THE FARMERS’ TEXT CENTER: EMPOWERING, SUSTAINING AND LINKING FARMERS TO KNOWLEDGE EXPERTS AND REPOSITORIES USING CELLULAR PHONE 1 The Farmers’ Text Center: Empowering, Sustaining and Linking Farmers to Knowledge Experts and Repositories using Cellular Phone Ann Michelle S. Medina It’s been fourteen years since I left the Bureau of Agricultural Research (BAR), a bureau under the Department of Agriculture (DA) in-charge of overseeing all agricultural research for the maximum advantage to agriculture. This was the agency where I first heard the Open Academy for Philippine Agriculture (OPAPA) and their initiative to leverage Information and Communications Technology (ICT) in the agriculture sector. Although, I held an insignificant and temporary position in my five (5) years of stay at the agency, I saw how experts, practitioners and policy makers who are involved in the OPAPA played their role in the establishment of an SMS helpdesk for the food producers – our farmers. Through this initiative, farm workers were empowered, sustained and linked to information using cellular phone through the Farmers’ Text Center (FTC). Introduction History would account for tools used by the different societies as they move from place to place. Primitive weapons were utilized by man in the ‘Hunting and Gathering Societies’ which were upgraded to hand tools during the ‘Horticular and Pastoral Societies’ . Animals and not hand tools matched the ‘ Agrarian Societies’ , machines flourished in the ‘ Industrial Societies’ and only computers equaled the rise of knowledge economy during the ‘ Post-Industrial Societies’ . For each change in time, man continuously adopts and adapts to emerging technologies (socio-cultural evolution) for their daily living, acquisition of relevant information through research and development (R&D), and for connection with others as to communication and knowledge sharing. This is still true today, tools have become sophisticated, portable and ubiquitous. It has disrupted the way people access information by changing the knowledge and discourse (Traxler, 2009), enabling learning anytime, anywhere, and accommodating any type of learner (Thüs, Chatti, Yalcin, Pallasch, Kyryliuk, Mageramov, & Schroeder, 2012). The discussion in this paper exemplified mobile learning in the farm as analyzed through the cultural-historical system of farmers in Barangay Caganganan in Banaybanay, Davao Oriental in a case study conducted by Zagado (2016). As farmers were mediated by cellular phone, they informally acquire new knowledge and skills (activity theory) to govern daily farm challenges through an OPAPA program called Farmers’ Text Center (FTC). Farmers as seekers of information in the Field I can vividly remember the days when my grandfather leaves the house before sunrise and get back at dawn to tend the farm. We used to bring him his mirienda at nine in the morning, his lunch at twelve noon, and afternoon snacks at three. Because farmers are busy tilling the ground, they only rest during these periods. But there are also moments when they cannot even eat because of field problems such as pest infestation or postharvest. In a study conducted by Zagado (2013), he detailed that rice farming is a series of activities which start from land preparation, crop