Progress 09/01/21 to 08/31/22
Outputs
Target Audience:The local farmers of American Samoa were in a pretentious state with shortages without proper control of supplies and expert assistance for agricultural farming needs and activities. An uprise in shipment costs and supplies left the community in a very distraught condition even more so with restrictions due to COVID-19 Pandemic. This disorder affected the agricultural community and economy due to insufficient resources, supplies and other necessities to fulfill obligations both social and economically. The American Samoa agricultural communities are one of the most neglected sectors of the economic development within the territory. Local farmers received no aid for their unfortunate situations and farming needs. These are apparent stressors that's distressed many of the local farmers from producing or maintaining their farmlands to provide for their families and their usual farming essentials. The distress within the agricultural communities affected the livelihood of many local farmers and families in general. In the same year of the pandemic, the distressed and afflicted became self-destructive. Without basic aid, help and support the agricultural communities suffered and endured their losses, misplacing their constructive confidence to ensue their usual agricultural activities and replacing them with mental health issues within agricultural communities. When local farmers do not produce it is indicative of issues within agricultural communities that need be addressed at its earliest. To be with mental health issues that's affecting performance, behavior and thought process, the American Samoa Department of Agriculture is encouraged to provide the distressed and prevent suicide with its Farmers De-Stress & Prevention Assistance by proposing a Farmers Assistance & Resource Management Stress & Suicide (FARMS²)-Helpline to collect data, analyze, evaluate and identify mental health issues most common within the agricultural communities. Identifying the mental health issues will facilitate our efforts to finding solutions with supporting partners of the American Samoa Department of Human Social Service and the American Samoa Department of Public Health to remedy diverse situations with professional assistance, services, outreach to alleviate stress and prevent suicide. To increase awareness of mental health issues within agricultural communities, is to also increase agricultural activities conducive to economic development and growth for enhancement of the American Samoa territory. Local Farmers within the Agricultural community and the general community of American Samoa. Farmers with mental health issues caused by related farm work, concerns, funding and resources. Identifying whether there were any mental health related conditions affecting the farmers productivity and or production with their farming activities. Throughout the duration of this project, the American Samoa Government Department of Agriculture established a Call Center or general Help Line that would assist farmers with technical support and the ease of information, resources and guidance with their appropriate needs; the first ever established call center of the ASG DOA was created to help the farmers within the farming community as there was no direct assistance received by the farmers within the territory. With this new establishment of operating its first call center to assist and identify farmers with mental health issues, the ASG DOA worked together with the American Samoa Government Department of Human and Social Services and ASG Department of Public Health. The target audience opened up to the general community anticipating there would be other types of callers aside farmers to contact the ASG DOA for random information nonrelated to agricultural activities. Changes/Problems:Efforts put forth by the ASG DOA to meet deadlines and initiating the call center/helpline services was rather complicated considering paperwork for personnel processed through the ASG HR; purchases of equipments are processed through the ASG Procurement; Issues with ASG Budget and ASG Treasury departments who processes all purchase orders for payment. To this date, the ASG DOA is still short of a call operator/dispatcher due to processes with the ASG HR, no valid explanation of the delay. The ASG DOA has managed to make do with what we were able to get done within this reporting period. The American Samoa Government have been very helpful, however because of the vast papertrail work, it prevents our efforts to report and provide information pertinent for the purpose of this project. Minor changes as we were not able to fully procure the total funding due to the paperwork required by local agencies however, the establishment of the ASG DOA's helpline call center was the greatest achievement under this grant project. With the ASG DOA efforts throughout the term of this project, we were successful in getting the awareness out to the agricultural community and the community as a whole with continuing to provide technical support through our call center. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Training and Professional development has been successfully conducted by our Partners; ASG DHSS and ASG DPH. Training entailed Phone eticate, customer service, the differences between mental health and mental health problems, identifying stressors, covering the multitude of scenarios, conducted hands-on with ASG DOA call operators/dispatchers to handle the different types of calls ranging from a normal farmer calling in to critical calls requiring their professional assistance for mental health cases and the public safety (911) emergency transfer calls when appropriate. We've had prior meetings with our partners including the ASG local government of the Samoan Affairs to layout the execution for the professional training and development for the ASG DOA Call Center/Helpline; considering it being the initial and new establishment within the ASG DOA, there was much to discuss and with the meetings it successfully paved the way for ASG DOA's Call Operators/Dispatchers to get a better grasp and understanding of the expectations from the agricultural community as well as those with mental heal problems. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Because of the COVID-19 outbreak within the Territory, results have been proclaimed by the ASG DOA, Grants Manager, the Call Operators/Dispatchers, the ASG DOA, the ASG DPH, ASG DHSS and ASG Local Government of the established Call Center within the ASG DOA. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?
Nothing Reported
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
ASDOA successfully hired 11 Call Operators/Dispatchers for the Project Goal of establishing the first Call Center within the Territory of American Samoa to assist with the Agricultural Community. ASDOA successfully established its ASDOA FARMS²-Helpline with direct number registered with the local American Samoa Telecommunications as: 699-AGRI (2474) Helpline for Farmers. Completed Professional Training with the ASG DHSS and the ASG DPH for ASG DOA's Call Operators/Dispatchers in January of 2022.Due to the COVID-19 Outbreak within the American Samoa Territory this year, Awareness Programs and further workshops with the local farmers have been prohibited with the American Samoa Government Declaration for Public Health. However the ASG DOA has been operable after successful installations and have been taking calls for the farming community. Launching will be conducted virtually as it cannot be done for public gatherings due to COVID-19 outbreak. Awareness is at a minimal currently due to COVID-19 local outbreak. At the end of the project year, the ASG DOA successfully accomplished its goals with being able to assist farmers and the general community throughout its helpline call center providing technical assistance, properly dispatch calls to its appropriate destination and most importantly identifying there aren't any mental health related conditions within the agricultural community. Common factors causing most of the local farmers stress is from family matters, finances and other non agricultural activities.
Publications
- Type:
Other
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2022
Citation:
Not an actual citation however the display of the USDA Logo on the ASG DOA Vehicle as means of marketing the ASG DOA Call Center as well as displaying the USDA Logo on Pull Up banners indicative of the Helpline number, time and services DOA would be providing for the farmers.
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