Strengthening organisational capacity, sustainable agriculture and water safety for a Filipino NGO providing residential care to orphaned, abandoned and at-risk girls.
Background
Bata ng Calabnugan, Inc. is a long-standing Filipino NGO providing residential, family-like care to orphaned, abandoned, disabled, or at-risk girls. Operating in a region marked by poverty, limited access to education and healthcare, and persistent risks of exploitation and trafficking, the organisation offers a safe home, schooling support, medical care, psychosocial guidance, and long-term reintegration pathways such as foster care, adoption, and family reunification. Alongside this, the centre runs small-scale agricultural activities to strengthen food security and reduce operational costs.
The organisation's mission is holistic: ensuring immediate protection while building long-term independence for each child. Its work also extends to vulnerable families in surrounding villages through educational support, medical assistance, and community-level child-protection awareness. Funding comes primarily from private donations, sponsorships, and occasional project-based grants from European foundations.
I2Impact Students
The proposed project focuses on sustainability, organisational strengthening, and social entrepreneurship, aiming to reduce staff workload, improve internal systems, and develop realistic income-generating activities. Students will work across three interconnected pillars:
Design and implement simple digital tools to streamline daily operations — budgeting, expenses, stock management, school follow-up, and farm production logs — as well as practical digital-skills workshops for staff and older girls.
Scale up the centre's most promising livelihood initiative — mushroom cultivation — and propose low-cost improvements for dragon fruit and lanzones cultivation to increase yield and reduce labour intensity.
Conduct water analyses to determine safe uses for irrigation, cleaning, and agricultural processes, and provide recommendations to reduce vulnerability to water shortages and support stable food production.
What Students Do
The project unfolds across two phases. The preparation phase (September–May) builds the groundwork remotely. The implementation phase involves a 6–8 week on-site experience in the Philippines.
September – May
Summer 2027 — 6–8 weeks on-site
Why It Matters
The project strengthens the organisation's operational efficiency, reduces staff overload, and builds internal capacity through sustainable systems. Together, the three pillars contribute to a more stable, autonomous, and resilient environment for vulnerable children.
Reduce staff workload through digital tools, enabling more time for direct care and support
Improve food security and generate supplementary income through a viable mushroom livelihood
Increase agricultural output through improved crop management for dragon fruit and lanzones
Increase water-safety resilience during supply disruptions and support stable food production