TVIRD partners with Maple Tree Foundation
Adela Tumaban Neri had been looking for additional sources of income to help her husband, Elmer Sr., support their five children. The meager wages he earns as a contractual carpenter, the scarcity of livelihood opportunities, and the absence of lending institutions in their remote mountain village of Canatuan in Siocon, Zamboanga del Norte make the prospects of a better life a distant dream for the Neris.
Adela Neri (second from right), with her youngest child, learns to make bead accessories under SLiP. “I could make use of what I learned here to earn additional income.”
Through its Canatuan Copper-Gold project, a mining company, TVI Resource Development Philippines, Inc. (TVIRD), is providing many basic needs of the Subanons, the indigenous tribe of the Neris and ancestral domain titleholders of Canatuan. In addition to employing some 400 Subanons in its Canatuan gold and silver operations, TVIRD has embarked on sustainable development programs in the areas of education, infrastructure, health and sanitation, as well as livelihood for their hosts; programs which have elevated the quality of life in Canatuan by several rungs. (Adela’s son, Elmer Jr. is a TVIRD scholar; for related story, go to: http://www./newsfeed.php?id=54 ),
Aware, however, that its efforts will simply never be enough to meet the total needs of the community like that of Adela and her family, TVIRD teamed up with the Maple Tree Foundation for Mountain Communities, an NGO, to launch the Skills and Livelihood Program. SLiP, the acronym for the program, aims to supplement TVIRD’s existing livelihood projects by providing employees and residents with entrepreneurial and livelihood skills that they can use after the mine life or as an alternative income source.
Neri sells her homemade rice cakes at the community market to earn additional income for her family.
SLiP has proven to be ideal for Adela. She learned to make bead accessories in a workshop that TVIRD and Maple Tree initially conducted for members of the Siocon Subanon Women’s Association, Inc. to which she belongs. Together with her colleagues in this local women’s group, Adela now sells various bead trinkets, along with the homemade food products she vends at the community market.
“Maayo na lang kay adunay ingon niini nga programa ang TVIRD. Mahimo kini nga gamiton nako isip dugang nga kapangitaan (It’s good that TVIRD has a program like this. I could make use of it for additional income),” she said.
Adela added that SLiP has given her the opportunity to experience education again, something she had missed for a long time, having finished only fourth grade in elementary school. She related that even if she wanted to attend short courses in nearby towns, her husband couldn’t afford to send her, owing to the fact that money has been hard to come by. Just recently, Elmer Sr. lost his job.
TVIRD Vice President for Philippine Operations Yulo Perez (left) checks out the finished products of Subanon women. The company’s community development initiatives are centered around creating an environment where people could effectively participate in wealth creation during and beyond the operation of TVIRD.
“We intend to expand both the reach of – and the number of courses offered under – SLiP,” Feliece Yeban, TVIRD vice president for Social Commitments, said. “Our community development initiatives are centered around creating an environment where people could effectively participate in wealth creation during and beyond the operation of TVIRD. We do this by building on what they already have and enhancing further their skills, their capabilities, and their confidence to engage in entrepreneurial activities so they can transform their families and the communities in which they live. As the saying goes: `Give a woman a fish and she eats for a day; teach her to fish and she eats for a lifetime’.”
Yeban said that apart from the Bead Accessories Workshop, other courses lined up under SLiP include: Home Bakeshop, Wood Framing, Orchid Raising, Candle and Potpourri Making, Basic Food Preparation and Production, Traditional and Alternative Medicines, Niyogosyo (from niyog, which means coconut; and negosyo, business, i.e., production and selling of coconut by-products such as virgin coco oil and soap).
“Through SLiP, we will seek to link potential entrepreneurs with the different enterprise development programs of the government, NGOs, cooperatives and various agencies with ongoing enterprise development and promotion programs such as the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA), the Technology Resource Center (TRC) and the Cooperative Development Authority (CDA) to further enhance the skills that the participants will acquire from the program,” Yeban further explained. “Investments Advisory Services will likewise be provided thru the SLiP program in coordination with established banks and financial institutions.”
A better life may still be a distant dream for the Neris. But SLiP could well be the catalyst that will rouse them from the doldrums.
Bead accessories made in Canatuan.