“If don’t want to be eliminated, you must be innovative. Update your knowledge and you won’t be outmoded,” Israelmore Ayivor says.
In connection to e-farming, the above quotation reflects that the Agricultural Extension Workers (AEWs) must be knowledgeable of the various Agri apps to quickly deploy agricultural information and technology to farmers and fishers. Like Rice Crop Manager Advisory Services (RCMAS) version 4.0.32.15, with its additional features, it is necessary to update their technical know-how on the operation of the said application.
With this, the Agricultural Training Institute MIMAROPA conducted a one-day RCMAS Briefing at Magsaysay Hillside Resort, Brgy. Poblacion, Magsaysay, Occidental Mindoro on August 12, 2022.
The activity is designed to orient the AEWs on the usage of the RCMAS application. Also, it aims to generate site-specific recommendations for rice farmers so they can apply the generated recommendations and increase their income through precise crop management.
The briefing covered the topics of Overview of RCMAS, RCMAS User Registration, RCMAS Online, RCMAS Offline, RCMAS Android, and Recommendation Generation.
The lecture started with an explanation of the RCMAS component tools such as User Registration, Farmer and Farm Lot Registration, Android App, Messenger Service, Farm Monitoring, and Farmer ID Maker. After the lecture, the Technical Working Group assisted the AEW participants in the registration and activation of their accounts.
Then, it was followed by the discussion of the RCMAS online and offline platforms. In this particular topic, the participants were able to use the application to register farmer and farmer lots online, upload GPX files, generate an ID card, and generate recommendations using their laptops and android phones.
Moreover, the generated recommendations were printed by the AEWs and explained thoroughly to rice farmer participants. A total of seven recommendations were generated using the RCMAS application.
“Itong ating isinagawang briefing ay napapanahon dahil ang dami naming katanungan tungkol sa RCMAS. Hindi kami makapag proceed sa aming interviews dahil hindi namin alam ang bagong version nito. Ngayon, alam na po namin kung paano ito gagamitin,” shared Mr. Romnick Soriano, Agricultural Technologist of Santa Cruz.
The briefing was participated by 26 participants consisting of seven (7) rice farmers and 19 AEWs in Magsaysay, San Jose, Rizal, Calintaan, Santa Cruz, Sablayan, and the Provincial Agriculture Office.
