Women sewing within the Columban program to support their families. Photos: Ana Flores
Super Typhoon Sendong (also known as Tropical Storm Washi) tore over Cagayan de Oro (CDO), Iligan City, and parts of Lanao del Norte in December 2011, destroying houses, damaging infrastructure, and killing several people. As a result, some families from CDO and other Misamis Oriental municipalities had to relocate, one new location being the Divine Mercy Village, located in Barangay Patag, Opol, Misamis Oriental.
Various humanitarian groups and religious congregations helped set up the new village and provided in-kind support interventions, the majority of which stopped within five years due to resource depletion.
Fourteen years later, myself and other Columban missionaries have kept up our accompanying commitment, particularly for women and young people. Columban support facilitates direct support to ten families. It also assists those who are hospitalised, students with problematic educational needs, and those living in unfavourable situations.
On January 15, 2015, a bag-making workshop was established to help women earn money. Getting started was hard because of the lack of a suitable location. Fortunately, a village official offered her house, and it is still being used for the programme. Ten women indicated their interest in joining the workshop, but finding supplies or materials and sewing machines for them was difficult, and marketing the products was even harder .
The sewing effort was briefly suspended during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, reopening with more members in June 2022. Regrettably, damage to the sewing machines occurred, so repairs were soon required. Three more machines have since failed.
The trained women also desired to produce t-shirts and jogging pants, which called for a new type of machine. In addition, the new members required skills training, and marketing strategies needed further development.
Although the group frequently had no customers, no materials, broken equipment, and falling membership, most members persisted. A breakthrough occurred after seven years of working on the project when women started receiving a small daily income, which really benefited each household. Also, women's sewing abilities improved to include the ability to make ethnic clothing, curtains, blouses, togas and graduation gowns, band uniforms, party costumes, bedsheets, sofa coverings, rags, and foot mats.
The project's initial goal was to assist the female members of each family with basic needs, including food and daily transportation for the children attending school and parents working outside the village, as well as to defray expenses for water and electricity bills. As the years passed, the demand for more sewing machines and supplies gradually became an issue as more and more women joined. This development pushed for the re-visioning of the project.
The women held meetings to discuss how to raise the calibre of their output, handle all neighbourhood sewing-related needs, and ensure that the women would personally profit from their labour. Their priorities were to increase the viability of their sewing project, improve the quality of their products, and ensure higher demand for their items.
Since this is a small enterprise with a local focus rather than a livelihood project, the women needed to familiarise themselves with the idea more. To increase collaboration with the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA), and the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), the women had to be more practical in planning and resource mobilisation.
The organisation has complied with the requirements of the Cooperative Code of the Philippines for a typical organisational structure. Officers oversee membership, and committees handle the numerous organisational issues. I also assist the group with daily tasks.
This local project deals with the real, immediate problems the women and their families face. Being forced to relocate was difficult; it was not simple to find the will to go on when everyone was still reeling from the trauma of the typhoon. However, along with being a source of income, the project has offered stress relief and psychological healing. As this goes on, in line with the Columban charism of promoting economic justice, it will be good to link the role of the members with the promotion and protection of the environment.
Moving forward, financially literate members will aid the other members in managing their incomes better. Given a regular market and the ability to enhance their output, this will eventually transform the organisation into one that is self-sustaining and self-nourishing, meaning they will rely entirely on their own resources instead of outside assistance.
Columban lay missionary Ana Flores lives and works in the Philippines.
Related links
- Read more from The Far East - May 2025
