Empowering vegetable farmers through KSK Farmers’ Training Program

MANILA, Philippines - The number of SM Foundation Kabalikat sa Kabuhayan Farmers’ Training Program (KSK-FTP) beneficiaries continues to increase as another batch of farmers completed their training in Magallanes, Cavite recently.

The Kabalikat sa Kabuhayan Farmers’ Training Program is among the livelihood and outreach programs of SM Foundation to empower vegetable farmers not only to earn more income, but also to be self-sufficient in food. 

The program is a 12-week hands-on training on high value crops, fruits and vegetables. Funding for the training is provided by SM Foundation while Harbest Agribusiness Corp., a program partner provides the manpower and specialists who impart modern techniques in farming in the lecture sessions and the seedlings used in the actual training at the demo farm.  

Arsenio Barcelona, president of Harbest, stressed that KSK FTP through Harbest continues to help the farmers by providing extension services even after the training program to ensure that the program is sustained.

The technical know-how the farmers learn is replicated in their own farmlots. Barcelona shared that participants in previous KSK FTP in Monkayo, Compostela now serve as trainors in the farmers’ training program in the municipality. He added that other KSK FTP would be implemented in Tanay, San Fernando City (Pampanga), UPLB, Camarines Sur and Fort Magsaysay (Nueva Ecija).

Aside from Harbest Agribusiness Corp., other program partners are the Department of Agriculture, DSWD, local government units and non-government organizations. 

The 123 farmers who finished the KSK-FTP in Barangay Medina, Magallanes, Cavite is the 53rd batch of graduates of the program. The farmers come from  Magallanes and other neighboring municipalities of Amadeo and Aguinaldo, some of them beneficiaries of  government’s 4P’s program. Magallanes is a fourth class municipality of Cavite with 16 barangays located 97 kms. south of Manila. It is 2,000 ft. above sea level and is primarily agricultural.

A day prior to the graduation ceremony at SM City Dasmariñas, a harvest festival was held at the site of the training program. Crops harvested included eggplant, tomato, patola, upo, string beans, watermelon, honeydew and sweet melon.  

Providing entrepreneurial training to the farmers is undertaken by the other program partners like DSWD and BDO. The DSWD conducts values formation seminars and  entrepreneurial skills training.

Seminars on accounting for non-accountants are given by BDO to equip the farmers with skills to market their produce and become entrepreneurs.

It is important for the farmers to have a marketing strategy and this strategy depends on the farmers, said Barcelona.

According to him, some graduates of the program have formed associations. Being members of an association makes it easier for small vegetable farmers to comply not only with documentation and paperworks required by supermarkets and buyers but also with the volume of produce needed.