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COLLABORATIONS AND PARTNERSHIPS FOR COMMUNITY RESILIENCY AND RECOVERY FROM DISASTERS - [SELEZIONA DATA] 1

Collaborations and Partnerships for Community resiliency and Recovery from disasters

Etimos Foundation Via G. de’ Menabuoi, 25/a 35020 Padova - ITALIA

t. 049 8645187 f. 049 9670656

[email protected] www.etimos.org

Veronica Magli, Country officer Filippine


Good afternoon to everybody!

Before going ahead with my topic, let me express my gratitude to the Philippine Society for the

Study of Nature for inviting me to this “16° International Conference in Nature Studies and Innovations for the Environment”. It is really an honor and a pleasure for me to be here, listening

to the contributions by other speakers and to share my experience in a so esteemed and

inspiring context.

In my speech, I’ll go through the specific contents of the LIFE project and I will explore all the

topics under my abstract, but at first let me now introduce my organization.

Etimos is a network of organizations that works in Italy and worldwide, promoting investments

and programs to improve people lives. We operate according to an idea of development that

focuses on the objectives of enhancing the potential of each individual, remove inequalities,

combat poverty, strengthen social ties, and safeguard common goods and natural resources.

It’s 25 years that we work on many levels. We promote and support social and innovative start-

up, we develop more equitable agricultural supply chains, we fund a range of micro-enterprises

excluded from traditional banking channels and we use microfinance in post-emergency

programs to help people and organizations to recover from disasters. I’ll come back later on this

last point.

We are able to follow all our purposes thanks to two main components, which characterize our

action: on one side the use of microfinance as the base and the common tool of our intervention;

we believe that only with the appropriation of financial instruments for everyone, it’s possible to

start a virtuous investment and credit cycle to promote a model of development that reduces

distances, values difference, and gives top priority to the dignity of people; on the other side, our

richness is a consolidate and international partnership that ensures us a wide network of

partner organizations worldwide, in order to facilitate the planning and the implementation of

various development programs.

Today, the cornerstone of my talking will focus on the second element, contextualizing that in

the particular area of post-emergency intervention and recovery from disasters. I will describe

how Etimos has been able in its history to effectively collaborate with partner organizations

worldwide in the areas hit by calamities and in the process that takes place from the end of the

first emergency phase to the prevention of future events. I will start from Etimos’ experience

because it represents the practical contribution I can share with you, but the final objective of


my speech is to enquire the importance of partnership and collaboration among any type of

organization in the post-emergency situation.

Before I continue, let me make some clarifications, just to circumscribe the area of my analysis.

Disasters can be classified into two broad categories. The first is natural disasters such as

floods, hurricanes, tornadoes or earthquakes. The second category is man-made disasters, such

as hazardous material spills, infrastructure failure, bio-terrorism, etc. During my speech I will

only refer to natural calamities, because it’s the specific context of the Etimos interventions; it

doesn’t mean that the same good practices and methodologies can’t be replicated and

implemented also in the second case, but, actually, we haven’t experience to intervene in the

second category.

For second, it’s important to clarify that we are talking about partnership and collaboration in

post-emergency situations, but localizing the action as from a later “post –emergency” stage.

Etimos is in fact an organization that works in the sector of microfinance and its action is

focused on starting from the moment in which the immediate emergency has overtaken. As we

know, after a disaster, people need first to receive an immediate relief in terms of fundamental

necessities, such as food, potable water, shelters, medical assistance, and usually there are

multiple organizations that provide this type of aid, in order not to let the hit area collapse due to

the shock. I don’t want to linger again on the microfinance paradigm, because we have already

approached the theme this morning. I just want to emphasize that under the Etimos experience,

partnership with local organizations doesn’t appear in the immediate post-emergency moment,

but in the following recovery step.

To better introduce the subject and describe the challenges and peculiarities of a shared

approach, I would like to compare three different relief programs starting from the Sri Lanka

Tsunami in 2004, continuing with the devastating earthquake in Italy in 2009 and lastly with

the super strong typhoon Yolanda that hit Central Visayas in November 2013. In all these natural

calamities, the partnerships Etimos established with local organizations has played a

fundamental role in the recovery from the economic and social crisis that follow the disasters

and in the design of a common development paradigm.

