“Livelihoods and Building the Resilience of Coconut Farmers in the Philippines” Project Aims to Intensify Project Operations

The project “Livelihoods and Building the Resilience of Coconut Farmers in the Philippines” of the Integrated Rural Development Foundation (IRDF), in partnership with Livelihood Funds and Franklin Baker, has conducted project orientations to 46 peasant organizations and cooperatives from Davao Occidental and Davao City during the first quarter of 2021. There were also 116 farmers who have completed Coconut Farmers’ Community Organizing Trainings and Workshops facilitated by the project. This project aims to 1) implement an integrated agro-ecological farming system beyond organic certification; 2) create and organize farmer groups and cooperatives; 3) organize labor managed by cooperatives; and 4) set up small-scale agricultural enterprise (service & agribusiness).

Farmer enrolment, source tracing, organizational management training, and coordination with the local government units (LGUs) are also performed by the project team. The team also gears towards conducting project orientation in sitios in goals to facilitate higher turn-out attendance of farmers and have a more interactive discussion with them.