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5 Programs for Strengthening and Transitioning the Community Post COVID-19

3 February 2021
Corporate Communication and Alumni Relations Center (CCARC)
In response to the COVID-19 economic downturn, CMU has implemented "reduced" tuition and dormitory fees, is “granting” scholarships to affected students, and "mitigating" circumstances by establishing a student aid fund. The goal is to waiver dormitory fees and living expenses totaling over 715 million baht

In addition, CMU’s Science and Technology Park (STeP) has created “5 Programs to unite CMU to accelerate recovery and transition after COVID-19 (5 Programs: CMU Power for Strengthening and Transitioning Post COVID-19)”.

Program 1: CMU Volunteer Plug and Play (CMU Local Engagement Plug & Play) offers the opportunity to third-year students and unemployed graduates to improve skills, prepare for work, and engage in a community with experts and volunteer community leaders. With a mentor team to give advice and strengthen knowledge, the participants engage in plug & play learning on financial literacy, technology utilization from universities, product development/marketing, and supply chain matching. The program can accommodate up to 750 students and graduates and allows participants to enhance their knowledge, develop production processes, and add sustainable business value to 77 communities.

Program 2: Learning & Working with CMU through the Project No. 2 Job Creation Project sponsored by the Ministry of Higher Education, Science, Research, and Innovation. The program can accommodate up to 3,000 unemployed people and those laid-off from work due to COVID-19, and allows them to earn an income, by providing opportunities to work with departments within Chiang Mai University, such as research assistants, operating staff support and coordination staff, etc.

Program 3: Create a start-up business with CMU (CMU Startup), providing opportunities for final year students and unemployed graduates through the process of creating startups in agriculture and food, health, creative and social businesses. This effort has already registered more than 30 companies.

Program 4: CMU Knowhow for All (CMU Knowhow for All) enhance skills with knowledge and is focused on research and technology. Technology is ready to be transferred to the community such as the production of Kam Chao CMU 107 seeds, bee keeping, bee products processing, the production of pineapple fiber woven cloth, and the development of edible natural coatings for products using natural materials etc., supporting a new generation of farmers. A group of community enterprises have the knowledge and ability to leverage their distribution channels across multiple platforms.

Program 5: The fifth program increases product value via the CMU Pilot Plant for Value-Added plan by utilizing two of Chiang Mai University's infrastructure:

1) Innovative Food Fabrication Pilot Plant to support the development of agricultural products and solve the problem of oversupply, adding value through standardized production processes. This has been successful in helping farmers with oversupply by accepting mango purchases and processing them into crispy mango products, mango in syrup, and mango puree. Study and research added value to the product.

2.) A prototype plant to eliminate insects and insect eggs with radio frequency technology (UTD RF Technology Pilot Plant) raises the level of safety for Thai rice in the region and provides security analysis services to build confidence with packaging that meets customer needs. It is ready to be tested on the market and is available for purchase in the NSP Inno Store, Northern Science Park (Chiang Mai Province).

Every project is due to the cooperation and integration from multiple sources in order to procure and allocate budgets. The budgets are consistent with the work, such as the OWor Work Building Project Phase 2, the Integrated Sub-District Economic and Social Enhancement Project (1 Tambon 1 University), to ensure the implementation of the project is in a timely manner, so part of the budget has been allocated from the approved projects, namely Project 7, New Work Plan, Regional Science Park.

With the support of the Ministry of Education and the project to enhance technology, augment value, and expand research with a prototype factory, it is expected that 5,500 people can be employed from 210 communities, bringing 150 products to market with 50 new SMEs / Startups.
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