TACLOBAN CITY, Leyte — The Department of Agriculture-Regional Field Office 8 conducted a two-day planning workshop on August 13-14, 2024, in Tacloban City, aimed to assist the different provinces in Eastern Visayas in finalizing their Comprehensive Provincial Agriculture and Fisheries Extension Plans (CPAFEP) under the Province-led Agriculture and Fisheries Extension System (PAFES). This is the second PAFES workshop, with representatives from the provinces of Leyte, Southern Leyte, and Biliran in attendance. Batch 1 was conducted on July 25-26, 2024, for Samar, Northern Samar, and Eastern Samar.
ATI-RTC 8’s Planning Officer Venus June Taghoy represented the Center in the workshop. The event included plenary sessions, discussions on the status of compliance with the PAFES Checklist, presentations of Rapid Rural Appraisal (RRA) highlights, and workshop breakout sessions where each provincial delegation revisited and updated their CPAFEP manuscripts.
DA-RFO 8’s Regional Technical Director (RTD) Larry U. Sultan, challenged the participants to come up with comprehensive and innovative plans that shall spur further development in the agriculture sector. Meanwhile, a reorientation of the PAFES framework was provided by Field Operations Division (FOD) Chief Rodel Macapanas, a concept introduced under the OneDA approach in response to the Mandanas-Garcia ruling.
During the breakout sessions, the participants outlined updates and revisions to be included in their plans. These revised outputs were presented on the second day and were critiqued by representatives from DA-RFO 8 and the Regional Technical Working Group (RTWG). Action plans were laid down to address major deliverables in the Work and Financial Plan (WFP) and handle deficiencies of the overall PAFES implementation.
The finalization of the CPAFEP manuscripts for each province is targeted for no later than the first week of October 2024, with corresponding endorsements to local chief executives and technical working groups.
