Converge Coordinate and Compliment the efforts of various migration stakeholders to be able to pro-vide the necessary social and economic services to the members.

Pinoy WISE International tap various service providers from government and the private sector to help create the enabling environment for investment and deliver comprehensive social and economic services to overseas Filipinos and their families. This includes partnership with the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), Department of Labor and Employment- Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (DOLE-OWWA) and National Reintegration Center for OFWs (DOLE-NRCO), Technical Education and Skills Development Authority(TESDA), Department of Agriculture (DA), Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), Department of Science and Technology (DOST) , Department of Education (DEPED) and Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD). Pinoy WISE partners with private sector including cooperatives and rural banks that can provide investment and business opportunities for them and their families. Atikha is tapped to provide to provide capacity building to Pinoy WISE partners in destination countries and source provinces.

This is an 8-hour-training on Understanding migration realities, Goal setting, Budgeting, Tracking expenses, Saving for investment and retirement, Borrowing and getting out of debt and Addressing family issues that drain the resources of the overseas Filipinos.

General Objectives :

1. To sensitize the Overseas Filipinos and their families on the various economic and social issues of migration and the barriers to achieving migration goals;

2. To be able to assist Overseas Filipinos and their families in financial planning and investment to ensure that migration will contribute to the long-term development of the OFs, their families and their communities; and

3. To guide the Overseas Filipinos in identifying and addressing their issues and concerns to enable them to achieve their financial and family goals for migration.

This training teaches overseas Filipinos on concepts in saving and investing such as “ Save Before You Spend”, the difference between “ Needs and Wants”, “Pay Yourself First” , Diversifying Investments and others. This could be done for 4 sessions of 2 hours or 2 sessions for 4 hours or whole day session.

This is an individual or group session conducted between 2-4 hours to be able to identify the specific needs of the overseas Filipinos and their families to enable them to achieve their goal for migration. It looks at their Dream Map, Savings and Investment goal. It discussers with migrants how much they need to save monthly to achieve their goal and links them to various investment vehicle that they can use while saving their money.

This session also identifies family and financial issues and concerns and refers the Overseas Filipinos and their families to appropriate Pinoy WISE partner from the national and local government, NGOs, faith based organisations, schools or private sector which can address their concerns.

This is a half day or whole day forum that introduces various business and investment opportunities to the overseas Filipinos and their families. Investment and Business Opportunities Forum or Pinoy WISE Market Place Events promote agribusiness and investment opportunities especially in leading cooperatives in the origin provinces of overseas Filipinos.

Business opportunities in goat raising, organic farming, rice and corn production, hog raising, cassava production and processing and others are promoted and the Overseas Filipinos are linked to farm business schools, Agriculture Training Institutes, private corporations or cooperatives involved in the business.

The Overseas Filipinos and families who are interested to engage in setting up individual or group business are linked to skills training that are provided by the local government, Department of Labor and Employment agencies such as TESDA, OWWA and NRCO, Department of Science and Technology, Atikha and other NGOs or private sector and cooperatives providing skills training.

Atikha in partnership with NRCO is also sponsoring training on tourism related services such as Home stay management and eco-tour guiding.

Individuals and Overseas Filipino organisations planning to set-up social enterprises are offered a training pro-gram for start-up social enterprises called Initial Venture into Entrepreneurship for Social Transformation (INVEST)

INVEST is an executive course that assists aspiring social entrepreneurs develop their social enterprise model, craft an initial social enterprise plan and prepare them for setting up and implementation. The participants of the course may either be individuals or teams. They are required to enroll not only themselves but their proposed social enterprise.

INVEST requires 33 sessions of hands on learning delivered over a period of one year: a 5-day face-to face classroom session; 24 webinar sessions and 4 face- to-face coaching sessions. The coaching sessions are customized per social enterprise enrolled.

This is a course for aspiring social entrepreneurs among returning OFWs, their families and support institutions who are in the process of incubating community-based enterprises that will help not only themselves but also the marginalized in their respective communities.

At the macro level, social entrepreneurship shall be introduced as a platform for public-private-people partnership towards sustainable local economic development where forced migration and poverty would have become history, consistent with the Sustainable Development Goals.

At the micro level, social entrepreneurship shall be tackled as a process of seeking, screening and seizing opportunities to provide sustainable livelihoods and quality services to returning OFWs, their families and other marginalized sectors in local communities.

The training is to be a joint program of Institute for Social Entrepreneurship in Asia (ISEA) and Atikha. It will be lead by Dr. Lisa Dacanay, president of ISEA and a PhD in Organizational and Management Studies from the Copenhagen Business School in Denmark and Estrella Dizon-Anonuevo, executive director of Atikha and a graduate of Masters in Social Entrepreneurship at the Asian Institute of Management.