Amiran targets more students with internship programme

An agro-technology firm plans to expand its pilot work-placement programme that targets students pursuing agricultural courses to cover more learners.
Amiran Kenya partnered with Egerton University in May to develop an eight-week practical course through which Third Year students undertaking courses at the Faculty of Agriculture were attached to farming enterprises.

“We are looking at expanding this programme to reach more students,” said Gilad Millo, the head of administration and business development at Amiran Kenya. He was speaking during a ceremony to mark the completion of the two-month programme by 35 students.

The partnership intends to produce ‘work-ready’ experts by exposing students to hands-on experience.

The students — who were taking courses in fields such as agri-business management, agricultural economics and animal health — were provided with an opportunity to test skills learnt in the classroom out in the field.

“This partnership helps diversify our curriculum and will improve the quality of our graduates,” said Arnold Opiyo, a senior lecturer in the Department of Crops, Horticulture and Soils at Egerton.

Amiran engages NGO and donor-funded projects that it supplies greenhouse solutions to, to provide training opportunities to the select group of diploma and degree learners.

The firm is exploring the possibility of roping in large-scale farms to open up opportunities for more students in the hope of mentoring the youth to take up farming as an enterprise.