We have too many provinces. Their number needs to be reduced and territory redrawn according to language groupings e.g. Ilocos for the Ilocanos, Bicol for Bicolanos, Pampanga for Kapampangan , a povince each for the Tagalogs, Cebuanos, Tausugs, etc. Some provinces like Pampanga will become bigger as a result of taking in some parts of Tarlac, Bulacan, N.E., etc. while some will disappear. A language gouping needs at least 1 million speakers in order to form a province otherwise they get incorporated into the bigger province. There are many economic and political benefits that could be get from this.

I don't believe economic development follows from reducing geography by language groupings. This will only lead to further in creating silos and alienation. What we need is to further emphasize and improve the use of industrial clusters similar in electronics in EPZA.

According to Michael Porter:

A cluster is a geographically proximate group of interconnected companies & associated institution in a particular field linked by commonalities & complementarities.

Why industrial clusters?

1. Many successful industrial development is cluster-based, not only historically but also at present throughout the world (e.g., Silicon Valley, Bangalore, Dhaka, Northern Italy, whole region of Taiwan, Wenzhou and many other regions in China, …..).
2. A small number of strong industrial clusters tend to dominate in the globalizing world, where country borders lose significance.
3. There is increasingly “broad” recognition that clusters have certain advantages over non-clusters.
4. There is also increasing recognition that development of SME-led labor-intensive industrialization is indispensable to reduce widespread poverty.

Cluster promotes enterprise-enterprise and enterprise-merchant transactions by reducing transaction costs. (Transaction costs = cheating, stealing, lying, shirking, etc)
Cluster stimulates multifaceted-innovations by attracting a variety of useful human resources.

So let's take a simple Luzon example and take a strip from Region III to Manila to Cavite as in the case of Electric Vehicles (where we may have a chance to leap-frog). I will not further expound but just give an idea.

1. Kapampangans and those from the Tarlac are said to be good metal-workers - bring advanced know-how from universities and learning centers and teach them on advanced technology on metal crafting (chasis and parts).
2. Progressively support and advance the industry on battery technology from Bulacan - advance product line-up from lead acid battery types to lithium-ion technology
3. Apply know-how on design and vehicle assemby from either Caloocan, Cavite, and Las Pinas; advance know-how from just assembly of jeeps and continue this towards building passenger cars or commercial vehicles.
4. Use the logistical know-how to deliver finished goods to and from NCR (and probably from Subic).

Unrelated local industries will also stem. But one can further link the production-supplier-value chains from other places in Luzon through deliberate and strategic distribution channels.

I know it's a simplistic view and indeed an old idea. You can call it a clear grasp of the obvious. But some obvious moves are often taken for granted. Also, at the moment, I find that our industrial clusters (as with EPZA) have not been utilized or optimized effectively.

This can apply to other regions as well each focusing on different main products.

The point is if we divide or group our provinces it should be by their comparative advantages not language.

I somewhat agree with you, these language-based provinces could have their own language instead of speaking Tagalog to each other thus preserving their tongue instead of a possible replacement by Tagalog in the future. Some of the present day regions are already language based though like the Ilocos Region for the Ilocanos, Bicol region for the Bicolanos and Southern Tagalog for the Tagalogs

^^ In fact that's how the present Regions were made. Regions were grouped according to (1) Language and (2) Location.

But isn't reducing the numbers of province would weight much responsibilities for the Governors?

Good idea. And let's see who's the most progressive. The Tagalogs have progressive cities. The Bisayans have Cebu, Davao, Cagayan de oro, General Santos, Butuan, Iligan and many more, hehehe. And each will have their own team in sports like basketball. There will be real competition which will make the people of each province work harder. The underdog provinces will work harder to overcome shame and embarrassment.

this going to be a big cha-cha

i dont think by languages distribution is the best solution either
but hawaii should be an overseas colony of ilocos heh

Only Cha-Cha can do that(federalism).
I don't think it as a good solution knowing the crab mentality of pinoys.
But then again many promdis feel oppressed by Imperial Manila because of the unequal distribution of wealth.

Subic is in Zambales Province but the goods and contraband inside it is worth billions. Inside Subic you can become very rich but you will be a poor man if you step outside Subic because you have to pay taxes to imperial Manila.

And 50% of the taxes collected by Imperial Manila will go to the Global financial elites.
And most of the tuition fees paid to the Catholic schools, Church collections from the weddings, deaths, etc. all go to the Vatican.

