As a way to encourage diligence and commitment to achieve set targets for the agency for CY 2023, the Department of Agriculture – Regional Field Office I, during its recently held Management Committee (ManCom) meeting, recognized its top-performing Operating Units (OU) based on an assessment made by the Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation Division (PMED) utilizing a set of criteria for the evaluation of the units’ Physical and Financial Performance for the 1st Quarter of 2023.

Emerging as the top 1 in program implementation among the Banner Programs is the Corn Banner Program which achieved a rating of 93.33% or equivalent to an Outstanding performance.

Rank 2nd as best performing program implementer is the National Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture Program (NUPAP) which also achieved an Outstanding rating of 93.13%. Coming out in the 3rd rank as best performing program implementer is the High-Value Crops Development Program (HVCDP) which achieved a Very Satisfactory rating of 87.92%.

Meanwhile among the Divisions, the Regulatory Division achieved the highest performance rating of 84.25% or Very Satisfactory rating. This was followed by the Integrated Laboratories Division (ILD) with a Satisfactory rating of 71.98%. Ranking 3rd among the divisions in best performance is the Regional Agriculture and Engineering Division (RAED) with a 71.93% Satisfactory rating.

Under Special Projects, the Special Area for Agricultural Development (SAAD) program was awarded best performance with a Satisfactory rating of 79.53%.

The evaluation rating was based on the operating units’ percentage contribution to the Regional Field Office’s performance where 30% is derived from physical accomplishment, 30% from financial accomplishment; 25% from financially correlated performance; and 15% for compliances for a total of 100% overall performance.

The DA-RFO I Stations, AFD, PMED, AMIA, YFP & GAD/IDS are not yet included in the 1st-semester performance assessment but for inclusion in the year-end evaluation.

In the recent Operations Management Meeting (OMG) held by the DA national office, the DA-RFO I under the leadership of its concurrent Regional Executive Director Dr. Annie Q. Bares, is one of the most improved regions among the regional field offices of DA as the office’s performance inched upward from its previous ranking.

With this positive outlook, the DA-RFO I workforce is more than inspired and focused to better serve the agri sector in Ilocos Region.