Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) have, for a long time, been one of the major instant cash provider for the Philippine economy through their remittances to their families in the Philippines. Their economic and social contribution to the Philippines is so immense that the Government, through Congress, recently created a department under the executive branch which is solely dedicated to address their concerns. As a result, the Department of Migrant Workers came to existence through Republic Act Number 11641 (RA 11641) which Congress started deliberating in July 2021 and afterwards passed in December 2021. President Rodrigo R. Duterte approved RA 11641 on December 30, 2021 or just within barely two weeks after Congress sent it to the President for approval. RA 11641 is a testament to the State’s acknowledgement of the significant role of OFWs not just in economic terms, but more importantly, their indelible contribution to the Filipino society and to the world.
The speed of passing the said legislation, which is rare in the history of Philippine laws except for some highly political or controversial rules, reflects the urgency to address the concerns of OFWs. In fact, Section 2 of RA 11641 recognizes this as the said provision partly reads “It is the duty of the State to protect the rights and promote the welfare of Overseas Filipino Workers and their families…” The sacrifice which OFWs and their families have to endure due to their physical separation from their loved ones is a heavy one due to the socially imbedded values of close family ties among Filipinos. Out of this sacrifice, many OFW families are able to send their children to school, build their dream house, or start their own business though there are still some who have unfortunate stories. Their toil, labor, and patience rightfully earned them the honor of being called “mga bagong bayani” or modern-day heroes. However, have we ever wondered what happens to an OFW after spending years of toil away from their families? Ms. Grace A. Macadangdang of Sta. Maria, Alfonso Lista, Ifugao offers us a glimpse of her and that of her family’s struggles and victories as she plowed the fields from being an OFW to a matriarch of a self-sustaining rice-based agri-venture. Now nearing her mid-sixties, Grace reflects on the path she chose before and the life lessons she so passionately imparts to her family and neighbors.
A forester by profession, Grace became an OFW because of economic necessity in the ‘90s. “It was difficult” she often says but she had to endure it as she had her family as her inspiration and source of strength. Having the future of her family in mind, she persisted and in the early 2000 her dream of providing her family a better way out of economic hardship started to sprout. “We are a family of farmers after all,” was her response when asked why she chose farming as a post-OFW enterprise. In 2006 Grace and her husband William Sr made a pivotal decision that bonded their legacy to their children. The Macadangdang couple decided to invest much of their savings from Grace’s employment abroad and purchased a two-hectare farm lot at Barangay Busilac in Alfonso Lista, Ifugao.
Starting a farm was not a walk in the park for the Macadangdang family as Grace recalls. The farm lot they bought mainly produce corn as there is no available irrigation system at that time. Monocropping with corn, as the Macadangdang family has experienced, is a very expensive and also a high-risk enterprise. Nonetheless, the odds are not always against them and that all started in 2007 when a communal irrigation system was put in place near their farm. The flowing of irrigation to their farm brought with it opportunities which the Macadangdang family took advantage the most. Overcoming the limitations of corn monocropping, the family plowed further into rice production and then added tilapia production through fishpond culture.
While Grace was able to bring her family out of extreme economic difficulties and have already gone far from what they were before, she never forgot her life as an OFW. She became one of the founding members and officers of the Alfonso Lista Overseas Filipino Workers Returnees and Dependents Association (ALOFWRDA) actively supporting current and returning OFWs in their community. Her passion of supporting OFWs and their families is her way of showing gratitude to the profession that brought her and her family to where they are today.
The Macadangdang couple acknowledged that their children must play bigger roles as they are aiming for a sustainable farm family business which they can pass to their children. As Grace puts it “we are getting older, the children will definitely have to take over so why not do it earlier at least we can assist them while we have the necessary physical strength.” Hence, in 2007 the couple decided to give their children the free hand to continue their farming business and divided their farmland among their children.
It was at this point that an array of endless opportunities opened up for the Macadangdang family patriarch’s namesake William Jr. William Jr is a rarity in his chosen profession, an agriculturist who walked the talk by becoming a farmer. Most professional agriculturist, William Jr says, prefer to work either as government employees, under private agricultural corporations, or seek employment abroad. Nonetheless, William Jr was not discouraged with this trend in his profession and continued to aim for his dream farm. In fact, he started his farming career at the very young age of 15 as he is now in his late thirties. While it is a common sight among rural communities in the Cordillera Region that families emersed their children in farm work at their tender years, the influence of William Jr’s parents specially in farming greatly molded him. He also understood the value of preparing himself technically, hence, he did not remain complacent with his agriculture degree. In 2008 he became one of the trainees under the Young Filipino Farmers Training Program in Japan (YFFTPJ) being implemented by the Agricultural Training Institute (ATI). He also took a short course on Agro-Studies in 2010 to 2011 from his alma mater, the Ifugao State University.
As a fulltime farmer and a professional agriculturist, William Jr now have the requisites to synergize both theory and practice to his advantage. His wit, persistence, and hard work did not go unnoticed. In 2009 the Department of Agriculture – Regional Field Office – Cordillera Administrative Region (DA-RFO-CAR), through the recommendation of the Municipal Agriculture Office of the Local Government Unit of Alfonso Lista, selected William Jr as host farmer for a technology demonstration on rice production. The DA-RFO-CAR further tapped him as farmer-cooperator for a farmer’s field school (FFS) in 2011. He also hosted a “zero-tillage” technology demonstration which the Philippine Rice Research Institute implemented in 2013. As host to said activities and projects William also took the chance to observe and learn from these and later applied the lessons he learned in his farm.
William Jr witnessed the struggles of his family when they started farming through corn monocropping. Thus, he made sure his farming direction is towards farm diversification as what her parents had started before. He then expanded more components to his farm such as goat, duck, chicken, and swine raising projects to compliment his rice production venture. A self-sustaining farm wherein resources get cycled around the farm minimizing costs and wastage while maximizing limited farm resources is William Jr’s ultimate dream for his farm. Yet William Jr is not yet done as his latest addition to his ever-branching farm enterprise is a 3,000-head quail egg production.
Having in mind his neighbors and fellow farmers in their community and further inspired by his parent’s example of concern for others William Jr and his family decide to open their farm and share their farm life experience to others. In January 2021 the Macadangdang Family, through William Jr, formally expressed their intent to become a Learning Site for Agriculture (LSA) of the ATI under the Rice Program. In August 2021, through their willingness to share their farm as a learning venue for their fellow farmers, with their extensive farming experience, and after undergoing thorough evaluation, the Macadangdang’s Farm joined the group of generous farmers serving as ATI-certified LSA.
Looking around his farm with a bright and colorful vision for the future William Jr quips “there is still a long way ahead. There are many things that can happen along the way but as long as there is dream which we want to achieve, and a family that is always there for us, there is always hope.” Indeed, a dream conceived from one generation does not end in that generation as the Macadangdang family has proved. Here, the parent’s dream is like a seed planted in a fertile soil, that is there children, and grew and bore fruit under their nurturing guidance. The nurturing guidance at times may demand sacrifice as Grace had experienced from being an OFW but they were able to rise above all of these as a family. In sharing their story, the Macadangdang family continue and are hopeful that their life stories will serve as an inspiration to those dreaming for a bright future through agriculture.
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