Farmers with good agri practices recognized

BAGUIO CITY: The Department of Agriculture-Cordillera (DA-CAR) awarded plaques of recognition to certified Good Agricultural Practices (GAP) farms, including the best GAP implementers for the provincial and municipal level in recognition of the various stakeholders, who continuously promote and implement GAP at the region during the culminating day of the 2022 Regional GAP Summit held recently.

On the last day, Soledad Go, representing Baguio City Rep. Marquez Go, lauded the participants for their continued hard work in attaining food sufficiency in our country.

“Farmers are really the hardest-working members of our society endowed with a very special responsibility which is to feed the people. To be the root of sustenance and nutrition by diligently nurturing the treasure of our lands until it is time for harvest,” shared Go.

She also added that the GAP Summit is crucial in imparting new and modern-day agricultural practices and techniques that can help our food producers become more competitive in food production and supply across the country and even to our neighboring nations.

Meanwhile, Ryan Palunan, chairman of the Regional Agriculture and Fisheries Council, challenged the participants to apply all their learnings and share it with their children considering that the average age for Filipino farmers is between 57 and 59 years old, which raises concerns for who will carry out the important task of farming in the coming years. He also encouraged them to strengthen their partnership with the different government agencies to enable them to constantly improve the farming practices and systems that are being introduced.

Other topics are Marketing; the Entrepreneurship Program of the Jollibee Group Foundation Inc.; Values and Leadership; and an Orientation on Civil Society Organization Accreditation, which were discussed by Jumelyn Buya, Jan Paulo Vicente of the Jollibee Group Foundation Inc., Tetchie Belle Bagnos of DA-CAR and Dr. Susan Balanza of DA-CAR, respectively.

The activity was spearheaded by the High-Value Crops Development Program and Regulatory Division of the DA-RFO-CAR.