PATRONIZING FILIPINO MADE JEEPNEYS

PATRONIZING FILIPINO MADE JEEPNEYS I heard about imported hard-tail mackerel or round scad (galunggong) being sold in the local markets that are probably smuggled, and are probably from China. That is probably triple jeopardy if we can call it that. The sad thing about that is that galunggong is supposed to be a local fish, and our local fishermen are supposed to be earning a livelihood from that, except that that is now being stolen from them. I can imagine how our rice farmers are feeling about the fact that after many years of working us to grow the rice that is their means of livelihood and is our means of survival, that too is being stolen from them as we are importing more rice supplies from abroad, some of them probably smuggled too. The other irony is, we are buying rice from the people who only learned how to grow rice from us. Now comes another big blow that will not only hurt our economy, it will also hurt our egos and our national pride. We know that the jeepney was originally an American product that we localized because of our ingenuity, but why are allowing some people to change it into a Chinese product? I really felt sad when I saw the supposedly Filipino jeepneys that are made in China, being sold here. How can that be? Why are we allowing foreign companies to profit from a product that we could actually produce locally, probably even in a better way? I call on the government to look into this. Who can do it? The DTI? Or the DOTr? IKE SENERES/04-01-2024