Unlad Kabayan’s ED on Mornings @ ANC

With Mornings @ ANC host Ricky Carandang

May-an Villalba, Unlad Kabayan’s executive director, recently appeared on the news program “Mornings @ ANC” on the ABS-CBN News Channel.

On February 22, host Ricky Carandang talked to her about her recent Social Entrepreneur award from Ernst and Young, and asked what makes social entrepreneurship different from corporate social responsibility. “It’s about social value creation and addressing social and economic issues in society,” Ms. Villalba answered. “Rather than develop oneself as an entrepreneur, we develop enterprises and entrepreneurs from the ranks of migrants and the poor. The challenge is, as we do this, migration still continues.” Women Entrepreneur awardee and Cibo restaurant owner Margarita Fores was also interviewed on the show.

Ms. Villalba made a second appearance on April 9 with host Marieton Pacheco, to talk about breaking the cycle of labor migration. Passion and enthusiasm will go a long way for returned migrants as they gradually become entrepreneurs in their own right, Ms. Villalba explained. Love for country was also discussed. “It’s not like they can go shopping for another country,” Ms. Villalba said. “This is the only one they have.”

Unlad Kabayan: A dose of hope for OFWs

By Dennis Carcamo
abs-cbnNEWS.com – Pinoy Migration
March 27, 2008

It has become a cycle of migration: Filipino workers go abroad, earn a little, return to the Philippines, use up the savings, and then work abroad again. More often than not, overseas workers do not get to break this cycle.

This is where Unlad Kabayan Migrant Services Foundation, Inc. steps in.
Its goal: to help develop an entrepreneurial mindset among overseas Filipino workers (OFWs).

This non-government organization, which was recently nominated for Ernst and Young's Entrepreneur of the Year Award, encourages OFWs to invest their hard-earned money in businesses in the Philippines.

“We give them assistance. We support their families so they can start their own income-generating projects,” said Unlad Kabayan’s executive director Maria Angela "May-an" Villalba.

Start of hope

Established in 1996, Unlad Kabayan pioneered the innovative approach of harnessing migrant workers' resources to bear on local economy development.

Unlad Kabayan entered its "entrepreneurial" stage in 2001-2005. This was the period for expanding its work in mobilizing savings and investments, and ramping up social enterprises into commercial operations.

In the early ‘90s, Migrant Savings for Alternative Investment (MSAI) was developed as a reintegration strategy by migrant groups in Hong Kong assisted by Unlad Kabayan.

Unlad Kabayan then set up MSAI groups in Japan and Hong Kong in 1996 to 1998, also individuals in various destination countries, providing capital for expanding microfinance operations and micro-enterprise building in the country.

MSAI evolved – it went beyond mobilizing migrant savings overseas and worked towards investing for community development and reintegration. Two strategies were employed: SEEDS (Social Entrepreneurship and Enterprise Development Services) and Business Incubation (BI).

SEEDS were designed as community-based training and resource centers to promote entrepreneurship in communities.

Meanwhile, BI enables small and medium entrepreneurs to learn the rigors of business management and social responsibility.

Two-pronged approach

Clearly, helping OFWs to start a business is not the goal of Unlad Kabayan, Villalba added, but also helps build sustainable communities especially in remote areas which traditional businessmen tend to ignore.

“We design the framework on how to build sustainable communities where the investments and savings of the migrant workers are funneled,” she said.

She said when the OFWs finally return to the communities, they will be productive members of the community as well.

Villalba cited one success story of 55 Filipino migrant workers in Taiwan. The group has raised more than P3 million capital and bought a rice mill foreclosed by Land Bank of the Philippines.

“Now they have a rice mill, palay trading, agrivet, and farm credit,” she said.
During the more than 10 years of its existence, Unlad Kabayan and its partners have helped more than 5,000 OFW families.

Unfazed by challenges

Though the programs of Unlad Kabayan have been gaining substantial ground, Villalba said they still need the much-needed funding for every income generating project they help put up for the OFWs.

Villalba said they also face many OFWs who looked askance at the NGO’s programs.
“It’s their money and they fear that they’ll lose that if the business goes bankrupt,” she said.

Despite the criticisms and limited financial assistance (Unlad Kabayan gets its money to operate from NGO partners here and abroad), the group already has helped established income generating projects, mostly in the remote parts of the country in the South.

Villalba said she is not disheartened by such stumbling blocks because many OFWs still need help.

“If you lose hope you are just saying that all this time and all the years to come we will just export our people. Its like that and then you will find them in other countries cleaning toilets of other people, cleaning bottoms of old people, cleaning airports. Is that what should happen? It's not even hope and optimism, it is the urge that we should do something about our economy,” Villalba said.

Full steam ahead

As of moment, Villalba said Unlad Kabayan has not lost steam, continuing to forge ahead with its programs.

“Our work just goes on. Many migrant workers are asking for support,” Villalba said, adding that they aim to convince 1,000 OFWs a year to join the programs of Unlad Kabayan.