The devastating effects caused by the Tsunami of 26 December 2004, in Sri Lanka, had a strong

emotional impact in the world, with a damaged rarely seen before. The calamity has taken over

31,000 lives, more than 15,000 people were wounded and over another 5,600 people were

displaced and were forced to live in emergency camps. A large part of the poorest population

living in rural areas was found very disadvantaged, due to the possibility of falling into


destitution and for the inability to quickly reactivate its income-generating activities, the only

source of livelihood for their families. It was worth stressing the fact that Sri Lanka’s most

affected economy was part of the informal sector, which is the main important source of

livelihood in the country, mainly in rural areas.

Overtaken the immediate after-tsunami emergency phase, we decided to operate by managing

funds from the Italian Civil Protection Dpt. with the aim of responding to the various needs

expressed by Microfinance Institutions, Regional Development Banks, NGOs, Cooperatives and

any other local business and micro-business, directly or indirectly damaged by the tsunami. The

intervention followed a “double face” methodology: a short term approach, through the

assistance for the re-creation of the pre-tsunami conditions both for beneficiaries and MFIs, and

a mid/long term approach, aimed at the strengthening of the MFIs and at the development of the

micro-business of their clients.

We did that through three different instruments. A credit line, to allow the MFIs to provide

financial services in order to restart the economic activities damaged, or to start up new

activities in tsunami affected areas. A capitalization line, to re-establish the operative

conditions of Microfinance Institutions hurt by the tsunami, and a capacity building activity, to

strengthen the capacity of the staff and the members of the MFIs in the management of micro

credit activities and to enhance the entrepreneurial and management skills of the beneficiaries.

In September 2005 Etimos activity was recognized by the Ministry of Finance & Planning of Sri

Lanka, which signed a dedicated Memorandum of Understanding, to give us the possibility to

continue supporting microfinance initiatives in the country, and after two years of successful

experience, we established a regional office in the area, Etimos Lanka, for monitoring and

supervising the activities of the loan portfolio.

During the last ten years Etimos Lanka and its local partner NGOs implemented a successful

program focused on microfinance and social investments in Sri Lanka, trying to improve the

productivity of local industries, helping to create a new breed of competent products in fair-

trade agriculture areas of cocoa, spices, fruits and vegetables and fisheries sectors, serving more

than 90.000 beneficiaries covering across 75% of villages in the country. This is the first

example that I wanted to show you about how it is possible to transform a single post-

emergency microfinance project into a stable long-term action continuing to support MFI’s and

the small rural producers.


Let me continue on with the second description.

On 6 April 2009 an Italian region, Abruzzo, was hit by a strong earthquake . More than 50

municipalities were seriously affected, including Aquila, the regional capital. There were 308

victims, more than 1,500 wounded and more than 10 billions euros of damage. In that context, at

the end of 2009, Etimos was appointed by the Italian Department of the Civil Protection, to

design and implement a post-emergency microfinance initiative in the region, providing a 5

million euros fund, deriving from private donations. The nine years lasting project aimed at the

beginning to support the micro-entrepreneurial sector in Abruzzo, which was fragile before the

earthquake and then further damaged by the calamity.

Almost the 100% of the resources were used to create a guarantee fund to ease microcredits to

families, micro-enterprises, cooperatives and social businesses, eliminating the need for

personal or patrimonial guarantees by beneficiaries, who just lost the main part of their assets.

The disbursement was provided by local banks which used their own funds. An agreement,

signed by the Italian Bank Association, the union of the local credit cooperative banks and

Etimos, defined the financial products and binds banks to guarantee a leverage on loans, which

multiplied the amount available for credits up to 50 million of euros, even when the guarantee

fund was completely used.

Already in 2011 the results achieved in terms of volume of disbursements, operational

sustainability and impact on the population have encouraged us to transform the project

activity into a dedicated social enterprise, focused on microfinance, and at the end of 2011

“Microcredit for Italy” was established as a social enterprise. Today it is one of the Italian leaders

in the field of microfinance and financial inclusion, with a portfolio of over 20 million of euros.

This is another example about how it is possible to transform a single post-emergency

recovery program into a local social enterprise, collaborating with the local financial bodies in

order to continue to support individual entrepreneurs.

It’s time now to talk about Philippines, through my direct experience.

Etimos started working in the Philippines in 2014, in partnership with a local network of

Microfinance Institutions, APPEND, after the strong typhoon that hit the Visayas region in

November 2013; Yolanda, one of the most powerful typhoon ever recorded in the world, that hit

and devastated the Central Philippines involving more than 14 million people. According to the

ILO there were about 6 million workers who have experienced damage or completely lost their


livelihoods because of the typhoon, of which about 2.5 million were already in a situation of

poverty. In particular small family businesses were damaged, which recorded losses of up to 80%

in the three most affected regions.

