The Albay province will host the National Livestock Summit set on September 16 to 18 this year at the Albay Astrodome, this city, a provincial agricultural officer said on Tuesday. The three-day summit with a theme “Coping with Emerging Challenges to Livestock and Poultry: Climate Change, Global Trade, Emerging Diseases and Food Security,” will be a joint project of the Department of Agriculture (DA) and the provincial government of Albay.

State-owned CIIF-Oil Mills Group is recommissioning starting tomorrow its P400-million copra-crushing plant in Arimbay, Legazpi City, which can immediately bring in $3.75 million in foreign-exchange earnings per month if its output is exported. Jesus Arranza, CIIF-Oil Mills president and CEO, said President Arroyo will join the local coconut farmers, community leaders, Legaspi Oil Co. chair Josefa Imperial Aquino and other officials of the Oil Mills Group in the re-opening ceremony of the facility.

Homegrown and overseas bets shared top honors in Sunday night’s Mutya ng Pilipinas beauty pageant held in Baler, Aurora. Legazpi City’s Jane Banares bagged the Mutya ng Pilipinas-International title while Northern Germany’s Jacqueline Schubert won the Mutya ng Pilipinas-Tourism

The city government of Legazpi is planning to boost its water supply by tapping another raw source aside from the Yawa River: seawater. The said planned project will source water from the sea to be desalinated and purified and introduced into the existing LCWD pipelines to meet the demand of the consumers.

I welcome you to the City of Legazpi with great joy and excitement.

Allow us to take you to the beauty and wonder of our great pride, the Mayon Volcano. Experience the exhilaration of being close to and being at peace with nature. Climb our Lignon Hill. Take a look at our array of tourist destinations.

Accessibility to all modes of transportation has always been one of Legazpi’s advantages. The city has a bustling airport, a vibrant seaport and will soon have a new, modern and high-tech integrated land transport terminal that will serve not only the city of Legazpi but the entire Bicol Region as well. The new Legazpi City Integrated Transport Terminal will start operation in August. Wow Legazpi cornered Mayor Noel Rosal while inspecting the facility last week. Here’s a transcript of our conversation:

The Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. will spend nearly a billion pesos for a five-year period to roll out landline telephones and Internet services in the Bicol region. PLDT’s project to install and operate a local telephone service that integrates information communications technology in Legaspi City, Tabaco City, Municipalities of Polangui, Bacacay, Oas, Guinobatan and Daraga, all in the province of Albay, was approved by the National Telecommunications Commission on July 17. PLDT’s CPCN is valid 18 months from date of the order.

The Bicol Region will eventually get its own international airport that promises to spur and accelerate the region’s economic development. Despite its vast natural resources including mineral deposits, geothermal power and tourism potentials, Bicol has remained among the poorest regions of the country today. The new Bicol International Airport will be developed on a 140-hectare prime land straddling areas of Daraga and Camalig towns.

Legazpi City (10 July) — Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs) has raised today Mayon Volcano’s alert status from Level 1 (low level unrest) to Level 2 (moderate unrest) after it manifested increasing volcanic quakes, swelling of its edifice and intense crater glow. Phivolcs said parameters monitored since last month indicated an increase in the current activity of the volcano, manifesting low frequency volcanic earthquakes rising to a higher level signifying possible movement of magma beneath the volcano edifice at shallow depth.

Albay Gov. Joey Salceda has unveiled a road map for his province centering on an economic strategy that mobilizes its massive potential for green energy, eco-cultural tourism, modern transport system, productive agriculture, responsive tertiary education and a state of the art medical system.