Above photo shows Dir. Asterio P. Saliot of Agricultural Training Institute stressing that school on the air is one of the effective strategies in educating and transforming viable technology on corn production to the farmers in order to increase corn production and sustain corn industry in the province.
Roxas City , Capiz – A total of 219 farmers from the ten municipalities of Capiz graduated from the School On the Air (SOA) on corn production program aired over DYVR, a local radio station recently.
The farmer-graduates came from the municipalities of Jamindan, Cuartero, Dumalag, Pontevedra, Maayon, Pilar, Dumarao, Tapaz, Mambusao, and Pres. Roxas, Capiz which are primarily corn areas of the province.
Director Asterio P. Saliot of Agricultural Training Institute (ATI) commended the efforts of farmcasters in disseminating agricultural information through the SOA among farmers living in far-flung areas.
"These farmcasters are effective agricultural extension workers (AEWs) giving farmers recommen-ded technologies and farming innovations over the radio," Dir. Saliot said.
He stressed that AEWs are teachers of farmers who provide them the right skills, information, and knowledge necessary to make decisions and choices such as proper technology, cultural management, and marketing scheme.
Likewise Dir. Saliot encouraged the farmer-graduates to apply what they have learned in the SOA. He assured he will negotiate with the UNIVET for the establishment of SARIMANOK project in Capiz in order to have stable and better prices of corn and sustain corn farming in Western Visayas .
Meanwhile, Gov. Victor Tanco of Capiz assured corn farmers that the provincial government will continue to support and even expand the coverage of the SOA not only in corn production but also with other identified priority commodities.
Gov. Tanco recognized the important role of farmers as backbone of the nation in sustaining the food requirement of the province of Capiz. "Farmers must be updated with the latest technology to increase yield and individual profitability," Gov. Tanco pointed out.
A farmer, Ferdinand Tumlos from Maayon, Capiz was grateful that through SOA he learned about Agro-Eco System Analysis (AESA) which is essential in all growth stages of corn production and the advantages of using hybrid corn seed varieties which he produces five metric tons per hectare compared to open pollinated varieties which only yields 1.5 to 2 metric tons.
According to Ricardo Saltin, the GMA regional corn coordinator, Western Visayas is on the 6th place in corn production with 350,259 metric tons produced and ranked 7th on area planted of corn with 142,448 hectares last 2008 in the national level.
"I am encouraging our farmer-graduates to share their learning experience to other corn farmers to improve corn production because the GMA corn program has allocated P150,000 for information support this year and P50,000 of which is intended for school on the air program," Saltin added.
Each farmer-graduate received transistor radio set from the provincial government of Capiz and one (1) kilo hybrid corn seeds (GSI 88 variety) from the Department of Agriculture, RFU 6 and certificates of completion. The organic fertilizers were raffled to each municipality after the program. /MP
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