DOLE gives livelihood aid to 287 informal sector workers

SAN JOSE DE BUENAVISTA, Antique -- The Department of Labor and Employment Integrated Livelihood and Emergency Program (DILEEP) released PHP4.7 million to 287 recipients from the informal sector at the Evelio B. Javier Gymnasium here on Thursday.

DOLE Antique Provincial Director Melissa Navarra said the recipients were sacadas, Indigenous Peoples (IPs), LGBT and returning overseas foreign workers.

There are the 179 recipients for the livelihood program of sari-sari stores, 21 for salon and 87 for rice trading.

Myra Pe of the Antique Public Service Employment Office said the rice trading assistance will be given soon after they have completed the processing of documents.

Elmeo Villanueva, one of the sacadas, said he is glad that he has been identified as a recipient of the grocery store project to be established in Barangay Tamayok in Patnongon in this province.

“I had been looking for a new livelihood because I do not want to go back to Negros Occidental anymore as a sugar migrant,” he said.

He said that he had been working as a sugar migrant worker or sacada in Negros Occidental since 1984. “The sari-sari store will really be a big help for me to earn a living,” he added.

Another recipient Nenita Bernabe, an Iraynon Bukidnon from Laua-an town, said that whatever she will earn from the store could really help them buy their own family needs as well as provide school allowance for her children.

“I have eight children but the three are already married while the rest are still going to school,” she said.

She said that she is one of the 11 IPs from their town chosen as recipients of DILEEP.

DILEEP seeks to contribute to poverty reduction and lessen the vulnerability to risks of the working poor, vulnerable and marginalized workers, either through emergency employment, and promotion of entrepreneurship and community enterprises. Recipients can be an individual or groups. (PNA)