The Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP)-Mamburao District Jail is providing more opportunities for persons deprived of liberty (PDLs) to change their lives for the better.
While serving their time in jail, at least 70 PDLs here are given many opportunities to undergo training to enhance their agriculture skills and knowledge, particularly in organic farming.
Inside the BJMP-MDJ compound is a vegetable garden where PDLs plant immediate cash crops such as pechay, beans, squash, cabbage, Chinese kangkong, eggplant, tomato, papaya, and bitter gourd, among others.
In an advisory, BJMP Mimaropa information officer Jail Officer 3 Joefrie Anglo announced the reinforcement of its eco-friendly jail program that allows PDLs and jail personnel to plant vegetables in their mini garden area.
“This Green Program of the BJMP is really therapeutic because it breaks up the monotony of everyday life in jail and provides PDLs with satisfying work, marketable skills, and fresh food to eat,” he said.
He added that the harvest from this garden will supplement the jail’s food supply, as well as teach the PDLs the valuable skill of growing their own food.
Anglo, however, stressed that the BJMP’s jail facilities are not a place for punishment. “They (PDLs) are not there to get punished but rehabilitated to become better members of their communities once they get out of jail.”
“What we’re trying to do here is to bring the jail community together, find their inner gardener. If they’re successful in reconnecting to themselves and to the natural world, we are indeed creating a safer, more humane society,” Anglo stated.
In addition to promoting vegetable gardening, BJMP-MDJ also supports various educational and sustainable livelihood programs within the jail facility, providing hope for the incarcerated to realize their aspirations for a better future.
