Cebuana Lhuillier Foundation, Ashoka Philippines center on Women & Youth sector for Barangay Rx Day 3

Last Friday, August 6, Cebuana Lhuillier Foundation, Inc. together with Ashoka Philippines launched Day 3 of the Barangay Resilience Exchange (Rx), an online event on community-driven innovation for resilience.

Day 3 of the Project Exchange segment covered conversations on self-sustainability, women empowerment, and the birth of a new type of Bayanihan – or simply known as 'Community Pantry'. These topics were expounded by speakers Ayesha Vera- Yu, CEO and co-founder of ARK, Ibu Nani Zulminarni founder of PEKKA, and Patricia Non founder of Community Pantry PH.

Inspired by a community's desire to invest in themselves, Vera-Yu co-founded Advancement for Rural Kids or ARK which partners and creates a path with rural communities in the developing world to secure their food, kids' schooling, and a self-sustaining future.

"Kami sa ARK ay gustong tumulong, mayroon kaming solusyon," Vera-Yu shared. "Makaka-solve ng gutom for life in just 5 weeks. Makakatangal ng malnutrition at makakagawa ng bagong hanabuhay at industriya sa inyong barangay for just P75,000."

"Sa ARK ako ay nakikipag-partner sa mga barangay leaders sa rural areas mga mangunguma (magsasaka) at mangingisda na gusto mawala ang gutom, na ang mga pamilya may pagkain for life, ang kanilang mga bata ay malulusog at nasa eskwela, na sila ay may sustainable income at nakakatayo sa kanilang paa," she added. "Nakikipag-partner ako sa kanila dahil sila ang nagpapakain sa atin, sa mundo, pero hirap sila magpakain sakanilang pamilya."

Vera-Yu is a successful investment banker who left Wall Street to restructure a small rice farm in her hometown of Capiz.

Highlighting women empowerment, Ibu Nani Zulminarni, a Muslim feminist powerhouse from Indonesia, spoke about PEKKA, a program that focuses on empowering female heads of the family. PEKKA offers exceptional support to women as heads of families – to recognize themselves as capable of making important contributions to society, helping them to create new roles for themselves, individually and collectively.

Expounding the importance of Community Based Data and Information Management, Zulminarni explained the roles women play by proposing to "involve women as part of the system" or the formation of a data management team.

"This team is trained to really understand what data means, because women really know what's going on – what indicators need to be there in the data and how they can actively be involved in this monitoring at what happened in their neighborhood so that data will be updated based on realtime," Zulminarni said.

Forging a new type of Bayanihan amidst the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, 26-year-old Patricia Non quickly became a household name after she inspired a whole nation by setting up the very first 'Community Pantry' – a simple way of helping others by allowing anyone who needs food to help tide them over their next meal.

In just a week, Non's simple bamboo cart setup on Maginhawa Street, Quezon City quickly spread all over the country. This Filipino spirit of "giving what you can" was even recognized and replicated overseas.

"Ang update po ay 6,700 Community Pantry na ang mayroon sa buong Pilipinas, and malaking bagay ang pagtutulungan, and ito yung resilience na kailangan natin sa panahon ngayon," said Non during the event.

"Imagine, kung kailan may pandemya, mahirap yung buhay, may something na nabuo sating mga Pilipino," she added. "Naniniwala ako na natural talaga satin yung pagtutulungan at pababayanihan."

"Ang resilience hindi lang kalakasan, kalakasan din i-acknowledge kung ano yung kakulangan," the 26-year-old noted.

Following the Project Exchange segment, Barangay Rx proceeded with its simultaneous Clinics or workshops hosted by Ashoka Philippines, ARK, Limitless Lab, and the Philippine Disaster Resilience Foundation (PDRF).

Ashoka Philippines hosted a clinic targeting 'Innovation Mapping', a collaborative and fun way of understanding challenges and finding possible, desirable, and mesuarable solutions that are suited to different communities.

Meanwhile, ARK facilitated a training on 'Food Security' while highlighting its project "Diskarteng Panalong (win-win) partnership" which collaborates with farmers and fisherfolk to solve hunger in only 5 weeks. Attendees were also taught the award-winning and self-sustaining ARK project 'P2.50 School Lunch', which is the only lunch in the world that parents pay for day one and fully fund on their own in 3 years. And when the pandemic hit, ARK also created 'Feed Back', a neighborhood-based vegetable exchange open to the entire community. It is a guaranteed market for 8 weeks that inspires families to farm in their backyards, solve hunger, and secure their food and health for life.

Entrepreneur, designer, and innovation consultant Joie Cruz also shared her knowledge on 'Design Thinking'. The clinic offered new ways of problem-solving that encourage organizations and communities to focus on the people they're creating for. By using design thinking, people can innovate on new products and services, new business models, or just new ways of doing things in their organizations or communities.

With changing and challenging times, the PDRF, in its quest to build disaster-resilient communities and businesses, shared their forte on Business Continuity Planning for MSMEs and Disaster Preparedness.

Through its Business Continuity and Organizational Resilience arm, PDRF provided capacity-building interventions and knowledge solutions to promote business and public sector continuity management in the region. PDRF's Community Resilience Program empowers communities, including local government units, families, and livelihoods to harness local knowledge and capacities in preparing for, quickly responding to, and recovering from disasters.

Barangay Rx is designed by Cebuana Lhuillier, Foundation Inc., the country's leading and largest micro-financial services provider, and Ashoka Philippines, the first and largest network of social innovators in the world with almost 4,000 Ashoka Fellows in over 90 countries. Barangay Rx aims to ensure that knowledge and skills reach overlooked frontliners and barangay leaders who often do not have access to professional development opportunities to prepare them for unpredictable emergencies like the COVID-19 pandemic.

Barangay Rx is supported by the Office of Civil Defense, the National Youth Commission, and the Department of the Interior and Local Government.

Through its three-day program, Barangay Resilience Exchange garnered over 1500 registrations from different barangays across the country. Aside from providing a platform to connect community-driven innovation with potential support, Barangay Rx also aims to stimulate continuous conversation and collaboration, hence the creation of the Barangay Resilence Exchange Facebook Group with 731 members as of writing.

Stay up to date with the latest announcements regarding the Barangay Resilience Exchange as we turn vulnerability into strength and strength into solutions. Things are just getting started.

Visit barangayrx.com to learn more.