Alternative Business

by Rucha Lim


I’m going to mention a word.

I want you to take a mental snapshot of the first thing that comes into mind.

Ready?

“Business.”

Now, what did you think of?

For assuming, idealistic liberal arts students like me, it makes me think of corporate greed. It makes me think of men in suits who don’t care about the plight and suffering of the poor.

Can you blame me? There’s so much discourse demonizing the corporate world.

How many movies have there been where executive types are generally portrayed as solely profit-motivated and unfeeling of others? How many “deep” songs are there that lament the rat race that is working in a capitalist society? How many teleseryes have there been where the obstacle to true love was a greedy businessman?

I’ve met a lot of people who say going corporate is “Selling your soul to the system.” For a long time, I bought the idea. To me, business types were greedy people who only want to make money and don’t care about the welfare of their fellow humans. (unless they’re family)

It’s not (just) about the money

This all changed when I was fortunate enough to attend the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit on Small and Medium Enterprises. (APEC SME)

In partnership with the Makati Business Club, the Philippine Secretariat for the APEC Business Advisory Council, 10 people from various areas of business were called to talk about innovation in world of business.

Sounds boring for someone who’s not interested like me right? Well, that’s what I thought at first.

Though all speakers were brilliant in their own rights, there were three who really stood out differently from all the others. They were Anna Meloto-Wilk, Dr. Jaime Aristotle Alip, and Bambang Ismawan.

A Woman For Others

Anna Meloto-Wilk, an alumnus of Ateneo de Manila University, is the daughter of Antonio “Tony” Meloto who, as you may know, is the founder of Gawad Kalinga.

Aside from assisting her father in Gawad Kalinga, she’s the owner of “Human Nature,” a social entrepreneurship venture that strives to help fight poverty.

The business’ slogan is “Pro-Philippines, Pro-Poor, Pro-Environment.”

She explained that they were Pro-Philippines because the ingredients for their products are all from local farmers in the Philippines. She acknowledged to sometimes sourcing their packaging from China but she said that they will remember their commitment to be 100% Filipino and that though packaging in the Philippines is not as good, investing in them would be what drives Filipino products to become world class.

For the Pro-Poor angle, they initially hired from Gawad Kalinga communities and had a minimum wage of P475 a day and then raised it to P625 a day. Their goal for this year is to raise it to P900 a day. They also have a debt assistance program, and a “No-Firing” policy, which she says is in the spirit of “walang iwanan,” letting people the people learn from their mistakes as a commitment to their environment.

Finally, she said they were “Pro-Environment” as all their products are made from 100% biodegradable products, they minimize their use of packaging, and locally source all products to reduce their carbon footprint.

“My business is poverty eradication!”

Dr. Jaime “Aris” Alip is the founder of CARD Mutually Reinforcing Institutions, (CMDI) a microfinance bank.

He calls CMDI a bank for the poor and by the poor. His concept of microfinance was to empower the poor by allowing them loans without collateral and requiring minimal paperwork.

The catch was that only women could get loans. His reasoning was that when you give loans to women, they would prioritize food and education in contrast to men who would probably spend it for “social reasons.”

CMDI also offers microinsurance whose rates range from P5 - 15 per week. Today, CMDI has insured 9 million people which comprises 25% of all the insured in the Philippines, said Alip.

One of their goals in poverty eradication is women empowerment and they hold weekly formation sessions, educating women and giving them the means to start their own businesses. To Alip, empowerment is “not only access to access to credit but control of resources.”

Empowering Self-Reliance

The last speaker I’d like to talk about is Bambang Ismawan, founder of Indonesia’s Bina Swadaya (which means “empowering self-reliance).

Bina Swadaya is an NGO that fights to eradicate poverty in Indonesia, a country where 56% of the population is in poverty where 133 million people live on $2 a day, according to Ismawan.

According to him, poverty in Indonesia is caused by multitude of factors like their colonial history, instability of government, an economic dependence trap, corruption, collusion, nepotism, natural disasters, to name a few. (Sound familiar?)

Unfortunately, Ismawan was unable to finish his talk for lack of time so I can’t give much more details about it. In the little time he was able to speak however, he mentioned the main thrust of Bina Swadaya.

 He quoted C.K. Pralahad’s book, “The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid: Eradicating Poverty Through Profits.” The quote goes:
“If we stop thinking of the poor as victims or as a burden and start recognizing them as resilient and creative entrepreneurs and value-conscious consumers, a whole new world of opportunity will open up.”

Isn’t this applicable to our country as well? The poor are often perceived as this amorphous, generic mass of people as I just did in this sentence. The “masa” is always perceived as uncritical, uneducated victims to be saved. They’re the damsels in distress to be saved by the privileged knights performing their noblesse oblige.

But what if we viewed them as equals, as fellow knights who just happened to be disarmed? What do you do in such a situation? Why, you give back the weapons they have lost so that they may fight again. People shouldn’t be helped. They should be empowered so that they can help themselves. It’s providing them means to get back on their feet.

God’s Eye-View

My reason for telling all these stories is because they simply struck me. We have all these awesome people, doing what they can to make this world a better place.

For the past few weeks, I’ve reverted back to my dark cynicism in viewing the world. People are being killed, living in poverty, suffering injustices, and so on. The world to me, was a very bleak place to live in.

Indeed the world is a bleak place. There’s no doubt about that. But in spite of that, there are still people out there willing to do things to help out. Though they may not do everything, to borrow from Mother Teresa, “We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop.”

These are stories I never would have heard about if I just stayed in my own bubble, living my life with myself as the center. I think in stepping out and opening myself to alternative narratives, I’m able to see more of the world than I once did. Part of what I saw, was hope.

The summit ended with a closing statement by Maria Ressa, CEO of Rappler.com. She gave this concept of the “human super organism” wherein humans, though distinct of each other, are able to unite and act for a collective purpose that they would not be able to achieve as individuals.

What is needed to form this super organism is what she called “God’s Eye-View.” To her, it is through expanding our perceptions, going beyond and seeing the potential unity of things, almost as if you were an almighty God who sees the oneness of all creation.

This is not saying of course that everyone should do the same thing. As we have learned from Levinas, the Other is not alter-ego but simply alter. It is the purpose that is unified but it is the ways we commit to the purpose that are different.

I may be inspired by all the stories of these successful businesspeople but that doesn’t mean that I should take up business to do my part. Rather, it is as if I have glimpsed a horizon to be reached and that I, in my own individual way, propel humanity towards it.