A provincial church's journey to self-reliance & sharing

Walking up the small hill to St. Stephen's Parish of Namillangan, Alfonso Lista, Ifugao Province, visitors are welcomed by good energy. Perhaps from the cool space shaded by the tall mango trees planted by the congregation sheltering us from the hot Filipino climate, or perhaps the array of tropical plants that surround the church building and throughout the compound, or maybe still it’s the open hearts of the church members, set on following the Good and sharing love with all.

St. Stephen's Episcopal Church, Ifugao Province, Philippines

Founded as an organized mission in 1976, the church community is home to members, most of whom are small-scale farmers, cultivating rice or corn fields and fish ponds. While not financially well-endowed, the members of this parish are strong givers. St. Stephen’s was able to become an aided parish in 2009 and a ‘full-fledged parish’ in 2013, being totally self-reliant and generating all operating expense funds. While some parishes achieve this through income-generating projects like farming or food production, others do so through creating a cooperative to support the church. St. Stephen’s, however, established self-reliance solely through membership giving. Fr. Constantio Abbugao, rector of St. Stephen’s, or ‘Padi Tando’, as called by all, attributes this success to preaching on stewardship, regular Bible studies and periodic retreats.

Even though self-reliance is achieved through giving, members are still keen on earning extra income for the parish and themselves. They have participated in a number of varied income-generating projects, including a beekeeping, livestock raising, water sanitation, microlending, and soapmaking. Through these projects they’ve learned lessons, strengthened their project management approach, and proven their spirit of resilience in overcoming challenges.

In 2008, the congregation began a beekeeping project in which the members would manage a hive in a newly constructed building adjacent to the church. Members were trained, materials were purchased, a professional bee consultant was hired. The feasibility study was complete, and by all estimates, the project would surely be a success. The bees arrived, and members were maintaining the hive. However, as the weeks passed, the bees became fewer and fewer. One thing the feasibility study did not account for was that the areas surrounding the community are corn fields which are heavily sprayed with chemicals which are toxic to the bees. The bees steadily declined, and the project failed.

St. Stephen's church members sharing their story of self-reliance with Anglicans from Myanmar and Mexico at E-CARE's recent International Development Training.

With the project’s remaining funds, the group decided to invest them in a livestock raising project with a ‘receiver to giver’ model. The first round of beneficiaries each received 2 piglets. They feed and raise them, and when the sow gave birth, the parishioner returns 4 piglets to the parish. Of this four, two go to the next round of recipients, and two are used for income to the parish. Thus, the project is self-sustaining and also supports the church. The church has granted back 70,000 pesos (nearly $1,600, exchange rate 2013) to the diocese. On top of that, additional income from the project has been used to capitalize a water sanitation and refilling project to serve the outside community’s needs for clean, accessible drinking water. Most of the project’s financing, however, was contributed by the lending organization’s own member share capital. The water project is still in the process of becoming operational. In the meantime, the organization is now tight on cash for its members’ lending needs

Organic pigs at St. Stephen's rectory

In 2012, the congregation used their existing building from the beekeeping project to begin a new enterprise: soapmaking. The community uses natural ingredients from readily accessible tropical plants and sells their products locally and through E-CARE outlet stores. Church members who assist are given a wage based upon the number of hours worked. Part of the income as well is dedicated to additional support for the church.

The three main church organizations [Brotherhood of Saint Andrews (BSA), Episcopal Church Women (ECW) and the youth organization (SKEP)] all have microlending associations with capital generated by membership support. Members borrow for livelihood projects and repay funds with a small interest. Even the SKEP has a microlending group, to gain experience in smart financial practice and the importance of cooperation early on. Using income from this lending group, the SKEP recently renovated the church’s front signage; even St. Stephen’s youth demonstrate true churchmanship and the spirit of giving! The BSA has a lending capital of 145,000 pesos; however, the needs of the group are now exceeding this capacity, as many are eager to further invest in farm livelihood projects.

Of the 266 total members of St. Stephen’s, 158 active members regularly attend Sunday services. On a given Sunday, nearly 100 fill the pews. Together they achieve the parish dream of self-reliance by giving through harvest offerings, annual pledges, special offerings and more to account for more than 430,000 pesos (nearly $8,600 at current exchange rate) annually.

Now, they are eager to enhance their savings and lending operations and continue to further the spirit of cooperation and sharing within the community and to accomplish the following objectives:

Breaking Down the ABCDs, Part II

For the backstory of The Episcopal Church of the Philippines coming to adopt Asset-Based Community Development, check out my last blog post here. Read on below to learn more about Asset-Based Community Development and the path of The E-CARE Foundation.

The Development Program Learns ABCD
The Development program, itself, has also learned through experience that ABCD is more effective in sustainably supporting economic development than conventional needs-based models.

