DAVAO CITY—A long-running radio education program in the Davao region graduated another batch of farmers, this time in the production of native chicken, as the regional agriculture office embarks on a new venture to intensify reproduction of Philippine native breeds.
The Department of Agriculture’s (DA) School-on-the-Air (SOA) graduated 500 farmers and fowl growers in a more than a month of curriculum-like broadcast tutorial on raising and reproducing native chicken.
The particular course on native-chicken production was handled by the DA’s Information Section and Livestock Program. It was aired from July 3 to August 15 over the program Mag-UmaSenso Ta” of dxRD 711 khz Sonshine Radio in Davao City.
The program “discussed the what’s and how to’s in native-chicken production, which include production and marketing support they can avail of from the DA,” the DA regional office here said.
Fifteen outstanding farmers from various provinces in the region received five heads of native chicken from the Livestock Program as a starter pack for their native-chicken production, it said.
Some 142 packs of chicken feeds with 5 kilograms per pack were given to the farmer-graduates.
The DA said it conducts the SOA program “as part of the training and development component of the DA with different featured commodity as a way of technology transfer to farmers”.
It quoted Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel F. Piñol as having mentioned of giving proper training as “really important before farmers can avail themselves of the assistance from the DA for them to be equipped with the knowledge on how to utilize it effectively”.
In her message to the graduates, Dr. Angelina Pancho, the regional technical director for research and regulations, encouraged farmers “to widen the native chicken (Gallus gallus domesticus) production, especially in their backyards for it is well-adapted to the country’s harsh temperature and with that it is susceptible to diseases unlike other breeds.”
“Remember, learning is a continuous process. It shouldn’t stop here. Apply what you’ve learned in this School-on-the-Air to improve your lives and we in DA will do everything to help you in your native-chicken production,” Pancho said.