With overseas jobs getting more scarce, it is about time that alternative employment or income sources are made available to Overseas Filipino Workers (OFW). The Bantay OCW Foundation recently launched its Operations Center that provides free IT training led by Informatics Philippines to OFWs and their dependents.

The facility was set up through the partnership between Informatics and Bantay OCW, under the corporate citizenry arm of the educational institution—SHIFT or Society for Higher Information Technology Education. The Mandaluyong-based center offers courses that equip OFWs and their families with basic skills in word processing, internet browsing, typing and using the mouse.

“IT skills help OFWs and their families in the midst of fluctuating international job markets and may even give an OFW the necessary tools to start a fruitful career without having to go overseas. With the local IT-BPO industry growing at a steady pace, leaving the country for work will soon become a choice, rather than a necessity, for more Filipinos,” says Leo Riingen, CEO of Informatics Philippines.

For more information on the Bantay OCW Foundation Center, contact Ellen Cruz through 6553671 or mecruz@informatics.com.ph.

As part of the celebrations of SME Development Week, DTI Secretary Gregory L. Domingo recently announced that budding entrepreneurs can avail of free entrepreneurship training programs to be offered on 8-9 July 2011, at the Philippine Trade Training Center. This is in keeping with the drive to encourage more Filipinos to participate in the SME sector, with the call to action “Pinoy SME: Business Tayo!”

The free entrepreneurship programs will consist of Business Development Briefing Sessions offered by DTI-Bureau of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprise Development (BMSMED) as part of its mandate to provide start-up enterprises with a knowledge base on a wide range of topics relevant to SME development.

Scheduled in the morning of Friday, 8 July 2011 are the following briefings: How to be an Entrepreneur; Barangay Micro Business Enterprise (BMBE) Law; Awareness on Product Standards Law; Consumer Rights and Protection; How to Acquire a BFAD Certificate.

The afternoon session for Friday, 8 July 2011 will offer: Integrated Business Licensing; Orientation on HALAL Certification; Orientation on the Cleaner Production for Small Business; Packaging Design and Labeling; Product Design Awareness; Orientation on Registering for Patents, Trademarks and Trade Names.

Meanwhile, the Philippine Trade Training Center (PTTC), which specializes in training programs intended to strengthen the Filipino export sector’s competitive advantage in the world market will also be offering free business management and demo skills sessions.

The course offerings on Friday, 8 July 2011 consist of: Basic Hilot; E-marketing – Setting up a Webstore; How to Set up a Laundry Business; Perfume and Cologne Making; Exploring Business Opportunities in Kosher Markets; Herbal Soap Making; Meat Processing 1 & 2; Basic Beadworks; Laundry and Cleaning Aids; and Gift-wrapping.

On Saturday, 9 July 2011, the free training will cover: Basic photography; Flip-flops Making; Managing a Money Changer Shop; Financing and Lending Programs; How to Start a Business; Food Safety; Siopao and Dimsum Making; No-bake Cakes; Polvoron and Pastillas Making; Buying a Franchise; Apartment/Commercial Stall Rental Business; Perfume and Cologne Making; Advanced Beadworks; Cleaning Aids 2; Flowers and Balloon Arrangement; and Empanada, Pizza Rolls.

Participants to the free entrepreneurship training programs will be accepted on a first come, first served basis, with registrations starting at 7:30AM. For more information, please call DTI-BMSMED at telephone numbers 897 1693 or 751 5076, and PTTC at telephone numbers 468 8962 to 70 or visit http://www.dti.gov.ph/uploads/DownloadableForms/SME_Bulletin_Final.pdf.

It must have been thirty years ago when I worked at the UP Institute for Small Scale Industries in the early 80′s. Providing ways to increase productivity in the agricultural sector is the solution to develop our economy. Our country is rich in natural resources and I find it disheartening that all these agricultural development plans did not take off as planned. Senator Kiko Pangilinan believes “farmtreneurs” is the key to food secuirity and job security, Here is his statement:

Senator Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan today says that he will work closely with the Department of Agriculture and Malacanang in providing opportunities for those without jobs and displaced OFWs by enjoining them to venture into farming.

“There are a lot of opportunities to be had in farming,” says Pangilinan, who as current chairman of the Senate Committee on Food and Agriculture has been going around the country surveying several farms and gathering data. “What is needed is a synergy of the whole chain—from the producers to the traders.”

Pangilinan along with the Department of Agriculture and the private sector convened the Agriculture and Fisheries 2025 (AF2025), gathering for the first time representatives of farmers, traders, suppliers and media to craft a long-term plan in addressing the country’s various agriculture and fisheries issues.

“Malacanang has fielded the idea of providing hectares of land for lease to informal settlers, and we feel that this plan should also include OFWs and the millions unemployed in the country. We need to propagate the idea of having ‘farmtreneurs’. This means shifting the paradigm away from the idea of leaving the country for greener pasteurs. The opportunities will be here and Filipinos won’t need to leave the comforts of their motherland.”

