Butuan City Bags Grand Prize in Bloomberg's 2021 Global Mayors Challenge


By LCP Secretariat
January 24, 2022 - Quezon City


The League of Cities of the Philippines, together with the Liveable Cities Challenge Philippines, warmly congratulates the City of Butuan for its triumph in the Bloomberg Philanthropies 2021 Global Mayors Challenge. Butuan is one of the 15 winning cities that have bested over 600 applicants from around the globe, including the more than 100 cities and municipalities that submitted their application from the Philippines. 

 

Now on its 5th run, the Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Mayors Challenge is a global competition that aims to “spark innovative, replicable ideas for improving cities, and the lives of people living in them.” This year’s competition challenged city leaders to pitch their boldest and most ambitious urban solutions to some of the most pressing challenges brought about by the global COVID-19 pandemic. It is the first time that the competition reached out to Asia. 

 

Butuan City Mayor Ronnie Vicente Lagnada underscored the unique issues the city faces regarding high rates of hunger and food insecurity, partially due to local food production challenges. In response, the city government launched the AgriBOOST Project, which aims to strengthen local food production by working with and empowering local farmers through technical and resource support, demand-driven production, and reliable farm gate pricing.

 

“AgriBOOST will enable a more secure livelihood for the disadvantaged farmers and other value chain players by improving the system of backward and forward linkages of resource and market accessibility of our agri-sector,” Lagnada said.

 

The city government is also hopeful that the project would jumpstart smart agriculture in their locality and lead to higher income for farmers, who will increase their production yield due to improved farming practices.

 

Butuan is the first Philippine city to be awarded the grand prize of the Mayors Challenge. 

“To be recognized worldwide is an opportunity for the city to attract people from different sectors all over the world to invest in this incredible instrument in empowering our agricultural sector,” the city government wrote in its official AgriBOOST Facebook page.

 

The latest Global Mayors Challenge winners come from 13 different nations and represent over 30 million residents. The 15 winners will receive $1 million each to realize their breakthrough ideas in addition to the 3-year technical support and coaching to implement and share these ideas with other cities around the globe.

 

 

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