PDP-Laban launches feeding program for QC street children, adults
President Rodrigo Duterte’s Partido Demokratikong Pilipino-Lakas ng Bayan (PDP-Laban) launched “Duterte’s Kitchen” in Cubao, Quezon City, a feeding program for the poor on December 1.
According to Glen Badon, PDP-Laban national executive director, Duterte’s Kitchen was agreed upon during a meeting among Speaker Pantaleon D. Alvarez, Senate President Aquilino L. Pimentel III, Energy Secretary Alfonso G. Cusi and other party officials.
Managed by Dexter Baracael, the feeding program aims to complement the ruling party’s Social Services and Economic Development Program and Duterte’s advocacy to feed the poor.
“It was the brainchild of the Speaker after their meeting,” Badon said, adding that Duterte’s Kitchen, which is located near the Metro Rail Transit 3 Cubao station, seeks to feed hundreds of children daily.
Located along EDSA near the Metro Rail Transit terminal in Cubao – between Farmers Plaza and the Social Security System building – Duterte’s Kitchen is feeding between 50 to 70 street children daily during breakfast, lunch and dinner.
“Before, we only provide food for the street children, but now even hungry adults are also being attended to,” Badon said.
Duterte’s Kitchen mostly serves free lugaw (rice porridge) and champorado (chocolate rice porridge) for breakfast, rice meal with vegetables, fish, adobong manok and baboy during lunch and dinner.
“Our staffs are volunteers who believe on the advocacy of extending help to the underprivileged people and bring hope and inspiration to them,” he said.
“The food being served also depends on the donors. If we receive donated vegetables, chicken or pork meat, then we serve these to the street children, and even to the elders,” Badon said.
Aside from the feeding program, Duterte’s Kitchen also serves as a family center to the street children, where volunteers teach them to read and explain the value of education.
“It provides street children the means to uplift their lives. We have programs that will equip them with knowledge like teaching them to read. We are family to them,” he said.
According to Badon, other Duterte’s Kitchens will also be set up in other parts of the country soon to complement other programs of the Department of Social Welfare and Development and aimed at helping the less privileged. He is very hopeful that Duterte’s Kitchen will soon become a comprehensive temporary shelter that will provide emergency medical services and feeding as well as basic education through the help of volunteers and donors.
Source: businessmirror, philstar
