To strengthen the Collaborative Provincial Agriculture and Fisheries Extension Program (CPAFEP) in implementing programs and projects on agriculture, the Department of Agriculture Cordillera (DA-CAR) conducted the Agriculture and Fishery Strategic and Operational Planning in Baguio City for the province of Benguet and Ifugao.
The strategic and operational planning which will be shared to the Local Government Units (LGUs) will serve as an initial activity by the LGUs through their Provincial and Municipal Agricultures Offices in crafting the final output of their agriculture and fisheries development plans and programs for the next five years.
DA-CAR Regional Executive Director Atty. Jennylin Dawayan reiterated the need for identifying the particular and specific needs of the province indicated in the CPAFEP which will include infrastructures and facilities, aside from trainings to be provided by the DA with the final output to be part of the Agri-Fisheries Extension Development Plan 2025 to 2030.
“Our intention in coming up with an updated CPAFEP is to make our jobs and tasks easier, we have to be forward thinking or having foresight in creating our plans. We have to cope up with the digitalization phase and we want the CPAFEP to be the basis for the bottoms-up planning of the DA in accordance with the mandate given by Secretary Tiu Laurel Jr. for the regions to come up with their plans suitable to their needs provided the plans are based on a certain framework,” Dawayan said.
To strengthen the collaboration between DA, local government units, academe, and private sector, CPAFEP will be institutionalized to bring extension services to the grassroots level amid the challenges of devolution.
With CPAFEP, the province serves as an extension hub that synchronizes agricultural plans and programs as well as orchestrate the activities of the various stakeholders, with the DA task to co-plan, co-invest, co-implement, and co-monitor priority projects in the provinces, particularly as they embark on commodity specializations to maximize comparative advantage.
Evelyn Esquejo, Resource Person for the Strategic and Operational Planning pointed out that the creation of the final output of the Agri-Fisheries Extension Development Plan will serve as a source of consistent information for all operational plans weather it be annual planning sessions or banner programs, which include the annual performance review for the LGUs to make the necessary corrections suitable to the times.
“The rationale of the Agriculture and Fisheries Strategic Plan is for this to be a substantial part of the comprehensive development plan wherein the provincial AFSP will be an integration of all the municipal AFSP which is commodity-based prioritizing support for each value chain segment, aside from identifying what agriculture and fisheries program should support each of the value chain segment. This is a harmonization of existing agri-related plans reflecting the intentions of PCIP, PIP, earlier versions of ASFP including the commodity roadmaps,” Esquejo stated.
DA-Agriculture Training Institute Training Center Director Charlie Sagudan added that the strategic and operational planning is timely as this will give the two province the opportunity to prioritize the immediate, medium, and long term plans which will provide a pathway to address the plans with consideration to the available resources of the LGUs and the national government. By JTLlanes