She said that until the government comes up with decent paying jobs, Filipinos will continue to go out of the country to look for better opportunities.

“If there are decent jobs here, they will not leave,” Villalba said.

OFW boycotts in the works

By Miko Morelos
Philippine Daily Inquirer
March 13, 2008

Different OFW groups, including the militant Migrante, recently called for a “Zero Remittance day” to dramatize their protest against President Macapagal-Arroyo in connection with the scandal-ridden $329-million National Broadband Network deal with China’s ZTE Corp.

Maita Santiago, Migrante International secretary general, said in a statement that the boycott would go on monthly as the group urges more OFWs around the world not to send money to the Philippines on certain days.

“That amounts to more than $30 million daily. Secretary Romulo Neri acknowledged that through our remittances, we are treated by Arroyo as an ‘exhaust valve’ for her bankrupt economy. We will no longer stand idly by while she relies on us to prop up her ailing economy,” Santiago said.

Another boycott, against Western Union

Meanwhile a US-based network of migrant workers groups has instigated a US-wide boycott against the remittance pioneer Western Union for allegedly neglecting to invest in immigrant communities’ welfare.

Western Union has disputed the claim, saying the engagements and partnerships they formed have helped “foster economic opportunity in our communities around the world.”

Transnational Institute for Grassroots Research and Action (Tigra) has been pressing Western Union to espouse “a written policy for community reinvestment that would prioritize building social capital in immigrant communities,” says its executive director Francis Calpotura, a Filipino-American. He was in the country in late January to coordinate with local migrants’ group a Philippine-wide boycott of Western Union.

This has yet to materialize, however. One of the migrant workers’ groups, the Center for Migrant Advocacy (CMA), has yet to complete its field work on the issue, said Ellene Sana of CMA.

Genuine community reinvestment

With a network of 200-strong migrant organizations, Tigra is asking Western Union to take up a covenant with migrant organizations, with the company promising “genuine” community reinvestment aside from lower money transfer fees and reasonable exchange rates. Tigra, whose advocacy is to promote economic justice for migrants, calls the proposed accord a “Transnational Community Benefits Agreement.”

Western Union pointed out, however, that its charitable foundation formed seven years ago has been giving back different forms of aid and “empowerment through education and global economic opportunity programs,” especially to migrant communities.

In a statement sent to the Inquirer, Angela Heng, company vice president based in Hong Kong, said, “Western Union believes that helping migrants can take many forms, from supporting them in the countries where they work, to supporting the families they leave behind. When Western Union supports community programs in the home countries of migrant workers, we are joining with our migrant worker customers in their efforts to build better lives for their families.”

Being the largest remittance company in the world, Western Union is an “indicator” of the industry, Calpotura said. He believed that if they could get Western Union to take the lead in adopting a TCBA, smaller remittance companies would definitely follow suit.

For more reinvestment

Aside from its telegraph operations, Western Union first offered money transfer service in 1871, making it the pioneer in remittance industry. It left the telecommunications business in 1879, but it now has more than 200,000 agents spread over 150 countries, according to the company website.

With the surge of the deployment of migrant workers to developed countries in the last 15 years, couriers and money transfer businesses have enjoyed a boom in channeling remittances from migrants to their home countries.

In a study published last year, the World Bank’s migration and remittance team noted that more migrants were sending their remittances through formal channels like banks, money transfer companies and the like.

“Large money transfer operators have therefore benefited from the shifting flows,” said the report released in November 2007.

Responsibility to consumers

It is only fair that companies who profit from migrant workers’ hard earned cash help in building communities of migrant families, Calpotura noted.

Aside from “cleaning up” the remittance business, Tigra advocates for more “community reinvestment” by the money transfer industry. Tigra is holding negotiations with four other industry players willing to adopt a TCBA.

Since its inception in December 2000, Western Union Foundation has given more than $40 million in humanitarian aid “to more than 1,500 non-governmental organizations in more than 70 countries,” according to the foundation’s website.

In 2006, the foundation granted more than $9 million to communities worldwide, an annual report of the WUF posted at the company’s website said.

Besides scholarships and funding for programs, Western Union Foundation says it also supported disaster relief operations in calamities in different parts of the globe, helping victims of the 2004 killer tsunami in Thailand and the 2006 Guinsaugon landslide.

In September 2007, WUF also launched “Our World, Our Family”—a $50 million, five-year initiative which aimed “to help migrant families stay connected, overcome barriers, and realize their dreams.

Heng said a need-assessment program has just been completed and the first phase of the project is expected to be rolled out in the Philippines and Guatemala within this year.

Calpotura however said that it’s more about marketing its product than uplifting standards of living of migrant workers. “The bigger concern here is their responsibility to their consumers,” he added.

“They need to reorient their giving (for it) to be a real partnership. The foundation is more focused on marketing rather than investing in social capital,” he said. “Will Western Union be part of that? Or will they still refuse when it’s already happening?”

