The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) over the weekend handed over P7.6-million seed capital fund to 25 livelihood associations in Agusan del Norte, which will be used as start-up capital for local entrepreneurs.

The handover of checks and awarding of the Civil Society Organizations Accreditation Certificates to the livelihood organizations was led by DSWD Asst. Secretary for Specialized Programs under the Operations Group Florentino Loyola Jr., along with DSWD Field Office-Caraga Regional Director Mari-Flor Dollaga and Agusan del Norte 2nd District Representative Dale Corvera.

In his message to the members of the organizations who received the capital assistance through the agency’s Sustainable Livelihood Program (SLP), Asst. Secretary Loyola encouraged them to strive and work together to achieve a stable and sustainable livelihood that will lead to an improved living condition.

“Through this seed capital fund, these associations are given the opportunity to manage their proposed livelihood activities that will help uplift their socio-economic-well-being and that of their families,” the DSWD official said.

For his part, Cong. Corvera led the “Komitido Ako” – a pledge of commitment of the SLP program participants that serves as their declaration of support to attain the goals of SLP and the “Panaghugpong Diha sa Panginabuhian Ngadto sa Paglambo” Program of the province.

The SLP assistance seeks to benefit farmers and fisherfolk members of the livelihood associations and aims to strengthen the value chain of their agricultural and fishery products.

Once the projects are implemented, a series of monitoring activities will be conducted by the Department, together with the different local government units (LGUs) in the province, to ensure that the associations are guided and provided with necessary technical assistance for them to succeed.

Also joining the awarding of checks were SLP Referral Management Section Head Noraidah Busran, and the respective local chief executives and representatives of the LGUs in the province.

SLP is a capability-building program that seeks to improve the program participants’ socio-economic status by implementing two different tracks: the Micro-enterprise Development (MD) Track which is designed for those who want to start a sustainable micro-enterprise; and the Employment Facilitation (EF) Track which assists participants to land jobs that are appropriate to their skills and competencies.