One community here in the Cordillera Mountains, before partnering with E-CARE, had a strong self-starter ethic: to secure a water supply, community members pooled their resources to purchase materials and create a system. Whenever there was a challenge, the community used their internal resources to solve it. The community partnered with the PEC’s Development program to build a more permanent water system, with the agreement that after it was built that the community would be responsible for maintenance and repairs. However, after a typhoon damaged the water system, the community returned to the Church, asking that they fix it. What had happened to this once self-reliant community? They began expecting that their needs be provided by an outside source instead of looking within to their own resources.

This project began when E-CARE was just starting to formally use the ABCD model. While this project did first identify the community's assets (during which its self-starter attitude was identified as a strength), the importance of community involvement during the project was a key point learned by the Development program from this instance.

ABCD Process
Now, the program has a structured process through which it orients communities on the program requirements and works with them to identify their assets When a community or community group comes into partnership with E-CARE, they must first participate in the ABCD process, or the exercises that community goes through to identify, appreciate and value local assets and capacities which they can mobilize for sustainable development. While communities that partner with E-CARE are required to participate in the ABCD process before they can receive funds for their projects, the process is not merely a ‘check in the box’ in order to get funding, but a distinct project in itself. One community even withdrew its application for funds after the ABCD process when it realized it could improve its water system using its own resources identified through the process.

The ABCD process enables communities to follow the lead of the Episcopal Church of the Philippines “to stop looking at others and start looking into itself so that it realizes and appreciates what it has and can look into what it can do with these.” The process also makes communities aware of “dependency-creating” development models and invites them to engage in a “glass-half-full” way of addressing challenges, looking at “‘God’s abundance’ within their midst.” One of the assumptions through which ABCD operates is that God has blessed everyone with gifts which can be used to maximize one’s potential. Through the process, communities identify and map their assets using visual aids. Finally, they participate in community visioning exercises to explore and maximize assets to discover the most viable options and create development vision and plans.

Challenges
The target communities for the E-CARE program are those facing debilitating economic marginalization. In this context where many are searching for their next meal, the rewards of a long-term endeavor like ABCD is difficult to envision and motivate one to act. The tendency here is to favor the dependency, needs-based approach. In this circumstance, E-CARE may then partner with a smaller group within that community which is interested in doing a project. After the community sees their success, others are oftentimes inspired to join in the effort.

Another challenge is overcoming the belief that agriculture can’t lead to a high level of economic development. Communities often underestimate their talents and potential. Most E-CARE communities are small-landholder farmers with inherited traditional agricultural knowledge. However, many undervalue this asset and believe that they cannot improve their economic status through their traditional livelihood.

Here, E-CARE may help the community to add value to their existing product. For example, one farming community up the road in my province here grew so much Chinese Cabbage, which can fluctuate in price and may not yield a high net value. So E-CARE brought in a food production specialist from the local university to train the community to produce kimchi, the delicious Korean fermented cabbage dish, for which the community can earn higher price for their product.

To further overcome the skepticism communities may have about investing in their traditional livelihoods for economic success, E-CARE commits to purchasing their organically grown vegetables and products. That’s where the E-CARE Marketing Centers and Cafe Galilea (the enterprise where I’m based) come in. Cafe Galilea serves organic vegetables, coffee, and meat produced by E-CARE partner communities, increasing the market for their products. And the marketing center (on the first floor of the building, and another E-CARE store in Manila) sells organic chilis, jams, wines, citronella, etc. produced by the local communities as well. Seeing the increased demand for their products through E-CARE’s commitment to market their products has encouraged fellow community members to follow suit.

E-CARE continues to encourage organic agricultural production through offering:

To purchase sustainably-produced rice at higher prices
Lower interest rates through cooperatives to farmers who produce rice sustainably
Advance payments to vegetable producers
Marketing assistance
Access to technology
Carbon-offset payments to agro-forestry development groups

After participating in the ABCD process, what can communities then do? Stay tuned till next week to learn about The E-CARE Foundation’s Receivers to Givers program!

Quotes and stories adapted from The E-CARE Foundation’s Manual of Operations.

Breaking Down the ABCDs, Part I

The E-CARE Foundation (standing for Episcopal Community Action for Relief and Renewal) is an economic development organization breaking the mold of traditional development models with the Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD) framework in mobilizing Filipino communities to harness their existing strengths to improve their economic livelihoods.

Episcopal Church Of the Philippines Development History
When the Episcopal Church established itself in the Northern Philippines in the early 1900s, it provided impoverished, indigenous communities with free food and education that instilled a sense of dependency and the idea that the Church is “a rich institution from which material benefits could be derived.” While education helped individuals enhance their skillset to improve their economic livelihood, community development remained minimal. Those educated moved to cities or abroad for higher compensation for their work, instead of reinvesting themselves in their communities; thus, the “brain drain.”

