The Crop Protection Graduate Program (PPGFS) started in 1991 as a concentration area of the Postgraduate Program in Agronomy (PPGA), the latter being the first postgraduate course at UFPel founded in 1973, both still in operation today. In 1999, with the inclusion of the doctoral level, it was dismembered from the PPGA and was renamed the Crop Protection Program,with areas of knowledge in Entomology, Plant Pathology e Weed Science, the latter starting in 2001.
After acting for 18 years with a single area of concentration (Plant Pathology), in 2017 the program transformed the three areas of knowledge into areas of concentration (Entomology, Plant Pathology and Weed Science). Even more recently (2019) we created new lines of research. In 2021 a new concentration area “Crop Protection” will be created which aims to meet a demand from international students, such as classes taught in English (Fig 1).
Figure 1. Current and planned structure of PPG in Plant Health. Crop Protection will be created in 2021.
The Program’s Strategic Plan (PEP) it is an essential tool in the organization of the program, where its purpose/goal and the limits of action are defined, based on the context (situation – where it is located), expectations (results – where it wants to go) and actions (resources – how to get).
. Mission, Vision and Values
Mission
The Crop Protection Gratuate Program (PPGFs) has the mission of training highly qualified professionals to develop teaching, research and extension activities to meet the important demand for training human resources in Brazil and in the MERCOSUR countries. Furthermore, its mission is to train human resources to generate scientific and technological knowledge through the development of processes, products and/or services aimed at professional ethics, improving the quality of life and food safety.
Vision
The Crop Protection Gratuate Program intends in the near future to reach the status of an international program and to be recognized as a reference in the teaching of Phytosanitary and in scientific and technological development with a focus on the growing demands of agriculture.
Values
The values are respect for ethics in the exercise of the profession and for the diversity of ideas, transparency, scientific quality, commitment to social function, innovative, collaborative and sustainable character.
For the radiographic analysis of the Crop Protection Gratuate Program we used the matriz SWOT (Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities e Threats).
Traditionally, this analysis aims to raise opportunities and threats considering the external environment of the Crop Protection Gratuate Program. Also, the strengths and weaknesses of the PPG were evaluated using the internal conditions. Many points were raised in both conductions but only the most relevant points were considered for the SWOT matrix that was the basis for the elaboration of our strategic plan.
Figure 2. SWOT matrix (Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats) of PPGFs.
Figure 3. Axes of the proposed strategic plan for PPGFs.
