MORE TRAININGS. Director Vivencio Mamaril, of the Department of Agriculture's Bureau of Agricultural Research, announces on Tuesday (March 16, 2021) that 808 youth applicants qualified for their six-month mentoring program. He encouraged the youth to request from their congressmen funding for agriculture-related trainings. (Screengrab from DA)
MANILA – The Department of Agriculture (DA) is encouraging the youth to learn more about farming or fisheries and upgrade their knowledge by requesting their congressmen for related trainings.
As Congress is preparing the third version of Bayanihan Law, the timing is just right to make such requests, said Bureau of Agricultural Research Director Vivencio Mamaril in a virtual briefer on Tuesday.
“They should write to their congressmen so there will be another training or internship program based on their interests,” he said.
Mamaril made the suggestion after the DA announced that 808 youths qualified for their Mentoring and Attracting Youth in Agribusiness (MAYA) program.
DA said they prioritized applicants with degrees related to agriculture.
“This MAYA program was requested by the DA from Congress so we can entice the youth towards farming,” Mamaril said.
Interested individuals may also check on available courses and trainings being offered by the Agricultural Training Institute (ATI) to make their quarantine period useful.
MAYA will be conducted through experiential learning, or a learner-centric methodology, that will enable interns, who will receive a monthly allowance of PHP20,000, to put into immediate use the knowledge and skills that they have learned.
DA said the six-month internship MAYA program aims to transform young Filipinos into agripreneurs or technocrats.
The program came into fruition after DA Secretary William Dar’s vision to entice the younger generation to engage in agriculture through agribusiness.
“This is the way forward to unlock the potential of Philippine agriculture,” he said.
“Our personnel staff in agriculture are already aging, and thus we need to put up this MAYA program for two purposes. First, they will have to be exposed to the field of agriculture and agribusiness and second, to actual farm situations and agribusiness operations,” he said. (PNA)
