PREDA NEWSLETTER JUNE 25, 2013

PREDA’S HOME FOR GIRLS ENJOY SUMMER CAMP 2013

           Summer camp is a time for swimming, fun, sports, reflection and education. Last May 29-31, 2013 the PREDA¹S Childhood for Children Home for Girls had their annual Summer Camp in D Farm Resort in Masinloc, Zambales. This was a lovely setting for many activities and for the themes of freedom, children rights and environmental protection. This year¹s camp was attended by 52 participants (29 CFC Residents, 10 After Care Clients, 4 international volunteers and 9 Preda social workers and facilitators.) All of them actively participated in the 3 days of activities. Besides the games, sports and fun there were educational sessions also.

The Important topics for the protection of children were discussed by trained facilitators; Neil Fabay a nurse by profession and a biology teacher in Saint Vincent¹s Academy  made a lively presentation on Global Warming and Environmental Destruction on the first day, Vincent Rhay Villeza a public educator and information officer of PREDA discussed Getting Familiar with Child Protection: Building a House and Children Preventing Abuse on the second day and last topic was discussed by Rodmar John Eda a trained facilitator of Council for the Welfare of the Children and an active member of AKBAY discussed Making a Place Safe for Every Child.

The three-day environmental camp was packed with activities; there was time for peaceful rest and meditation. The facilitators were terrific to get maximum participation and all were emotionally involved and it was a life enhancing experience. At the end, all were happy and enthusatic about the coming return to school and getting on in building a new and overcoming the hardships and traumas of the past.

 

LOCAL INSPECTORS TRAINING FOR ORGANIC MANGO FARMERS

The big hope of Preda Fair Trade team is to help many more Indigenous People earn fair return on the sale of their mangos. But presently they don’t harvest most of the mangos in there mountainous terrain because the price is so low in the market traders. They have hard work climbing trees and gathering sacks of the delicious fruit but then they walk and carry the heavy load up to ten kilometers to sell them and get only 4 pesos a kilo. To change this Preda has found a buyer for their Pico mangos variety provided that it is organic.

So Preda Fair Trade agriculturists mapped the whole area and were able to have the trees inspected by organic certifiers as Wild Natural Mangos and so they can under certain conditions be approved and certified as organic. They will earn more than 100% higher price from Preda fair trade. These will be pulped into mango puree and sent to fair trade partners in Germany.

In order to continue the Skills Enhancement of Local Mango Farmers and Producers in Zambales and Bataan area the 3rd Local Inspectors Training was held. 19 IP Mango Producers coming from 11 Aeta Communities in Zambales and Bataan attended the 2 day seminar/workshop held in PREDA Foundation Main Office in Olongapo City.

The training session was spearheaded by the Pro-Fair Trade Agriculturists Donard, Roger and Aris. The seminar workshop developed the awareness of local farmers who will become local field inspectors. They were taught the importance of organic farming and the care for the environment and never to use chemicals on the trees. The community leading farmers were trained as community inspectors on proper organic farming practices and inspection procedures. They were taught to understand the roles and functions of an organic inspector familiarize and master the organic farming process. With these, intelligent members of the communities of the Indigenous communities attended the training workshop. The learning and procedure will be shared to other community members, many more training workshops are being conducted to secure the Organic Mango Certification that will be coming from OCCP (Organic Certification Center of the Philippines) and ACT (Organic Agriculture Certification Thailand) and by extension Natural land.

 

 AKBAY Monthly Youth Meeting Training and Planning

A few weeks ago the youth group known as The AKBAY youth had a meeting to plan social action  events to bring  these youth  to a new level of awareness about dangerous drugs and to  inspire  the youth over the  province to be involved in environmental  protection activities.

The training inspired the youth to think for themselves and analyze the causes of social and environmental problems and come up with some solutions to change their village communities for the better.

It is also one of the opportunities where the youth leaders get the chance to establish rapport to the new members and share their ideas with other members thus strengthening their commitment to the organization and its objectives.   An average of 65 youth leaders is attending the said meeting every month.