In line with the Women’s Month celebration, the Agribusiness and Marketing Assistance Division (AMAD) conducted a seminar on Gender Sensitivity in Communication Planning last March 13.
Personnel of AMAD were equipped with the necessary skills in crafting communication plans, emphasizing gender-sensitive language for both men and women, and the importance of properly communicating the programs of the division to their intended audience.
“If you are communicating, you are creating a relationship,” said Lily Anne Lando, the resource person of the activity. She is also a freelance consultant at WorldFish. “It’s important to release the impact [of your programs and projects] that is contributing to DA (Department of Agriculture) accomplishing its mandate.”
Lando also said there is nothing to be hesitant in boasting about accomplishments because this is the only way the public would know that the agency is doing something.
“We’re sometimes afraid of bragging about ourselves, pero paminsan-minsan, kailangan kasi nating gawin. Kasi hindi naman ‘yan malalaman ng iba kung hindi rin natin sasabihin. You need to establish your value in the organization, and therefore, you need to tell that story,” she pointed out.
Lando also recognized the importance of gender sensitivity in planning, which responsibly caters to all genders, targeting their specific needs to implement their plans effectively and efficiently.
After the lecture, the participants had a hands-on workshop in crafting their communication plans. They were divided into three groups representing AMAD’s priority programs: Young Farmers’ Challenge, Kadiwa, and price-volume monitoring.
In crafting the communication plans, Lando asked them to enumerate the communication objectives and identify its key messages, intended audience, channel, and action plans. She also encouraged the participants to go above and beyond the numbers and figures in reporting the accomplishments of the division by looking for interesting human interest stories like challenges, success stories, and profiles. By Joven B. Peralta