QUEZON CITY -- Agrarian Reform Secretary Conrado Estrella III has launched intensive training for the members of agrarian reform beneficiaries organizations (ARBOs) to introduce new farming techniques to help them produce more and provide quality farm products.
Estrella said the training is in line with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s directive to maximize food production in the country.
He emphasized that he has high respect for various farmers’ organizations since they have long proven their dependability, by providing food to the people in areas critically affected by the Covid 19 pandemic.
“As a former Abono Partylist representative, I should know because we worked with them to ensure the continued supply of food for our people when operations of the food manufacturing industry practically came to a halt during the pandemic,” Estrella said.
So far, there are approximately 7,500 ARBOs nationwide, which the government can tap for its food security program.
Following the Secretary’s direction, Atty. Milagros Isabel Cristobal, Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) Undersecretary for Support Services, in cooperation with the Agriculture Training Institute (ATI) of the Department of Agriculture (DA), mobilized the different ARBOs nationwide to establish demonstration farms under the Farm Business School (FBS) project.
Participants in this endeavor are tasked to evaluate the readiness of ARBOs to face the challenge posed by President Marcos Jr., which is to “Raise food productivity.”
Cristobal said the FBS is a long-standing project of the DAR where interested members of ARBOs are taught new farming methods to help them produce more and provide quality crops.
She added that the demonstration farms would serve as model farms where interested ARBOs could visit to learn some farming techniques which they can replicate in their respective areas.
“The idea here is to determine the technical capability and readiness of our ARBOs to develop demonstration farms where fellow, but less technically abled ARBOs can learn from,” Cristobal explained.
“We wanted to convince at least one ARBO in every region all over the country to take the challenge, as part of our food security program, and be among the pioneers in this undertaking,” she said. (DAR)
