From old newspapers to ecobags

SERVATHON INQUIRER employees volunteer to produce ecobags from old newspapers during the Servathon 2016 event organized by the Hands on Manila Foundation. ARNOLD ALMACEN

UNFAZED by the crowd around her, Julieta Abapo wove the newspaper strips into a wooden molder, her fingers pressing the corners for a smooth, clean finish.

“You pull it to tighten, otherwise it’s loose, poor quality ecobag,” Abapo, 53, explained to a her audience, a group of Inquirer employees who volunteered for the 2016 Servathon of Hands on Manila (HOM) Foundation on Saturday at the Philippine International Convention Center Forum in Pasay City.

Without a nosy crowd, Abapo said she could finish a bag in two hours and sell it for P260 to P380, depending on the size.

“It really changed our lives,” she said of the skills she learned 10 years ago from a workshop by the Families and Children for Empowerment and Development (FCED), an NGO in Pandacan, Manila, which shouldered her son Ronaldo’s education (a two-year computer programming course).

Of the FCED scholar-beneficiaries who trained in 2006, only three have continued using their skills as a livelihood, Abapo said.

With her friends Annie Abo and Nida Verano, Abapo is part of FCED’s community trainers. They are preparing for the expected high demand of newspaper ecobags during the Christmas season.

Scholarship funds

The newspaper ecobags created by Servathon volunteers will be sold by FCED to bazaars, partner organizations and communities, where proceeds become part of funds for their scholars.

On the 15th anniversary of Hands on Manila Foundation Inc., 31 groups of corporate volunteers with 30 members each gathered under one roof to make 120 ecobags, 500 pairs of slippers, 450 solar bulbs, 450 mosquito pest traps, 420 citronella candles, 300 fidget mat blankets and 500 disaster kits.

Titled “Celebrating the Volunteer in You,” this year’s Servathon drew more than a thousand people on top of 250 HOM volunteers and “sherpas” (volunteer leaders).

Partner communities that are beneficiaries were Barangays Payatas in Quezon City; 531 Zone 52 in Sampaloc, Manila and GK San Jose del Monte City (solar bulbs); 842 Zone 92 in Pandacan, Manila (mosquito pest traps and citronella candles); Pitogo in Makati City (disaster kits); Laura Vicuna Foundation Inc. (tsinelas design); St. Therese Little Sisters of the Abandoned Elderly and Graces Home for the Elderly (fidget mat blankets); and Families and Children for Empowerment and Development (newspaper ecobags).

“We’ve been going to other areas to do volunteerism, but we decided to do things different this year,” HOM president Gianna Montinola said.

For the past two to three years, problems with the weather usually canceled the event, while traffic congestion forced HOM to spend more time on the road, according to the HOM president.

Growing volunteers

“We started small but little by little, volunteerism is growing. When we started in 2001, we wanted volunteerism to be synonymous with Hands on Manila,” Montinola said.

She said it had always been a challenge for HOM being a small NGO compared with bigger nongovernmental organizations with international funding. But the advocacy is what keeps the group and its volunteers going, said HOM vice president Patrice Tan.

The HOM vision is for the Philippines to become one of the leading nations in terms of volunteerism. “We are the first to introduce community service activities in Manila,” Tan said.

Montinola expressed gratitude to HOM Servathon’s chair Lizette Cojuangco, who admitted that one of their challenges was resources and staff, but getting more BPOs to become active was their biggest success. “We want more corporations to participate,” she said.

Partners of HOM were the Philippine Daily Inquirer, Ace Saatchi and Saatchi, Bank of Singapore, BPI Foundation, Casas Architects, CIBO, Condura, Far Eastern University, Galapagos, Globe, Manila Peninsula, Northern Trust, One Meralco Foundation, QBE, Rockwell Land Corp, Romulo Law, Roxas Foundation Inc., SNL, Standard Insurance, True Value, Wells Fargo and Zendesk.

Its sponsors were Alaska, Century Tuna, Cloudfone by Cell Prime, Cyma Greek Taverna, Diamond Hotel, Dunkin Donuts, Fairmont Makati, FEU Institute of Technology, Galapagos, JL Investment & Development Inc,., Kettle Korn, Maynilad, Raffles Makati, Rebisco, Red Cross Makati, RS Concepts Inc., Selecta, Sunkist, Unilab and Zesto.