Tarps to bags project showcases youth innovation

“INNOVATION, passion and enthusiasm have never faltered among Cebuano’s youth.”

So said Mark Lawrence Badayos, a member of the Cebuano Youth Ambassadors (CYA).

Organizing quietly for two years  CYA has implemented projects like the BasuraSkwela where they help women convert used tarpaulins into bags.

The Cebu City government through the City Council has approved last June 20 a resolution supporting CYA’s BasuraSkwela project.

The resolution encouraged government offices, non-government organizations (NGOs), private institutions, companies and individuals to donate their used tarpaulins to the CYA.

These used tarpaulins are then made into tarpbags which they distribute to elementary and high school students from poor communities.

“From an ordinary problem, there came an ordinary solution with extraordinary thrusts, aims and effects on the lives and future of the poor families in Tingub Urban Poor Community,” he said.

“These partners donate their tarps for the project which were later on sewn by the community of mothers in Tingub Urban Poor Community into backpack bags,” said Badayos.

Complementing its slogan:‘We change lives one bag at a time’, Badayos said that the income earned from the project will be used to send elementary and high school students to school.

CYA founder and president Paolo Martin Smith said the CYA’s goal is to “nurture and build a network of youth who will become leaders and change agents in their peers and their community.”

BasuraSkwela project nurtures social responsibility and leadership culture among the youth, promotes environmental stewardship, and encourages sustainable social entrepreneurship. /Correspondent Tweeny M. Malinao