by Krystal Paco

Guam - The University of Guam played host to this year's CariPac Internship Program, where students learned about agriculture for sustainability. The 2011 Caribbean and Pacific Consortium Summer Internship is a three and a half-week program engaged students in field activities and hands-on laboratories to observe and learn about agricultural components on Guam.

CariPac coordinator Prem Singh told KUAM News, "The most important thing is that there is a lot of agriculture on Guam. We think there is nothing going on. You take different disciplines from ecotourism to farming growing bananas, tomatoes, any vegetables hydroponic, aquaponics, so there is a lot of activities and how do we incorporate sustainable technologies for agriculture."

12 college students from the Northern Mariana Islands, American Samoa, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, Palau, and Guam participated. Lucas Laplace is a student from the Virgin Islands and said, "The teachers are very knowledgeable about what they do. They're very professional. Always on time, always gave us the information we need to gain experience and knowledge. They weren't afraid to share any information with us. They're definitely some of the best teachers in the world."

The CariPac experience has made Laplace consider changing his major to agriculture, as he said, "I feel it's the best opportunity I ever had. It gave me an insight into agriculture. I already knew a bit about agriculture but it opened my mind more. It gave me the details of all the different fields of agriculture and it's just been great."

Funding is already available for next year's CariPac internship, which Guam will again host. For more information contact UOG College of Natural and Applied Sciences at 735-2000.