OFW-entrepreneurs in unserved areas to benefit from Php10-M loan

May-an Villalba shakes hands with DBP President Reynaldo David after the MOA signing

From DBP Bulletin
March 10, 2008

The Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP) has granted a Php10-million credit line to Unlad Kabayan Migrant Services Foundation to finance its various savings and enterprise development programs for returning migrant workers and micro-entrepreneurs.

DBP’s partnership with Unlad Kabayan signals the bank’s intensified micro-finance efforts for unserved areas in Mindanao. Unlad Kabayan currently operates in different areas of the region: Lanao del Norte, Surigao del Norte, Davao City, Davao Oriental, Compostela Valley and Bukidnon.

DBP president Reynaldo David said the assistance will help Unlad Kabayan strengthen its credit program for returning overseas Filipino workers who are looking to establish their own businesses, and for women and micro-entrepreneurs.

Established in 1996, Unlad Kabayan is credited for introducing a migrant savings program wherein generated funds are invested into various products and services like micro-finance loans. It also provides enterprise development services such as crafting of business feasibility plans and finance management training.

Int'l Women's Day at reintegration center

Elsa Belarmino (2nd from right), who started her business through the reintegration program of Hope Workers Center and Unlad Kabayan

On March 7, Unlad Kabayan celebrated International Women's Day with returned migrant women at the National Reitegration Center for OFWs (NRCO) in Intramuros, Manila.

A 'Kapihan Series' hosted by Sec. Arturo Brion, then Secretary of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), and beauty queen Miriam Quiambao, was televised live from the NRCO over the NBN TV channel. Elsa Belarmino, a returned caregiver from Taiwan who now manages the Matin-ao Rice Center in Surigao del Norte, a community enterprise assisted by Unlad Kabayan, was one of the featured guests. Unlad Kabayan's Executive Director, May-an Villalba, was interviewed as well by Ms. Quiambao. Unlad Kabayan's booth at the premises featured handicrafts, plant-holders and rugs from the coconut fiber processing plant supported by Unlad Kabayan in Davao Oriental.

Unlad Kabayan’s ED is Social Entrepreneur of the Year

With Kevin Teo (left) of Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship and Reynaldo David (right) of DBP

From Business World
February 6, 2008

Maria Angela Villalba, Executive Director of Unlad Kabayan Migrant Services Foundation, was named Social Entrepreneur of 2007 in the recent awards sponsored globally by Ernst & Young, and in the Philippines by SGV Foundation.

Ms. Villalba was cited for linking the benefits of migration to local community development by harnessing migrants' resources and infusing them into social enterprises in the Philippines. At present, Unlad Kabayan has two migrant-invested social enterprises: Matin-ao Rice Center in Surigao del Norte and FAMDev Integrated Farm in Bukidnon.

The panel of judges recognized Villalba's practical, innovative and market-oriented approach to community-based business by creating products and services that address the challenges faced by communities, help solve complex social problems and benefit the marginalized and the poor. Aside from the two migrant-invested enterprises, Unlad Kabayan incubates three other social enterprises: coconut fiber processing in Davao Oriental, food processing in Davao and virgin coconut oil production in Lanao del Norte.

All nominees for the award went through a strict financial data ranking system used by all Entrepreneur of the Year participating countries. The finalists were further evaluated by an independent panel of judges composed of distinguished personalities from government, business and academe.

The Entrepreneur of the Year was founded in the United States by professional services firm Ernst & Young in 1986 to recognize the achievements of the most successful and innovative entrepreneurs worldwide. In the Philippines, SGV Foundation established the Entrepreneur of the Year in 2003 and presented its very first award to Jollibee Foods Corporation President and CEO Tony Tan Caktiong.

Sweet and sour flight

By Babes Romualdez
Philippine Star – Business
January 31, 2008

In spite of it all, there’s still some good news. The wife of the former Canadian Ambassador to the Philippines, Mrs. Marilyn Collette, told me that there was this Filipina who was a participant in the “invitation only” Summit for Social Entrepreneurs that was held in Zurich last week. The Summit is held under the aegis of the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship (founded by World Economic Forum founder Klaus Schwab) which is leading a worldwide movement, doing the not-for-profit work of addressing the world’s social problems using private sector means.

The Filipina is Maria Angela Villalba, the founder and director of Unlad Kabayan Migrant Services Foundation of the Philippines, and is apparently getting the nod and respect of social entrepreneurs the world over because of the work she has been doing. Villalba’s organization is active in finance and development including credit assistance, enterprise development, education and training, advocacy and research, and currently assists projects in coco fiber processing plants, integrated agri-business farming, rice centers, virgin coconut oil processing, food processing and communities of backyard livestock and crop production.

Apparently, Ms. Villalba, who has a degree in Social Work at the University of the Philippines in Diliman, became attuned to the plight of OFWs during her stint with the Asian Migrant Centre in Hong Kong, and thus created a program to help migrantworkers build long-term businesses at home.
This is what I mean when I say that there’s still a lot of hope for this country because, really, it’s the people who are its greatest resources. We have so many Filipinos who, given the right environment and opportunity, can help make this country take its rightful place among the best in the world.