We came in the country with a large program named LIFE project – Livelihood Intervention

through Financing and Entrepreneurship, financed by the Italian Bishops Conference, with the

primary objective of restoring livelihood and of promoting the family-based business of more

than 150 communities for a total of around 10.000 people in Visayas, who lost their source of

income because of the typhoon.

The program is made by two components as follow: a rotating fund, to improve business skills of

the affected people and finance the start-up of their microenterprises; a capacity building

activity, to train the 5 most damaged local microfinance NGOs through specific trainings in post

emergency microfinance, disaster risk reduction management, adaptation and mitigation to the

climate change, social impact assessment tools.

After the project departure, last August 2015, Etimos sent me here, as its country officer, to

coordinate the action with the Append local partner, which is a network of 10 Christian

microfinance organizations and 1 bank, founded in 1991 and based in Manila, operating around

all the Philippines, as Sir Manny explained this morning.

During my period here we coordinated the activities under the two years LIFE project and we

decided to orient the main part of the program on the topic of climate change. Both the

organizations agree on the importance of increasing the awareness among local communities,

especially in rural areas, on how it is crucial in people’s lives and how it is important to prevent

and mitigate the risks associated with climate change. According to that purpose, we started a

strategic relationship with the University of the Philippines, in order to be updated about the

new scientific input, and we also decided to rename the revolving fund under the project in

“Green fund” and dedicate it to the environment and the climate change purpose.

This is an additional example about how it is possible to translate a post-emergency

intervention in a durable action in order to prevent future calamities and spread the awareness

about one of the most important actual and critical issues.


After the technical description of three most relevant Etimos’ post-emergency interventions, let

me now move on some relevant related comments.

Every post-emergency action begins through a different type of partnership: in Sri Lanka we

started working with one of the most hit microfinance institution and we suddenly get in touch

with the other damaged ones. So we built a system where it didn’t previously exist. Otherwise in

the Philippines we found an efficient and large network already operating in the country and we

just approached them and offer for collaboration. It means that also if the purpose of the initial

intervention and the microfinance methodology remain the same, it exists a high level of

flexibility and adaptation in every partnership’s paradigm. Etimos also doesn’t create new

micro-credit programs and doesn’t pretend to directly manage the existing ones. We usually

identify local organizations already working in the area and provide them with tools and

resources to restart their lending activities. Only doing that is possible to implement a virtuous

circle, obtaining a strong economic and social impact and a durable network of organizations.

For second it’s important to be flexible also for the purpose of the action and the collaboration

among organizations. In the post-emergency scenario the question is always the same: “How

can we help organizations and people in the recovery from a disaster?” After some experiences,

as I’ve shown before, we are quite able to organize and implement a successful action, but when

the emergency is over, we have to look around again and change the question. It becomes “How

could we prevent similar future situations? Which is our role in the countries development

process?” The needs change and we have to ask ourselves at first if we are able to collaborate

with the local partner starting a new development phase. In Sri Lanka, after the tsunami we

went to the impact investing, starting to talk about the renewable energy, the access to water,

and the social business in general, with social investments in the fields of organic farming and

fair trade chains. In Italy we filled the gap in the funding of social enterprises, small and medium

business and start up. Here in the Philippines we focused on climate change and environment

awareness, one of the most serious concerns that nowadays everyone is facing on earth. In this

aspect we can really find the real sense of collaboration among organizations from the post

emergency to a durable partnership. By the way, let me mention, the main reason why me and

my colleague Sir Manny are here today, is because of collaboration with UPOU through Dr.

Baggy: he became our technical resource person and trainer in the LIFE project climate change

training-workshop. And now he invited us to speak before you all…isn’t it all started with

collaboration and partnership?


In fact, if in the first post-emergency scenario we have a fundamental action in the economical

recovery of the organizations’ financial asset and portfolio, in the following phase they are really

the local partners who lead us to the comprehension of their development path and, as a

consequence, to the realization of a durable be-lateral collaboration in order to achieve common

goals.

And finally, the last question we have to consider is “Why we do that? Why do we try to

collaborate and help each other as the final result of our business plan?” I tried to answer to this

dilemma during my long travel in Visayas, when I immersed myself to really get in touch with

people all around me and to understand their culture, their perspectives and their needs. I found

out that we collaborate because we are all part of the same development path and the modern

dynamics show us that more and more our countries are interrelated and our actions may have

consequence to other countries.

Thank you.

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