ICOT-P opens new Aquaculture Training & Production Center in Leyte town

By Provincial Media Relations Center
November 26, 2009

TACLOBAN CITY  –  At least 44 high school students benefits from the newly launched Aquaculture Training and Production training, started among three public secondary schools in Leyte, Leyte.

The training course, called Income Creating Opportunities Technology-Project (ICOT-P) on Aquaculture Technology Course, is bankrolled by the provincial government of Leyte to provide livelihood skills to students who are unable to proceed to tertiary level of education and earn a degree.

Leyte Gov. Carlos Jericho Petilla, who initiated the training program under his expanding ICOT-P training courses, led the opening of the ICOT Aquaculture Training and Production Center in Leyte town that covers more or less 10,000 square meters of fish pond apportioned for the aquaculture students.

Already 7,000 square meters of the area have been developed where the students can grow their fish variety.

During the recent inauguration at least 5,000 fish fry or fingerlings of different variety were spread into the constructed fish pond.

The ICOT-P is a pro-poor project initiated by Gov.  Petilla and is being implemented by the Provincial Government of Leyte. It focuses on graduating secondary level students who cannot pursue college education, by providing technology and skills transfer initially on modern agriculture and entrepreneurship, thereby creating opportunities for gainful income with the use of technology even without college education.

With the success of the initial implementation in various public high schools in the province, the ICOT-P program has extented to the field of information technology when it offered the ICOT-P on IT program and providing them a venue for an IT training course throuh the ICOT-P on IT Data Center at the Leyte ICT Park in Palo.

However, with yet another success story and graduating hundreds of high school students from various recipent schools, the program expanded this year to include aquaculture training and production among selected public high schools.

The ICOT-P envisions to bridge societal divides in the province of Leyte by providing opportunities to young students of Leyte to acquire skills and technologies that will make them productive members of the society despite economic situation in life.