UNAM promotes rural businesses with online education project

Aiming to help producers put their business ideas to work, increase productivity, and improve their economic and environmental decisions, the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) presented a project of online education for rural businesses.

The education plan will seek to help organizations emerging from Mexico’s common lands (‘Ejidos’) , agrarian communities, and small producers, from rural production societies to associations of collective interest, said Alejandro Polanco, an academic at the National University and the project manager.

In a statement, he explained that this proposal is meant for professionals and technicians (agronomists, veterinarians, administrators) who work for or with organizations involved in economic development, in this case, from the south-southeast of the country.

He said that the social or solidarity economy is a web of economic and social actors, companies, and organizations that offer goods and services that are responsive to the needs of society, with a particular feature: They put their focus on working towards the common good and not maximizing profits.

He added that, in light of a rural sector characterized by abandonment of properties and an impoverished population with poor health, aging producers, and single women leading ‘ejido’ units, "we try to promote education at work, getting the most out of computer technologies".

“The course includes lectures, multimedia examples, and rural business models relevant to our context," he claimed, adding that the teachers who will be invited to participate and who will serve as advisors have extensive experience outside the university sector.

In the first stage, an introductory course will be launched to analyze the technical, economic, financial, legal, and environmental feasibility of projects, and continue with an invitation for the graduates to take a diploma, in which they will draw up a business plan that will receive proper financing.

Furthermore, participants will be able to form learning communities and collaborative relationships with academics and university students.

The project, which has an advisory council of specialists from institutions such as the National School of Social Work, and the School of Accounting and Administration , will be evaluated by the Department of Education of the Ibero-American University (Universidad Iberoamericana) .

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