Dumingag bags National Award

From left is Mayor Jun Pacalioga posing with TESDA

acting Regional Director Lorenzo Makapili. (Photo

Provided)

By Julius Breva

DUMINGAG, Zamboanga del Sur - The Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) honors the Dumingag LGU with the Kabalikat National Award for training tens of thousands of people in organic agriculture and in technical education.

The award is annually given by TESDA to companies, institutions, and local governments that help it achieve its goal of training the manpower resources of the country and of making them world class.

In receiving the award at the TESDA Women’s Center in Taguig, Manila last August 22, Mayor Pacalioga was accompanied by his wife Girlyn and the Municipal Economic and Development Officer of Dumingag Neil Estillore.

In an interview about the award, Mayor Jun Pacalioga said that he would take the award as an instrument to inspire and motivate more people to participate in the training programs of the Dumingag LGU and become productive members and even world-class work force of society.

TESDA Director General Joel Villanueva gave the honors to the award, and popular TV host Boy Abunda gave the inspirational talk in the awarding ceremony.

TESDA Regional Director Lorenzo Makapili said he was very happy about Dumingag because for the first time an entry for the Kabalikat Award from TESDA-9 has won the top honors since the start of the Award in the late 1990’s.

Pacalioga lauded TESDA for recently formulating regulations to organic agriculture trainings that made the several organic agriculture trainings of Dumingag eligible in the criteria of the Kabalikat Award.

 Pacalioga said he assigned Estillore to oversee and supervise the agricultural and technical training programs of Dumingag LGU that would bring productivity and progress to the people of Dumingag.

In the ceremony, the Dumingag LGU was cited for investing a lot in putting up a school in agriculture and health called Dumingag Institute for Sustainable Organic Agriculture (DISOA), and another school that offers courses in industrial and service sectors called Dumingag Technological Training School (DTTS).

To make up for the lack of funds in creating these schools, the LGU converted a dilapidated-building-turned stable into an agricultural training school and unutilized spaces under a bleacher into a technical skills training school.

To run the schools, the Dumingag LGU assigned a management team and hired instructors for each school. To date, the DISOA provides intensive sustainable organic agriculture training towards healthy food sufficiency, while DTTS continue to help the youth acquire low-cost but quality tech-voc education in the fields of welding, automotive, electrical installation and management, computer servicing, and consumer electronics.