel’s success was certainly no accident. It was the product of hard work, an obsessed owner-operator who understood his business at a visceral level, a skill earned over decades of hard, unglamorous work. Zemurray adhered to his own, classically American immigrant code of conduct: “get up first, work harder, get your hands in the dirt and the blood in your eyes.” Cohen describes his commitment and ultimate advantage this way: “Zemurray worked in the fields beside his engineers, planters, and machete men. He was deep in the muck, sweat covered, swinging a blade. He helped map the plantations, plant the rhizomes, clear the weeds, lay the track…unlike most of his competitors, he understood every part of the business, from the executive suite where the stock was manipulated to the ripening room where the green fruit turned yellow…By the time he was forty, he had served in every position from fruit jobber to boss. He worked on the docks, on the ships and railroads, in the fields and warehouses. He had ridden the mules. He had managed the fruit and money, the mercenaries and government men. He understood the meaning of every change in the weather, the significance of every date on the calendar.” Indeed, dedicated immigrants like Sam Zemurray have made America great. There’s nothing wrong with doing grunt work. In fact, it’s essential. United Fruit bought out Cuyamel in the early days of the stock market crash of 1929, when the former had a market share of 54% to the latter’s 14%. United Fruit’s profit was some $45m and its stock price $108. By 1932, profit was down to $6m and the stock languished at $10.25. “The company was caught in a death spiral,” according to Cohen. By January 1933, Zemurray used his massive stake and proxy votes to take over the company, claiming “I realized that the greatest mistake the United Fruit management had made was to assume it could run its activities in many tropical countries from an office on the 10th floor of a Boston office building.” The immigrant with dirt under his nails and a rumbled jacket knew the business better than the Ivy Leaguers with manicures and pinstriped suits. Indeed, the fish (Cuyamel Fruit) was swallowing the whale (United Fruit). Zemurray would run the company until 1951, arguably the most successful years of its history. In 1950, the company cleared $66m in profit. By 1960, profits would fall to just $2m. United Fruit collapsed, eventually restructuring and reinventing itself as Chiquita Brands, based in Cincinnati. When Zemurray started in the industry at the turn of the century, bananas were curiosities, a sidebar trade, something for the rich. By the time he retired, bananas were part of the daily American fabric, the interests of the industry consistent with that of political leadership in Washington. Indeed, some of the most illustrious and powerful men in government had close connections to United Fruit during the Zemurray era: CIA director Allen Dulles (member of the board of directors), secretary of state John Foster Dulles (U.F. legal counsel at Sullivan & Cromwell), New Deal fixer Tom Corcoran (paid lobbyist), UN Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge (large shareholder), among others. By the 1950s, Cohen writes, “it was hard to tell where the government ended and the company began.” At its height, Cohen says, United Fruit was “as ubiquitous as Google and as feared as Halliburton.” For anyone interested in business history, American politics in Central America or the development of the global fruit industry, “The Fish that Ate the Whale” is a book to own and savor. Read less