I totally agree. Linguistic suddivision is clear sign of 'nationalistic' shenanigans who by 'guesstimates' think that heterogenity is the key to success. There's a book that is well liked by my old professor, he helped in trying to sort out darfur, called "Nation, States and Violence" by D. Laitin that argues against the thought of nationalism as being natural and that heterogenity is key to prorgress as some nationalist believe. He based his studies on comparative datas and comparative studies of nations and countries, and he broke the thought that heterogenity: be it by language, culture etc. has anything to do with stability of states.

I agree with you that the efficient of use of geography through economics, by I also add just overall quality of government. It doesn't matter if you have a province full of people that speaks similar language, if its run by $hitbags it's still a $hithole.

And yeah Nikki, the problem with consolidation of provinces is the widening power responsibility. In the Philippines AS IS, the local governments have hard time reigning in and executing legislation and giving services to constituents. What I don't get is this also: why would Visayan regionalist, who argue that Manila held central government give them less flexibility and efficient governing by holding all the offices in Manila, agree to this when they would allow this in their own backyard when it comes to little communes (ie small island provinces like Biliran)? How ironic and hypocritical.

I don't think we need a change in governance,what we need is a change of heart.

Actually,the unpatriotic elites need to pack up and go to their country of their master for our archipelago for our archipelago to progress.

so its going to look kinda similar to this?

^I wonder why it has Bisaya as a separate color. I thought Bisaya emcompassed Cebunao, Hiligaynon, Waray, and other languages.

bisaya is different from hilligaynon...

http://www.filipinolanguages.com/visayan_new.htm

posting links of internet "sources" do not constitute the complete truth. until they do a study polling and speaking to each individual dialect group in the visayan provinces, then i won't be convinced. being an ilongga i know for sure i barely understand cebuano.

putting a blanket statement that visayans are all the same is like saying tagalog & ilokano is the same. it isnt and it never was.

dont generalize like a haole scholar. you are better than that, my friend.

i agree 100%. cebuano is different from hiligaynon. and not all of panay island speaks hligaynon. only iloilo does. basically... iloilo & negros occidental speak ilonggo/hiligaynon. aklanon s spoken in aklan provinces like kalibo & boracay. and kinaray-a is spoken in antique.

kinaray-a...is my mom's language

lol we must be related. my grandmom from my mother side is karay-a.

what town is she from??

I never said that they were the same language. I was talking about the term Bisaya and how it collectively emcompasses all of the languages of the Visayas. It's a language family. When talking about a specific language, Bisaya refers to Cebuano. Some people mistakenly consider them one language. Sometimes they are mutually intelligible.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhFmhelzDd4
In this clip, Lovely is speaking Hiligaynon and the boy is speaking Waray but they are having a conversation. So you could say that they're having a Bisayan conversation because they're both speaking Bisayan languages.

But anyways, the whole reason why I brought this up is because of this map:



It has a color for Cebuano, Waray, and Hiligaynon (all Bisayan languages) and then it has a color for Bisayan itself. That doesn't make sense. I'm assuming they mean Cebuano, but I wonder why they have two different colors for the same language.

more accurate?

she's from anini-y. yes.... i have heard the 'witch' stories. apparently the witches would fly from capiz to anini-y. omg... for awhile i heard stories from relatives that the women in my family had witch blood. it scared the $hit outta me.

my apologies. its just that i really hate it when some people refer to cebuano as the lingua franca of the visayan world. i know u dont do it but some people do. anyways, i can understand what that little kid says if that is waray. it sounds like ilonggo but a more raw simplified, common version. it is intelligible but not immediately.

thats not accurate at all. aklanons do not speak hiligaynon. and where is kinray-a? and btw... there are two aklanon dialects. ibajay aklanon is different from kalibo aklanon. and the hiligaynon spoken in capiz is different, too.

putsa na man, here MORRRRE ACCURATE HAAHA

copyrighted i think so link to tha site http://www.muturzikin.com/cartesasiesudest/5.htm


now we're going to have more provinces hahaha

YES!!!!

ayan ang tama. omg... its WAY accurate. thanks!!!

^ur so demanding, i feel bad for ur man lol j/k

Hindi ito tama, kapampangan dapat sa buong gitnang luson....

alam mo naman basta tayong mga pinay. under da saya ang asawa. lolz! jk.

get rid of the concept of "capital city".

...my gohhhd, so many ppl to be pleased lol



maybe thats why i havent gone out with a pinay recently hahahaha

It is really our society that needs tho change the masses should rebel from the elitistas who are both greedy and apathetic.