The limitations brought about by the covid-19 pandemic will continue in varying degrees depending upon the level of risk. While these limitations are desirable in order to, as they say, flatten the curve, these are causing difficulties to thousands of households whose livelihoods depend upon free movement of people, goods and services and especially among those in the informal sector. Responding to this challenge, the Episcopal CARE Foundation, has launched two major initiatives: a] the capitalization of communities or organizations which are shifting into or expanding their home-based livelihoods; and, b] the voucher support system, where the Foundation provides cash to families who will pay the same through services to be done in the future. (Details of these programs may be requested from the E-CARE Foundation.)
Today, the Foundation is launching another initiative. It is offering capitalization assistance (primarily the cost of raw materials) to individuals (not necessarily organizations) who have skills that can be maximized for income-generating purposes while staying at home. Please contact our E-CARE staff in your diocese for those who wish to apply. If the intended product is among the crafts that are currently being marketed by the Foundation, it will buy the same and, if not, assistance shall be rendered to enable the project participant to sell the same. From the sales proceeds, the capitalization assistance may be re-granted to the participant for succeeding cycles or granted back to E-CARE to be used by other interested project participants under E-CARE’s Receivers-to-Givers (R2G) p
(This morning, my daughter started a cross-stich project and I told her that if she has done this at the start of the ECQ, instead of spending all her time outside of her virtual learning sessions on social media, she may have already completed the project and could sell the finished product to me. This has given us the idea for this project. Cross-stitching is a skill – a “gift of the hand”. E-CARE shall assist those who wish to maximize the gifts of their hands in order to generate income for their families at this time. The “gifts of the hand” are among the valuable assets that people have and which can be the building blocks of development under the Asset-Based Community or Congregational Development approach (ABCD) that the ECP is practicing.)