SEARCA in the News

After months of testing and implementation, six finalists compete for the top spot in the Grand Finals of the Innovation Olympics 2.0 (IO 2.0), an agri-hackathon that challenges the next generation​ of agriculture, business, and technology Filipino leaders to develop innovative solutions to​ real-life challenges of smallholder vegetable farmers. The IO 2.0 Grand Finals, which will be shown via Facebook Live on October 15, 2:00 p.m. (GMT +8), is set to determine the winning team who will receive PhP200,000 as cash prize to improve and continue their technology solution to help farmers in the Philippines. As part of the competition… Read more

The Philippine government-hosted Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA) said the Covid-19 pandemic trained a spotlight on the interconnectedness of the health of people, animals and the environment — also known as One Health. With this, SEARCA said it chose to focus the 2021 SEARCA Photo Contest on "One Health is Wealth: Healthy Agriculture and Sustainable Food One Health is Wealth: Healthy Agriculture and Sustainable Food Systems," now on its 15th year with great cash prizes up for grabs among those who will join the contest. Cash prizes of US$1,000, $800, and $500 await… Read more

A British organization has collaborated with a University of the Philippines Los Baños-based Southeast Asian regional center to empower people especially the youth to contribute to climate solutions. Providing free educational content about the causes, consequences and solutions to climate change, the British ClimateScience, a non-profit organization, aims to make learning fun, accessible, and science-backed. ClimateScience co-founder Eric Steinberger said this volunteer-driven organization has become the leading provider of accessible educational resources on solutions to climate change globally. Steinbereg noted that agriculture takes up everything even the largest share of usable land resources and that it can make a huge… Read more

ClimateScience, a United Kingdom-based nonprofit organization, has collaborated with a University of the Philippines Los Baños-based Southeast Asian regional center to empower people, especially the youth to contribute to climate solutions. Providing free educational content about the causes, consequences and solutions to climate change, ClimateScience aims to make learning fun, accessible and science-backed. Eric Steinberger, ClimateScience co-founder, said this volunteer-driven team has become the leading provider of accessible educational resources on solutions to climate change globally. "Agriculture takes up everything, even the largest share of our usable land resources and we recognize that it can make a huge difference in… Read more

A United States Agency for International Development (USAid)-funded wildlife conservation initiative called the Protect Wildlife Activity (PWA) was found to have contributed greatly to reduce the threats to wildlife and biodiversity, according to a University of the Philippines Los Baños (UPLB)-based center. This was the observation of an evaluation team under the UPLB-based Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA)-led Final Performance Evaluation of PWA that was also commissioned by the USAid. SEARCA director Dr. Glenn Gregorio said the PWA which covered several biodiversity hotspots in the Philippines said the results of the evaluation can… Read more

The COVID-19 pandemic trained a spotlight on the interconnectedness of the health of people, animals, and the environment—also known as One Health. The Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA) thus chose to focus the 2021 SEARCA Photo Contest on “One Health is Wealth: Healthy Agriculture and Sustainable Food One Health is Wealth: Healthy Agriculture and Sustainable Food Systems.” Now on its 15th year, the SEARCA Photo Contest invites photographers from the Philippines and other Southeast Asian countries to submit their best shots depicting One Health applications to agricultural and rural development (ARD), particularly those… Read more

Eight ASEAN Member States are represented in the second virtual offering of the ASEAN Climate Leadership Programme (ACLP) being conducted by the Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA) and the Deutsche Gessellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmBH-Climate-Smart Land Use in ASEAN (CSLU) Project until October 28, 2021. Ms. Zahra Mutiara, Advisor for the GIZ CSLU Project, said the project aims to support ASEAN in strengthening its coordinating role to develop and implement policies that ensure the promotion of climate change mitigation and adaptation in the land use sector. SEARCA Director Dr. Glenn B. Gregorio… Read more

The Philippine government-hosted Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA) has teamed up with United Kingdom-based ClimateScience to empower people, especially the youth, to contribute to climate solutions. ClimateScience is a United Kingdom-based non-profit organization providing free educational content about the causes, consequences, and solutions to climate change. It aims to make learning fun, accessible, and science-backed. The volunteer-driven team has become the leading provider of accessible educational resources on solutions to climate change globally. “Agriculture takes up everything even the largest share of our usable land resources and we recognize that it can make… Read more

The following link will take you to INQUIRER.net: Agriculture smuggling: An unending torture for PH farmershttps://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1497381/agriculture-smuggling-an-unending-torture-for-ph-farmers… Read more

Gene editing is among the technologies that can be used to improve farm productivity and mitigate the effects of climate change, a biosafety expert said recently. Dr. Carl Ramage, managing director of Rautaki Solutions Inc., gave this statement at the recent webinar, “SOLVE Public Info-sufficiency on Genome-edited Crops,” where he and Dr. Saturnina Halos, president of the Biotechnology Coalition of the Philippines, presented the global and local perspectives on genome editing technologies and biosafety regulations, respectively, a news release said.  Ramage shared several examples of genome editing regulatory approaches implemented in countries, such as Argentina and the United States. He… Read more