TESDA OK P’sinan School to Train for Free Wannabe Farmers

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

LINGAYEN, Pangasinan – The Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) has awarded a school that offers a Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) Program based here to attract poor Filipinos to learn for free a course on Rice Machinery Operators NC –II.

“I saw how sorry the plight of our farmers. I am a daughter of a farmer and I want to help them improve their lives through the TESDA Programs given to my school in Lingayen,” President Hedelin T. de Vera of the Excellent Agro Farm Training and Assessment Center, Inc. (EAFTACI) told Northern Watch Newspaper.

With a duration of 251 hours plus 100 Supervised Industry Learning (SIL) hours, the Rice Machinery Operators NC-II covers the following core competencies:

Operate rice land preparation machinery and equipment; Operate rice crop establishment machinery and equipment; Operate rice crop care machinery and equipment; Operate rice harvesting and threshing machinery and equipment; Operate rice drying machinery and equipment, and; Operate rice mill machinery and equipment.

In an allocation of P3 million from the TESDA given recently to EAFTACI, President De Vera said 100 students would benefit of the scholarship.

“The grant allowed P28, 302 per students for an almost one-month training in our school and farm in Barangay Aliwekwek in Lingayen,” said by an Executive Officer of EAFTACI.

A student in the school is given an allowance of P160 a day by the government. The P3 million allocation to EAFTACI is part of the promised P10 million by TESDA that could totally fund the training of 333 mostly poor Filipinos where they can use their skills and earn in the farm or go abroad and work there.

The certification from TESDA given to the school was March 24, 2023 and signed by the TESDA Director General and TESDA Region-1 Director Vincent Aljon A. Cifra.