The Department of Agriculture-Central Visayas (DA7) was one of the lucky regions in the country to send a personnel to a two-week Fellowship Program under the USDA-Foreign Agricultural Service in Washington D.C. and Athens, Georgia, United States of America.

 

Dr. Zeam Voltaire E. Amper, a veterinarian and the regional livestock coordinator, was one of the 10 fellows to join and represent the Philippines to the said scholarship.

 

Dr. Amper shared that the training focused on livestock, poultry, and grain forecasting, with the goal of learning the USDA-National Agricultural Statistics Services’ (USDA-NASS) best practices in conducting surveys and census within the agricultural sector. The gained knowledge will be applied in improving the data analytics of the institution.

 

He further said that various statistical techniques for identifying sampling frames, data editing, imputation, and analysis were also covered.

They also underwent hands-on training on data collection to the involved key players through farm visitation specializing in beef cattle, corn, pecans, and mushrooms, as well as to veterinary diagnostic laboratories and farmers markets.

 

Dr. Amper said his training in the US was highly beneficial and very relevant to his professional responsibilities, especially in formulating data-driven strategies for implementing agricultural programs and projects aimed at supporting livestock farmers and providing production guidance to the players along the livestock chain.

 

He added, that his training is very timely, as one of the directives of the DA Secretary and Regional Executive Director is to have better agricultural analytics to achieve its goal – masaganang agrikultura, maunlad na ekonomiya.