DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 01 Sept) — Organizers of a three-day entrepreneurship boot camp in Davao City will gather women entrepreneurs and innovators to discuss issues and come up with solutions to the problems confronting the cacao industry in the region and Mindanao.
“The objective is to help in coming up with tech ideas for the cacao/chocolate industry and help the ‘idea owners’ create a business model around these ideas through the entrepreneurship boot camp at the Startup Weekend,” Mary Rose Ofianga, organizer of the Startup Weekend Women Davao 2019, said on Sunday.
She said the boot camp will gather female students, developers, engineers, and entrepreneurs from September 20 to 22 at the TechHub Corporation here to connect, formulate, create a team, and pitch ideas for solutions to the pressing challenges faced by the cacao industry players of Mindanao.
“We encourage the women to get out of their usual comfort zone and discover their potentials and to do business and to create solutions,” she said.
Ofianga said organizers created an entrepreneurship boot camp designed specifically for women to inspire them to ideate, create, and innovate solutions because “women can do more with technology.”
Among the industry stakeholders who will participate in the program are farmers, producers, processors, consolidators, and officials from Rural Agro-Industrial Partnership for Inclusive Development and Growth-Department of Agriculture, Department of Trade, Department of Science and Technology, City Agriculturist office, Mindanao Development Authority, and City Gender and Development Office.
“This year, Startup Weekend Women Davao focuses on creating solutions for the Cacao industry in Davao Region and Mindanao. The Cacao industry has been ranked to be one of the hottest fields of agriculture in Davao City,” she said.
During the boot camp, participants will generate and polish ideas that will benefit the agriculture sector either of the city or the Philippines, she said.
“Their ideas will be validated and solidified on Day 2 where the participants will receive mentorship coming from people who are experts in business and technology,” she said.
She said the boot camp is open to individuals and teams of three to eight members with innovative ideas addressing the challenges of the cacao/chocolate industry. (Antonio L. Colina IV / MindaNews)
