Women’s group in Baguion converts trash into cash
Posted on January 16th, 2010
In Baguio City, enterprising housewives banded themselves together and formed a group which challenged the local government to send the city’s uncollected garbage to them. A challenge which have live up, up to this day.
These women from 10 barangay in the city have doing this for decades now – they have been converting trash into novelty items. The idea was introduced to them by the Jaime V. Ongpin Foundation Inc (JVOFI) and some environment advocates, at the start of the new millennium.
The novelty items that they produce are not your typical products which you can inside a mall. The women have produced market bags made of discarded fruit drink boxes, which sell for P100; they also wallets woven out of snack wrappers, which sell for P30 per piece; a sofa cushion from recycled newspapers; and decorative flowers fashioned out of used soda plastic containers, among others.
The products of this creative group of women are all directly delivered to their European buyers with who they have a direct supply contract, said Soledad Valencia, 54, who is the head of the Dinnadan Ethnic Handicrafts of Barangay Dontogan in Baguio. The contract is worth up to P200,000 of recycled décor, Valencia said. The most valued products are wallets and bags that show which kind of trash it is recycled from, she added.
Unfortunately, in spite of the success of this women’s group, there are still some resident in the city who realizes the economics of garbage. The city government is now allowing villages to tax their residents for the trash they produce, with the intention and hope that it would add value to things households throw away.
