CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY – In compliance with Republic Act 10173, the country’s Data Privacy Law, the Special Area for Agricultural Development (SAAD) Program of the Department of Agriculture (DA) enhanced its internal protocol on data privacy and management by crafting its Data Privacy Manual.
SAAD convened its regional IT and Database Development and Public Relations and Development Communications personnel from 15 SAAD-implementing regions nationwide, for a training-workshop on Data Privacy and Management on October 2-6 here.
The program’s National Director Ulysses J. Lustria, Jr. said the activity is reflective of the program’s intent to train its personnel on the Data Privacy Act (DPA) and its Implementing Rules and Regulations to protect farmers and fishers’ information housed in the program’s database system.
“The training workshop helps improve our implementation of SAAD. [Moving onward], we know how to collect, store, process, and dispose of data properly,” he said, stressing the importance of proper data handling to protect SAAD’s data subjects and clients – the farmers and fisherfolk.
Dir Lustria stressed that after SAAD [phase 2] implementation in 2028, others can use the data for research, policy-making, and [implementation] of other projects similar to SAAD.
Data Privacy expert Atty. Jose Angelo Tiglao and Atty. Willie Ann Angsiy, DA legal service director, who concurrently serves as the agency’s Data Protection Officer, apprised the participants of the salient features of DPA and protocols for responsible and accountable data management.
The training specifically emphasized proactive measures in preventing, managing, and responding to data breach incidents to avoid unlawful and harmful data leaks.
Significantly, the training enables SAAD’s IT and Communications personnel to foster DPA-compliant procedures in collecting, storing, processing, using and publishing farmers’ and fishers’ data in carrying out their respective functions in consonance with the SAAD mandate.
For his part, DA-10 Regional Executive Director and SAAD-Northern Mindanao focal person Carlene C. Collado, enjoined SAAD personnel in the region to be receptive to their duty not only to help the farmers and fisherfolk, but also to protect them from any harm such as data breach.
He also urged ways to improve SAAD-10’s data management protocol to better protect the farmers’ information under its care.
Said event was also participated by SAAD personnel from the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR), information officers from the Regional Agriculture and Fisheries Information Section (RAFIS) and the Agriculture and Fisheries Information Division (AFID), and personnel from the Office of the DA Secretary.
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