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TRANSPORTATION
Several buses and vans-for-hire travel to and from Santander at a 20-minute interval. The ride from the Cebu South Bus Terminal in Cebu City is approximately three hours.
There is a wharf in Barangay Talisay, Santander, which takes passengers through a fastcrafts or barges to Tampi, Amlan Negros Oriental. There are also two separate ports in Barangay Liloan—one for fastcrafts and another for pumpboats for Sibulan, also in Negros.
PUBLIC UTILITIES
The Cebu Electric Cooperative Inc. is supplying power to the households and commercial and public establishments in all 10 barangays of Santander.
Water, meanwhile, is supplied by the Municipal Water System which has greatly improved its services from what used to be rationing years ago to a 24-hour supply. There are also available purified water refilling stations in the town.
As for telecommunications, Globelines is available for landline services while Globe, Smart and Sun Cellular are servicing the mobile phone needs of residents and tourists. There are public phone booths in the Poblacion, and internet connection is available at various internet cafés.
HEALTH SERVICES
There is a municipal health center and six barangay health centers that could attend to the medical needs of the town. There is an available doctor, a public health nurse, seven midwives, a dentist, sanitary inspector, medical technologist and a representative from the Department of Health.
Moreover, three ambulances are available to take patients either to the nearby district hospital in Oslob or to medical facilities in Cebu City. Santander is also minutes away from hospitals in Dumaguete City and other parts of Negros island.
PUBLIC SAFETY
There are 16 members of the Santander Police Station who are maintaining peace and order in the municipality. The town also has a fire station with four firemen assigned from the Bureau of Fire Protection.
AGRICULTURE
Of Santander’s 3,567 hectares, 40 percent are agricultural lands devoted to coconut, corn and banana. Although nearly 52 percent of the total land area used to be covered with shrubs, there is a notable transformation or shift on the use of these areas for agricultural use, particularly for corn which is now the dominant agricultural crop of the municipality both in terms of area planted and in terms of production.
COMMERCE
Although far from Cebu City and heavily relying on agriculture, there are various commercial establishments that support the needs of Santander residents and visitors.
Available are wholesale enterprises or general merchandise stores, hardware and electrical supplies stores, pawnshops, eateries and two local banks, the Rural Bank of Barili and the Cebu CFI Cooperative.
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