DAVAO DEL NORTE (PIA) – Flood-affected families in Davao will be the recipients of the various immediate training programs of the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA).

During the Davao del Norte episode of Philippine Information Agency’s One Davao Presser, TESDA Provincial Director Jasmin Neri said that her office had initially identified 150 families for the training. 

They were identified through the training needs assessment (TNA)  that TESDA Davao del Norte conducted immediately after the massive flooding due to continuous rains in the last week of January to the first week of February.

She said TESDA will be conducting organic agriculture production (OAP), or basic gardening, for the first batch of training beneficiaries. This training integrates training on fertilizer and pesticide-making.

TESDA intends to innovate its training on gardening. It will transfer skills and knowledge about containerized hanging gardening.

“Kung mahurot kalunod ilang tanum, na pay naka-hang,” she said.

(If their plants were submerged, there would still be those hanging.)

“We have a special partnership with the KAANIB Foundation on top of the special training under TESDA,” she said, emphasizing that the foundation made the request for TESDA to conduct training for flood-affected families that it has identified.

For interested people’s organizations and local government units, Neri said they just have to submit a list of training recipients with their letter of intent to TESDA for them to be prioritized.

The TESDA special training session for the calamity-affected families forms part of the “TESDA sa Barangay” program as a way of bringing down at the grassroots the skills training needed by communities in the lowland and upland.

“Ang mga IPs (Indigenous peoples), former rebels, disaster-affected, kana sila ang atong mas palanggaon, mas tutukan ug mas hatagan ug atong mga skills training. We would like to have their own livelihood or income-generating activities, para ma transform ang ilang lives (to transform their lives),” she said.

(Indigenous Peoples, former rebels, and disaster-affected individuals are the ones we prioritize, focus on, and provide skills training to.)  (JMDA/PIA Davao del Norte)