The Department of Trade and Industry – Cordillera Administrative Region (DTI-CAR) joins the Local Government Unit (LGU) of Baguio City in its celebration of this year’s Baguio Creative Festival or Ibagiw Festival.
The festival aims to inspire and promote innovations in crafts and folk art by way of competitions in selected fields of expertise, and with this, provide a venue for local artists and artisans to explore new ideas and designs that would further broaden the city’s creative skyline and enliven its creative economy.
Similar to the previous years of Ibagiw celebration, DTI continues with its support through the Creative Fridays initiative, Mandëko Kito, and Crafts Competition. The Creative Fridays is a series of blended capacity-building sessions that introduces Creative Industry Sector micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) to various learning modules including Doing Business Online, Intellectual Property Rights, 4th Industrial Revolution, Visual Merchandizing, Fabrication Laboratory Visit, Design & Landscaping, and Capability Development Summit.
The agency also sponsored the Crafts Competition for this year’s Ibagiw. Over 40 entries vying for this year’s best creative output award were presented and judged through a short program on 22 November 2021 at the Baguio City One Town, One Product (OTOP) Hub, Upper Session Road, Baguio City. Congressman Christopher De Venecia and Congresswoman Geraldine Roman graced the short opening program. The competition has five categories: metal craft, woodcarving, textile weaving, basket weaving and yarn craft. The competition entries are displayed at the OTOP Hub until 12 December 2021.
Twelve MSMEs were also supported by the agency at the Mandeko Kito Fair. Mandëko Kito 4 partners with DTI-CAR in bringing more artisans from the Baguio-Benguet area. The fair showcases a wide range of products from cakes and pastries, tie-dye shirts, and arts and crafts. Check out their beautiful arts and crafts at the Berkeley School Baguio, Fridays till Mondays, from 19 November – 13 December 2021.
With the theme “Exploring Potentials and Opportunities for Resilient Agribusiness Enterprise”, the 2021 Agribusiness Support for Promotion and Investment in Regional Exposition (ASPIRE) aims to converge and harmonize market development support services to farmers; fisherfolk; MSMEs; and other stakeholders especially in the face of the pandemic. About 37 Farmers Cooperative and Associations (FCAs) and MSMEs across Cordillera attended the event.
The ASPIRE is a collaboration of the Department of Agriculture (DA), Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI). Various activities such as market matching, agribusiness investment and opportunities fora, marketing strategies and KADIWA retailing are included in the said event.
The DTI-CAR through the Supporting Women’s Economic Empowerment in the Philippines Project or GREAT Women Project 2 program conducted a two-day training on Strategic Development Planning Workshop to capacitate four women micro enterprises (WMEs) / organizations who are part of the Benguet Arabica Coffee Enterprise (BACE) and who will be managing the Benguet Coffee Trading Center (BCTC) turned over by the Department of Agriculture under the Philippine Rural Development Project.
The workshop aims to capacitate participants in increasing organizational effectiveness and upgrading operational management competency by facilitating the development of plans and strategies that would help in the accomplishment of the organizations’ goals and objectives.
GREAT Women is a project funded by the Government of Canada that seeks to improve the economic empowerment of women micro entrepreneurs (WMEs) and their workers by improving competitiveness and sustainability of women’s micro enterprises and improving the enabling environment for women’s economic empowerment. ♦
Date of Release: 7 December 2021