ASCC Agriculture Majors Participate In Guam Internship

ASCC Press Release Thursday, 16 June 2011
ASCC Agriculture Majors Participate In Guam Internship

(Press Release) Two General Agriculture majors at the American Samoa Community College (ASCC) have joined a gathering of their peers from Guam, the Virgin Islands, the Marshall Islands, Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas Islands, Guam, Palau, and the Federated States of Micronesia for a three and a half week summer internship under the CariPac Consortium, an Internship program through which all land grant institutions in the Caribbean and the Pacific collaborate and share information about agricultural innovation, research and applications. Currently underway at the University of Guam (UOG) campus, the consortium will continue through June 23.

Students: Samuel Ioka Meleisea and Ryan A. Taifane, both in the General Agriculture program offered by the Community & Natural Resources (CNR) division of ASCC, were selected to attend the consortium based on criteria including their GPA and the results of a student interview. Taifane has graduated from ASCC Magna Cum Laude in the spring of this year, while Meleisea expects to graduate this fall. Both students are also affiliated with the ASCC chapter of the prestigious Phi Theta Kappa honors society.

CariPac was formed as a consortium to help address the challenges of providing food and agricultural education to college and university students in the Caribbean and Pacific Islands. In essence, the eight Land Grant colleges and universities in the U.S. insular areas came together to leverage their respective resources, develop new collaborative efforts and to strengthen their own programs. The University of Puerto Rico hosted the Internship program for the past three years, and all the interns had to travel to Puerto Rico for four weeks. This is the first year it is hosted by the University of Guam. “Students participate in a variety of field observations and hands-on laboratories where they can observe and learn about the agricultural businesses and activities that are found on Guam,” said Dr. Prem Singh, UOG faculty member and CariPac Internship Program Coordinator.

Activities include visits to a variety of farms, including the Department of Agriculture organic farm; the Triton Farm’s aquaponics facility; the Watson vegetable/fruit farm which uses a drip irrigation and fertigation system on a farm scale, and utilizes many innovations in its operation; the Ernie Wusting Corn Farm which utilizes a no-till corn production method and which has reduced soil erosion and increased soil depth; Quan's Coconut Farm which supplies fresh coconut drinks to the tourism industry; the Hydroponic Living Lettuce farm; and local plant nurseries to learn about the business and production aspects of modern agribusinesses. They will also visit the ecotourism facility Hamamoto Fruit World to observe how to combine tourism, ecology, vegetable and fruit production, and post harvesting and processing to develop a business enterprise.

In the UOG labs they will learn about plant propagation and grafting and agricultural engineering technologies for Sustainable Tropical Agriculture. The students will learn how to setup an automated micro-irrigation system, irrigation controllers, and learn about water harvesting canopies among other activities. They will also learn about biotechnology in agriculture and observe juvenile shrimp production facilities at UOG’s aquaculture facility and how Guam is fighting the invasion of Rhino beetle that threatens the existence of coconut trees on Guam. “This is an all encompassing three and a half weeks where these students get the opportunity to absorb information that they can take back to their home islands to enhance their own agricultural economies,” said Lee Yudin, Dean of the College of Natural and Applied Sciences and Principal Investigator for the consortium grant.

CNR Dean and Director Tapaau Daniel Aga congratulated Meleaisea and Taifane on successfully applying for the Internship. “American Samoa has enormous challenges as well as exciting opportunities to strengthen agriculture, food security, and improve health“, said Tapaau, "not to forget maintaining our natural resources like forests, water, and coasts. The parents of Sam and Ryan must be proud to see their children represent American Samoa in this internship experience as well as meet other Pacific Islanders and Caribbean Islanders. It's great for us at CNR to see some of our most talented youth show a desire to enter the field of agriculture."

Tapaau reflected that this is the third year CNR students have participated in the CariPac Internship. In past years, former students Toepo Leiataua and Pauline McFall attended the summer program when it was held in Puerto Rico, and both went on to later join CNR as employees.

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