Pangilinan explains that ‘farmtreneurs’ will be different from how farmers are generally perceived. “We will build their capacity to earn more by providing them the means to sell their products directly to market via our fellow AF2025 convenors. We also have in AF2025 the built-in network to ensure the sustainability of the project.”

Pangilinan adds that having farmtreneurs would also address the need for increased crop output.

“The DA has reported an unprecedented increase in the harvest of palay this year. But fisheries and livestock continue to lag behind. Having ‘farmtreneurs’ will help the whole sector as farming becomes more profitable for them. Increased output is essentially what is needed for food self-sufficiency.”

“This is an out-of-the box way of approaching decades-old problem of unemployment, poverty, and food self-sufficiency. And this is exactly the proverbial shot in the arm needed to boost further what the DA under the Aquino administration has accomplished. It is about time our agriculture and fisheries sector get the recognition and status that they deserve.”

Photo credit

The execution of the three Filipino drug mules in China is a long testament to the ugly diaspora of our countrymen who are forced to leave abroad to better the lives of their families. Perhaps, our agony from the burden of seeing OFWs dying from lethal injection in China is far from over as we have yet more than 70 of them on death row.

Sally Ordinario, Ramon Credo, and Elizabeth Batain and their families may have categorically classified themselves as victims of drug trafficking but we cannot deny that the imposition of punishment by a foreign country to drug couriers should not be viewed with a local sentiment but seeing things on a broader perspective; that anyone who visits a foreign land should by all means respect and follow the law of that country. Nothing more, nothing less.

Philippine Laws in the Face of Drug Couriers’ Execution’

In light of the increasing number of OFWs on death row, our very own laws are under attack because of our lack of implementation and our inability to punish criminals who commit drug trafficking within our national premises. I don’t know but for ordinary people like me it’s difficult to understand the fact that we deport criminals, face the law of their own countries, rather than make them pay for the punishment set by our own laws for the crime they commit. I know it’s all about taking care of our foreign policy but don’t you think we are in the face of reducing our constitution into a piece of a mere cardboard game?

It Takes “Two” to Tango

Things like this happens because we allow them to happen. We dream of a good life for our family but to continuously allow people to proliferate to the point of having to force one member to leave abroad for work is never logical to me. This is one reason why I do not understand the sentiments of people who are against family planning and those who are against the RH Bill. Denying people of a life with only having the number of children they can afford to care for is far more immoral than having to wear that rubber and decide when it’s time to add more members to a tribe.

I’m not against the faithful who fervently follow the teachings of the few “wise men” in robes but what I do not understand is to follow someone without question and without the basis of personal reason. To follow blindly is a curse that has plagued mankind who are enslaved by “organizations” who have a long track record of civic persecution.

I am a witness to the ugliness of poverty and a testament to how the poor have spent their lives in noontime shows and the promise of politicians to make their lives better only to find themselves still drowned from the stench of poverty. I have always despised poverty but the more I do so the more it makes me realize that the poverty I hate is the same reflection of the people that are close to my heart – my family. The people who continuously oppose family planning and RH bill are no more than the likes of people who never understands the word “poverty” and never felt the experience of having to eat decently and sufficiently for the entire day. The hypocrites of our society are many and we can see them everyday. And what’s worse, they are increasing.

Poverty is a Choice.

Poverty is a vicious cycle that enslaves most of our countrymen and I am convinced that there are factors that continuous to fuel it. With a world full of resources, I always believe that poverty is something that we create more than something that happens to create on its own. Poverty exists because there are people who subscribe to it, poverty exists because there are corporate and religious organizations that continuously feed, fuel, and support it. Do you really think “noontime/entertainment” shows that cash in to the plight of the poor exist for charity reasons? Will they continue to exist if no one’s continue to watch them? Perhaps that something we all can contemplate before tonight’s sleep.

Of course I’m no KJ to the idea of watching entertainment shows and telenovelas. I grew up with them. But perhaps, we Filipinos have shaped our culture allowing ourselves be entertained the whole day rather than to pick ourselves up, go out and think of ways to make our lives better. These shows have served as prisons from where we connect ourselves and be shaped by it. The entire psychological process is difficult to explain thinking that I’m no professional in this field but perhaps someone else would be better at doing it for me.

All this brings us to a cultural revolution called for by intellectuals – that reconditioning would be another good start for us all. Maybe we can start teaching our children this: to do their best in school so that one day they can setup a business on their own or become the leader in their field instead of the usual drama that our children should learn their lessons well in school so that one day they could become another corporate employees? Don’t get me wrong, I don’t despise labor. Perhaps, it’s an analogy that, if interpreted well, could help catapult us all to greatness.

It Takes More than Two to Tango

So we can conclude that it takes two, three, four or all to tango. It takes more than the government to clean up the mess of the past for. It requires synchrony and real wanting of the masses to improve their lives as a family, as a people, as a nation.

If we genuinely care for the poor that means picking up the same record and playing it on the same turntable and kicking to the same beat to relinquish ourselves from the snare of poverty that continues to pillage each and everyone of us. We can’t dance with two records and turntable working at the same time.