Gorontalo City, InfoPublik – Rojer Manopo’s face was happy after taking part in the literacy community empowerment program held by the Gorontalo Provincial Language Office for 4 days.

Rojer seemed to have new energy to develop the Pabuto Nantu village school and library together with transmigration residents in Settlement Unit (SP) 3 Sari Tani Village, Wonosari District, Boalemo Regency.

“After taking part in empowering the literacy community, I have become more enthusiastic about adding activities in the village,” said Rojer Manopo, Thursday (7/3/2024).

Rojer expressed his thanks to Ahmad Nawari, Head of the Gorontalo Provincial Language Office, who has embraced the Pabuto Nantu Library, which is far from the city center, for activities.

The Pabuto Nantu Library is an independent effort by migrant residents to remain literate amidst their busy lives cultivating fields in remote areas. The SP 3 area is deep in the interior of Saritani Village, which borders the Nantu Wildlife Reserve. The villages where these transmigrant farmers live and their fields are originally forests. They were truly on the outskirts, after their settlement was the Pabuto forest.

Together with Bunaeri, the manager of the Village School at SP3, Rojer worked together to build education in the village.

“The library and village school that we built occupied the building that stored transmigrant living allowances, because it was no longer used, the residents took the initiative to use it as a village school and library,” said Rojer Manopo.

Rojer, who is a Javanese wife, tells the story of the persistence of farmers who want to build knowledge through literacy activities. They formed a community group called Marsudi Lestantun, through this community the farmers developed environmentally friendly farming procedures. They also build togetherness in working on the fields through mohuyula or mutual cooperation activities.

According to Rojer, these library books are very helpful for farmers, this book collection has agricultural themes such as how to cultivate horticulture, raise chickens and goats, how to make compost, and many other book titles.

Through this book, farmers learn about environmentally friendly agricultural techniques and learn to practice them in the fields. All farming techniques are explained clearly and easily understood in the books from the Pabuto Nantu library collection. This is where farmers get real and direct benefits from the presence of libraries.

Not only that, there are also lots of reading books for school children here, even teenagers who like novels or other books can also read in this former building for transmigrant living rations.

The success of building a community of farmers who love literacy did not just appear out of thin air. Marsudi Lestantun farmers are partners of the Global Environmental Facility-Small Grants Program (GEF-SGP) in phase 6.

This program aims to provide funding facilities to community groups and non-governmental organizations who are facing ecological challenges with innovative, independent and affordable methods and technologies through sustainable resource management.

The focus of the supported work areas is community-based biodiversity conservation, climate change mitigation, use of environmentally friendly energy, and rehabilitation of critical land in ecosystems that have global environmental benefits.

The success of the GEF SGP phase 6 program at SP3 Saritani has strengthened farmers, providing insight into their future and its relationship with environmental management and knowledge systems through the presence of the Pabuto Nantu library and village school, until it continues in phase 7.

This enthusiasm for improving the quality of life and preserving the environment of transmigrants deserves a thumbs up. They are tough farmers who are struggling to implement environmentally friendly agriculture.

Rojer Manopo remembered Ahmad Nawari’s message when he opened the literacy drive community empowerment activity, one of the tasks of the Gorontalo Provincial Language Office was to accompany and embrace the literacy drive community in Gorontalo. One way to do this is through community empowerment activities that encourage literacy which is expected to help and become a provision for community administrators who will later be involved directly in the community.

“It turns out we are not alone, our efforts to build civilization through literacy activities have received support from the Gorontalo Provincial Language Office, we are very grateful,” said Rojer Manopo.

Rojer hopes that collaboration with the Gorontalo Provincial Language Office will continue in overseeing activities at village schools and the Pabuto Nantu Library.

Meanwhile, Ahmad Nawari emphasized that one of the priority programs of the Gorontalo Provincial Language Office is linguistic and literary literacy, one of the activities carried out is empowering the literacy community.

“We hope this activity can be successful to provide literacy community administrators with the ability to apply the knowledge provided by resource persons in their community,” said Ahmad Nawari.

Coordinator of the Literacy Expertise and Professional Services Group (KKLP) of the Gorontalo Provincial Language Office, Eka Fitriany, also hopes that the literacy community will be more confident in innovating in providing something to the community. He also asked the literacy community to be able to realize increasing creativity in driving literacy in society, to maximize the concept of community performance so that literacy activities continue to be active and sustainable.

In this 4-day literacy community empowerment activity, participants received various materials from a number of literacy activists, such as material on Language Policy, Book Management, and Digital Reading Corner by the Head of the Gorontalo Provincial Language Office and the Head of the Library Division of the Gorontalo Provincial Library Service, Smart to Literate Digital by Elia Damopolii, Strengthening Management of Literacy Communities by Musyawir S. Dunggu, Socialization of Government Assistance for Literacy Communities by Eka Fitriany.

Dimas Indiana Senja, who is the main speaker for this activity, will present material on Evaluation of Literacy Mobilization Community Empowerment Activities in 2023-2024, Preparation of Creative Literacy Community Programs, Literary Works (Poetry, Children’s Stories, Reviews), Evaluating Creative Literacy Community Program Designs, Evaluating Creative Literacy Community Program Designs, Building Digital Literacy: Challenges and Opportunities in the Digital Era. (mcgorontaloprov/ochid)