THE DEPARTMENT of Agriculture-Agricultural Training Institute (DA-ATI) XI has earmarked more than P15M for a digital farmers’ program, drone technology, rice production, climate resiliency, and capacity-building.
The budget will cover 36 workshops in Davao Region with 30 target participants for each training.
DA-ATI XI information officer Lucille Camarines highlighted that the digital farmers’ program is designed to equip rice farmers with digital literacy and introduce them to modern agricultural technologies. The digitalization initiative started in 2019.
The digital farmers’ program is also implemented in different commodities such as coconut and cacao with their own allocated budgets. Caramines expects that the program will come across all commodities.
Last year, DA-ATI was able to train 534 farmers from the regular rice program and 189 farmers from the RCEF (Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund) program.
DA-ATI also has other programs for farmers, youth, and stakeholders on scholarships, digitalization in agriculture, farm business schools, and more. This also includes training programs for livestock and mechanization.
