PP Gina Chacon
According to the United Nations, more than 700 million people or ten percent of the global population still live in extreme poverty, which means that they are surviving on less than US $1.90 a day. In addition, the world needs 30 million new jobs every year to keep up with the growth of the global working age population. Experts predict that these figures will continue to rise because of the COVID-19 crisis alongside with the ongoing impacts of conflicts and climate change
In honor of Rotary Economic and Community Development Month celebrated every October, our club plans to act within our communities to address the root causes of poverty: unemployment, underemployment, lack of economic opportunity, lack of appropriate training, and the absence of social safety nets.
Here are a few ideas we plan to implement to help grow local economies:
1. Generate income and savings through organic gardening and pest management
The club has partnered and entered into an agreement with a training center in Sinoloan, Laguna and sponsored aspiring locals on organic vegetable gardening and pest management. The value of learning organic gardening as a small business and incurring savings by getting their food from their own gardens which was the target goal of this training. In attendance during this activity were LCP Judith Landicho, CP Anne Margaret San Antonio, IPP Ruel Fajardo and the trainer was our very own PP Gina Chacon also a certified trainer and assessor of TESDA.
2. Empower members of our community through entrepreneurship
The club aims to provide training in skills and leadership for young people and women by teaching them meat processing like longganisa and tocino making, pastry and cake making, and hydroponics and mushroom growing. We have lined up all these trainings throughout the year. The club will also include a training on how to create a business plan and maintain accurate financial accounting.
3. Enhance our economic and community development projects
The Rotary Guide, Economic, and Community Development Project Strategies aim to help clubs and districts ask the right questions, identify needs, and make the greatest possible impact with available time, energy, and resources. With this guide the club has come up with the projects and hopefully be a sustainable project every year.
The biggest and most rewarding impact these projects will produce, will be the empowerment of women in our communities. There is a great pride in the communities showing that through their hard work and leadership they become entrepreneurial at the same time undergoing income generating projects.