Kabulig sa Kinaiyahan | PHINLA Global Program

Empowering Waste Workers in the Community

Turn over of pedicabs and PPE's
to one of PHINLA's new beneficiary.

The German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Global Development (BMZ) funded the PHINLA Project, implemented by EcoWaste Coalition and World Vision. PHINLA, coined from the name countries the project is being implemented in (the Philippines, Indonesia, and Sri Lanka) seeks to empower waste workers and communities affected by poor waste management by using waste as a resource to create meaningful employment and to earn income, while tackling health and environmental issues associated with waste management. In the Philippines, only three (3) barangays were chosen to be a part its program and one of those barangay is Barangay Cugman.

In Brgy. Cugman, Cagayan de Oro, Northern Mindanao, one of the project’s main initiatives, to date, involved organizing the waste workers association and training them to create a better collection system and MRF for the community, through this initiative the KABULIG SA KINAIYAHAN ASSOCIATION is born. Most of the volunteers who identify themselves as "Kabulig", (a word in Hiligaynon with its meaning in English as "helpmate, partner, support system") do daily house to house waste collection using the 17 pedicabs and 5 motorbikes that the PHINLA project provided. To further help them earn income, the barangay created an incentives-based system called WASTE BANKING, depending on the weight of the recyclables collected to encourage the practice of proper waste segregation.

With World Vision and EcoWaste Coalition, PHINLA supports the "Kabulig" and BESWM establish the waste collectors’ association as a business enterprise in the future through providing technical support and capacity building like financial literacy and management, also how to start uo a business. The barangay through the MRF is hoping to provide salary for the waste collectors by earning income on its own.

The major highlight of this project is to bring about behavioral change among the residents in the barangay by helping them improve the habits of management of household waste to practicing resource recovery methods of waste management. This project will also assist the recycling industry with insight and ideas relating to waste management and contribute to circular economic principals.

KKA's mission and vision is to build a clean community that inspires and responds to environment crisis and children’s needs.

KABULIG is a word in Hiligaynon with its meaning in English is "helpmate, help, helper, assistant, assistance, partner", on the other hand, KINAIYAHAN in English means "nature", thus it's where the name of the association derives.