Tagum women to improve bamboo sticks production

DAVAO DEL NORTE, March 4 (PIA) – – Recognized by the ASEAN Business Advisory Council Philippines as a Small and Medium Enterprise Excellence Awardee, the Tagum City Council of Women Inc (TCCWI) extended its arms to help another micro enterprise in the city.

TCCWI President Alma Uy stressed during a press conference earlier today that the council saw the need to assist the women, who are producing bamboo sticks using their bare hands.

“Their manual labor may cause them injuries in their hands and they said that as they aged, they will have a hard time folding their fingers,” Uy said.

She emphasized that to help these women, there is a need to mechanize the production of bamboo sticks for their health and for their families.

“These women can only produce five bundles of 100 bamboo sticks a day, which is sold at P-6 per bundle or an income of P-30 a day, which is not enough to feed their families in a day,” Uy said.

Through the TCCWI, the bamboo stick producers will receive a P1.3-million worth of Shared Service Facility from the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI).

The SSF, which will be launched on March 29, will include bamboo pole cutter, splitter, width and thickness cutter, stick slicer, length cutter, polisher and sharpening machine.

“The machine will arrive on the weekend; that’s the time that we will have to conduct a dry run to determine its production capacity and the needed manpower.”

Uy added that among the assistance that they will extend were institutional development by forming the producers into a cooperative and market linkage.

“In fact, we have a market that will get unlimited supply to be distributed nationwide.”

Read More: Bamboo Sticks Production Line