Cocofoundation celebrates 25 years of providing aid to coconut farmers
THE United Coconut Planters Bank-Coconut Industry Investment Fund (UCPB-CIIF) Foundation Inc. marked its 25th year of providing assistance to local coconut farmers and their dependents.
Established in 1987, UCPB-CIIF Foundation Inc. or Cocofoundation began helping coconut farmers with its flagship program, Adopt-a-School for Development Program. In 1988, Cocofoundation sponsored its first batch of 30 college scholars. Since then, it has supported more students in partnership with other companies.
Seeing the need to expand its educational support, Cocofoundation launched its scholarship program in 2004.
A total of 1,589 scholars from 53 coconut-growing provinces availed of the scholarship program, which is tenable in over 40 state colleges or at Don Bosco training centers and Tesda-accredited schools.
The Cocofoundation scholarship program has produced a total of 819 graduates, 388 of them with college degrees and 431 with vocational-technical certificates. One college scholar graduated Summa Cum Laude, 4 garnered magna cum laude honors while 55 others received cum laude honors.
Cocofoundation does not only provide scholarship grants, but also career opportunities to scholar-graduates.
Article continues after this advertisement“We feel (our scholarship program) is one way of helping the children of small coconut farmers find better opportunities in life,” UCPB-CIIF Foundation Inc. president Edgardo Amistad said.
