Ping Lacson eyes scholarship programs for young farmers to ensure food security
ROSALES, Pangasinan – TO enhance our food security while encouraging youths to be farmers, former Senator and 2025 senatorial candidate Panfilo “Ping” M. Lacson is eyeing a scholarship program for deserving students – especially children of farmers – who want to join the agriculture sector.
Lacson said Wednesday that such a program similar to the “Doktor Para sa Bayan Act” – authored by former Senate President Vicente Sotto III – would also expose young scholars to technological advancements in agriculture.
“This is to encourage children of farmers to study new technologies through scholarships in agriculture courses. They will study new technologies and developments to improve their agricultural yield, instead of using traditional manual methods,” he said in Filipino at a Konsultahang Bayan with local farmers here.
“We will enhance our agricultural productivity while increasing the interest of our youths in farming,” he added.
Even better, he said this will in the long run even help the Philippines become an agriculture exporting country instead of an importing one.
Many of the farmers in the audience cheered when Lacson asked them if they approve of such an agriculture scholarship program.
Lacson noted the University of the Philippines in Los Banos (UPLB) is one such institute that offers masteral courses that feature biotechnology.
The UPLB National Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology (BIOTECH) was able to procure modern, state-of-the-art equipment due to the yearly increases in its budget stemming from institutional amendments Lacson introduced to the national budget.
“We must have young farmers who can learn to use new technologies and equipment to improve our production. We can add funding to the appropriate agencies for this,” Lacson stressed.
Meanwhile, Lacson also reiterated his push for digitalization of government transactions, so the government can address the needs of farmers using a data-driven and science-based approach.
Using such an approach, the government can determine the areas that need intervention, he noted.
Otherwise, he said this will open opportunities for discretion – and in turn, opportunities for corruption.
“If we resort to guesswork, we allow discretion. If there is discretion, there is corruption,” he said.