What resulted from the introduction of the Church into these once self-sustaining communities was a sense of dependency. The American Church model, along with its “costs of the structures and operates that sustained mission work or, further, the ‘cravings, desires and necessities of western civilization,’” was applied without much regard to the Philippine context. These communities couldn’t financially sustain such operations, so an annual grant subsidy from the Episcopal Church in the USA (ECUSA) began, which remained the main source of support for the Philippine Episcopal Church (ECP) for 100+ years.

Amidst the political and economic turmoil, rising unemployment and widespread hunger of the Philippines in the 1970s and 80s, the ECP remained financially well-off through this annual grant. However, realizing that it must act to address the country’s socio-economic challenges, the ECP began to build its capacity to financially self-support and created a Development Program that housed income-generating projects, such as poultry and rice farms, a hotel, a cinema and transport lines. Most projects failed “due to technical problems, lack of management skills, poor feasibility planning, and, most significantly, the lukewarm support for these ventures from general membership.”

For one, the Church’s image as a wealthy institution lead to its projects’ demise. While most people were living in poverty, they didn’t see the need to devote time and energy to support an already-rich institution. Secondly, the development projects were seen as ends in themselves, not as a means of social transformation in overcoming dependency mindset.

From these failures (and one success - the organization of cooperatives which acted as credit unions), it learned the following lessons for grassroots economic development:

1. Social projects need the full support of the people to succeed 
2. Full support is given only if the people have ownership of the project 
3. People’s sense of ownership over the project arises only if they are directly impacted by the project’s gains and losses 

In applying these lessons, the church shifted to community-based projects that catered to needs of the people, especially in areas with “massive economic marginalization.” The program grew to work with 200+ communities across the country on potable water and sanitation systems, agricultural support projects, irrigation systems, a cargo tram line, micro-hydro power projects and more.

Lessons Learned
Two strengths of the ECP’s development program is that it lives within the context it works and it incorporates lessons learned through experience into practice. While most development models’ only metric of success is financial which has “tended to weaken positive values and brought about self-centeredness” in this context, the ECP’s development program stresses that projects must “contribute towards the formation or strengthening of systems and relationships that embody the values of the Kingdom of God.” The program emphasizes building a loving and just community through the values of cooperation and enabling everyone to reach his or her full potential.

Another learning was that households in impoverished communities ranged in their amount of assets and that development projects tended to help those who already had some assets to access opportunities that micro-enterprise projects, water projects or coops provided. To address this, the development program pursued projects designed to help the poorest of the poor, those who could not otherwise avail of a development project’s benefits, while also supporting the entrepreneurial poor through credit and vital services.

Traditional Development Models
Many conventional development theories are needs-based, looking at what a community lacks and giving it to them. This may be large grants or providing them with water systems, schools, agricultural infrastructure, etc. The problem with this approach is that it doesn’t value the community’s capacity to improve its own economic well being. Being the ever-recipient of handouts builds the mentality that one is incapable of helping oneself and must rely on a benefactor to provide for his needs.

On the other hand, Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD), developed in the early 1990s, focuses on a community’s existing strengths and resources, to leverage them to improve their livelihood. It’s also applied in the Diocese of Louisiana, which has created an asset map in the region. This model contrasts this traditional “needs-based” approach, which focuses on what a community lacks, and champions upon what a community already has to build upon that.

The Church Learns ABCD
ABCD isn’t just a model from a book that this development program haphazardly adopted; it’s been the M.O. of the Church since it boldly discovered firsthand that ABCD works.

While the Philippine Episcopal Church became independent from the Episcopal Church in the USA in 1990, 60% of its budget was still covered by the annual grant subsidy from the US. Wanting to truly achieve independence, the ECP created a plan to gradually reduce the subsidy until it reached $0 in 2007.

Initially, budget deficits grew, programs were frozen and salaries were delayed. In 2004, the annual grant subsidy still covered 14% of the budget. Parish priests felt they had exhausted all income-generating efforts, and most believed the ECP couldn’t reach the 2007 target. The ECP contemplated requesting a 3 year extension from the ECUSA. Instead, the Episcopal Church of the Philippines made a bold decision. It did the complete opposite and resolved to end grant support, not by 2007, in 3 years, but by the end of that same year.

Diocesan leaders and members were outraged, but leadership ‘bit the bullet.’ Many prepared for the worst (deficits, salary delays, etc), but none of these came to be. In fact, for the first time in 20 years, the ECP ended the fiscal year with a budget surplus of 3,000,000 pesos (about $55,000)!

“The Church learned that it is only when it stops looking towards others and instead starts to fully look into itself that it realizes what it has and what it can achieve with it…. It did not just read about, analyze and conclude that ABCD was an effective tool - it actually lived it out and proved it to be the correct approach to development.”

From this experience, the ECP officially adopted ABCD as the mode to pursue community development work.

Stay tuned till next week when we’ll explore how the development program now applies the ABCD framework when working with communities in the Philippines!

Quotes and stories here are taken from the E-CARE Foundation Manual of Operations.