How many poor have you helped? That depends on the help

MANILA: By email, in response to my earlier essay, "Whose inclusive capitalism? Our poor are poor out of our poor thinking" (16 February 2015, Law of the Empty Head, blogspot.com), Angelito Sarmiento writes to ask me, "How many have you lifted out of poverty? pwde copy." My immediate answer was: "You become an associate member or an investor of our cooperative Nagkaisa MPC in Asingan and you will see." (Minimum share: 5K.)

Actually, Angel's comment is anything but angelic; in fact, it is acerbic. But I forgive him. In fact, I thank him because he just gave me another good reason for doing what I love the most – writing about poverty.

I have been writing about poverty emancipation for at least 5 years now – visit my dedicated blog iCRiSAT Watch if you wish, blogspot.com, and search for IMOD, about which I have written 111 essays! IMOD is inclusive market-oriented development, a genius of an improvement over the World Bank's market oriented development approach, or market-oriented agriculture. IMOD is not mine; it was a creation of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics based in India during the 15-year servant leadership of its Director General William Dar, a great Filipino. I will explain in a little while.

Angel, you asked the wrong question, I'm sorry to say. It should be "How can WE" lift the poor out of poverty, not simply "How can I" – no matter how ingenious, intelligent, innovative, inventive, incisive, incredible I am.

And yes, Angel you have to define what you mean by "lifted out of poverty" – if you are like Noynoy Aquino, you will mean that you simply give additional income and you have lifted the poor out of poverty. Let's see now; you mean any of the following terms – I will now turn to the American Heritage Dictionary for definitions (alphabetized):

(1) Poverty alleviation. To alleviate is to "make less intense or more bearable."

(2) Poverty emancipation. To emancipate is to "free from bondage, oppression, or restraint; liberate."

(3) Poverty eradication. To eradicate is to "tear up by the roots; get rid of, eliminate."

(4) Poverty reduction. To reduce is to "bring down, as in extent, amount, or degree; diminish."

(5) Poverty upliftment. To uplift is to "raise to a higher social, intellectual, or moral level or condition."

So, Angel, when you say "lifted out of poverty" –

Are you referring to (1) poverty alleviation? With Noynoy Aquino's Conditional Cash Transfer, he is alleviating the poverty of a million Filipino families. You believe in the wisdom of the CCT? Better than nothing.

Or, are you referring to (2) poverty emancipation? That will be setting the poor free from the bondage of poverty. Do you know how the poor live? It's your choice.

Or, are you referring to (3) poverty eradication? That will need a class act, because if the rich wanted the poor to disappear, poverty would have been solved long ago!

Or, are you referring to (4) poverty reduction? That will be easy, because if you increase the salary of your maid by one thousand pesos a month, you will be reducing her poverty. Just like that.

Or, are you referring to (5) poverty upliftment? That will not be so hard, because if you give a gift of a 2-storey house to a very poor family, you have set them up to a higher level of living, no pun intended.

So, Angel, take your pick! However, if you are rich, you may have a problem with empathy, like someone we all know.

Of course, my personal choice is (2) poverty emancipation. So I go back to my instant challenge to you or anybody else: "You become an associate member or an investor of our cooperative Nagkaisa MPC in Asingan and you will see."

Pronounce it the Tagalog Nagkáisa or the Ilocano Nagkaísa, both words meaning exactly the same, which is being one or being united, our coop that is barely 2 years old is very ambitious, even if the cash we circulated in the last 12 months is only 1.5 million pesos or so. Wealth that is not shared is a burden to society. The rich who do not share should be ashamed of themselves.

Our Chair is Roger Daranciang, a Balikbayan whose heart, along with that of his wife Lita, is in the right place, to help the poor. I am the Vice Chair, and my larger contribution to the group is not funds but ideas, lots of ideas. Lito Sales, a member of our board of directors, had worked at the HSBC and retired from it years ago; he has lots of experience and lots of money ideas too, for the sake of the coop.

How many poor have you helped? That depends on the help you give. The CCT is a handout and merely encourages mendicancy, not emancipation from poverty. Salary increases and fantastic gifts such as a house and lot are great, but they do not emancipate anyone except from a life of deprivation, and only temporarily.

Angel, you attend our meetings and you will find out our plans. One of them is to set up within Nagkaisa a business enterprise that will provide:

(a)     Appropriate credit, with low, low interest rates, to farmers, to take care of farm inputs such as seeds, fertilizers, and pesticides.

(b)     Technologies, systems, equipment as may be necessary, for rent at coop costs.

(c)     Harvesting, postharvest handling and processing, to enjoy economies of scale.

(d)     Warehousing with credit extended, so that the farmers don't have to sell their produce at harvest time when the traders are high on the prowl and their prices are low.

(e)     Credit when times are rough (what we call in Ilocano gawat, months of scarcity, between harvests), so that they don't resort to five-six, the scourge of the poor.

(f)      Marketing, selling the farm produce to direct consumers, when the price is right.

"How many have you lifted out of poverty?" You have to help the poor help themselves. A coop acting like that I call a Super Coop, which we want to create out of Nagkaisa. (I have been writing about Super Coops; Coop marketing like that enjoys all the values added from seed to soup, and the members are enriched. Sustainably. Continued coop membership and marketing will lift the poor members out of poverty.  

Yes, Angel, instead of counting how many I have lifted out of poverty, why don't you count how much you can invest in us who invest on the poor? You can invest in the rich future of the poor. @