THE OVERSEAS WORKERS INVESTMENTS PROGRAM

(For the benefit of those who were not able to attend yesterday’s forum in Hongkong and also for Cotabato overseas workers who are now in other countries, I am posting here the text of the presentation I made at the Bayanihan Center yesterday attended by about 200 OFWs from the province.

This concept is still subject to further amendments and needs to be embodied in a provincial ordinance before it could be implemented. Inputs from the overseas workers themselves, legal researches and actuarial studies will have to be made before we could come up with a final version of this Investments Program.)

The Overseas Filipino Workers, known as the modern day heroes of the country because of their contributions to the Philippine economy, have largely been exploited and neglected.

They go through so many harrowing experiences in their quest to find jobs abroad. Many are victimized by illegal recruiters, most could not find sources of money to pay the exorbitant placement fees, and the unfortunate among them end up with abusive and oftentimes cruel employers.

In spite of these hardships, most of them end up with barely enough savings to make their lives comfortable after they retire.

Most of the money they earn is spent for the education of their children and in helping their families.

Many of them also squander their money whenever they come home because of the Filipino tradition of “blow-out” and “pasalubongs.

Under the North Cotabato OFWs Investments Program, the following measures will be undertaken:

1. The provincial government will initiate a move to organize all OFWs from North Cotabato into an investments group or a cooperative.

2. Once organized, they will be asked to identify or appoint people who will professionally manage their investments group or cooperative under the supervision of the provincial government of North Cotabato.

3. To facilitate information dissemination, the OFW Investments Group will open a website where all members will have access. Major decisions of the investments group will be made with proper consultations with the members using the website.

4. They then will be presented investments opportunities, i.e. Oil Palm Plantation, Rubber Plantation, Hog Raising or Rubber Products and Palm Oil Processing.

5. Once the investments project has been chosen, the members will be asked to raise their shares which will be determined by the cost of the project.

6. The Provincial Government will allocate funds which will be twice as much as the amount raised by the OFWs. This amount will serve as a soft loan to pump prime the investments program. i.e. The OFWs P5-M will be provided a counterpart fund of P10-M by the provincial government thus raising a P15-M initial capitalization.

This amount is good enough to start a 200-hectare Oil Palm Plantation which is expected to yield after 3 years and will continue to be productive for 35 years.

To give the prospective investors an idea of the earnings to be generated from the Oil Palm Plantation Project, here are the simple computations:

– Cost of Project Per Hectare

(From Planting to Harvest After 3 Years) – P 75,000

– Cost of Development 200 Hectares – P 15,000,000

– Estimated Earnings/Hectare/Year – P 200,000

– Gross Income of 200 has./Year – P 40,000,000

An Oil Palm Plantation owned by the North Cotabato OFWs Investments Group with an area of 1,000 hectares would generate a gross earnings of P200-M every year.

With a successful investments project in the agriculture level, the North Cotabato OFWs Investments Corporation (Cooperative) could go to the processing level where instead of just selling raw rubber, motorcycle tires will already be manufactured in North Cotabato or instead of selling crude Palm Oil, cosmetics and cooking oil will also be processed in the province.

An additional benefit to this project would be the jobs which will be generated by the investments project.

OUR DREAM: For our North Cotabato OFWs to come home every year, not to spend their hard-earned money for blow-outs and pasalubongs, but to collect their dividends from their agro-industrial investments.