Kind Souls Come to Tatay Efren’s Aid

Kind Souls Come to Tatay Efren’s Aid

Single Father

Angat Buhay enrolled 200 children from Janiuay, Iloilo in the Mingo Meals Nutrition Program in September 2022. To help ensure the effectivity of the program, parents must attend our Mingo Meals orientation. Mothers are the ones who usually attend this orientation. However, for the Angat Buhay Janiuay orientation, one father attended along with 199 mothers.

This father was Tatay Efren. He lost his wife three years ago and has been raising their three children on his own. His two daughters (Julian Marie and Junife) are of school age and they should have been at school on the day of the orientation. However, because the family is so poor, Tatay Efren’s daughters had nothing to eat. And so, they did not have the strength to walk to school. Besides, they had hardly any school supplies.

Tatay Efren is willing to work to support his family but his youngest child, Nelson, is a special child. Therefore, Tatay Efren must stay home to care for Nelson. Nelson was one of the children enrolled in the Mingo Meals program for the most undernourished young children in the municipality.

 

We snapped a photo of Tatay Efren and Nelson after the Orientation for Parents.

 

During a home visit, Junife (Efren’s second child) showed our field officer her “school supplies”–a few sheets of paper.

Reaching Out Online

We posted about Tatay Efren’s situation on our Facebook page and many people contacted us wanting to help him. Midwives of Janiuay sent over hot meals for the family to enjoy that day. A kind soul sent NVC’s Field Officer funds to buy the family some groceries. Another offered to enroll Tatay Efren’s two older children in the Mingo Meals Nutrition Program. To address the family’s long-term needs, a baker in the US sent over provision to help Tatay Efren set up a small farm near his home. With this, he can grow food for the family and have a small business that he can run from home. And yet another generous heart sent over funds for Tatay Efren’s daughter’s educational needs. Everything from their uniforms, shoes, school bags and school supplies were taken care of.

 

Thanks to the generosity of donors, the family received Mingo Meals for the older children and some grocery items (above). This was in addition to the hot cooked meals sent over for them to consume immediately. The two older children were also given educational assistance (right).

 

Expert Advice

When people heard about Tatay Efren’s situation, many sent help his way. One gift of love was provision to help him start a home-based livelihood opportunity so he could make a decent living while caring for Nelson. This gift was sent across the miles from a small home-based bakery in the US.

Thanks to this generous donation, we are setting up a small farm at Efren’s home in Janiuay, Iloilo. Fortunately for us, Ariel Lastica (a former Executive Assistant for Agriculture in Lambunao, Iloilo) recently joined the NVC team. In September, he paid a visit to Efren’s home and mapped out the path to Efren’s self-sufficiency:
Efren will care for a pair of goats whose offspring can be sold to provide income in less than a year. He will also raise a rooster and five hens so that the family will have eggs as a regular source of protein. Some of the eggs can be hatched and raised as chickens to sell. Efren will be given seeds to grow vegetables to eat and sell. These vegetables will be grown with vermicompost instead of commercial fertilizers. The vermicompost will be produced on-site by little crawling critters which will process farm and food waste.

We took snaps of Tatay Efren caring for his new chickens (left) and holding up seed packets while standing in the goat pen.

Tatay Efren Has a Farm!

Tatay Efren received tools and materials to build pens for his chickens and goats. After he built those, we returned in October and gave him the livestock. In addition to the livestock, we turned over farming tools and seeds. Keep checking this story to for the latest updates on the progress of this project!

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