Volunteerism: A Way of Life and Community Service

Volunteerism: A Way of Life
Volunteerism: A Way of Life

Jo B. Bitonio- ARD CDA
Lecture/Presenter
Capability Enhancement Training, Pangasinan Regency Hotel
Calasiao, Pangasinan – November 7, 2012

There is no "I" in Team but there is a
"u" in volunteer! And There is no
"I" in Team, but we sure are glad
there is "u" in our volunteers!
Debbie Weir

• Everyday across the globe, millions of
people are involved in a myriad of
activities as health workers, in
construction, as care assistants, as
social activists, and in a multitude of
other direct activities to strengthen
their communities and the “civil
society” in which they live.
• The common factor shared by all types
of volunteers is a commitment by the
individual to the common or public
good, in that they work not merely for
their own interests but for the benefit
of others. “

The scale of volunteering worldwide crosses
cultures and political systems and makes it one of
the most powerful elements in development
and relief. But despite the major contribution of
volunteerism to development, it has yet greater
untapped potential for local and national
capacity development.

What then are the voluntary services?
Some people believe that the good deeds
in our daily lives are voluntary services.
Others think that a mere donation of
money without physical or emotional
involvement cannot be defined as
voluntary service.
Voluntary services are non-profit and
non-remunerative efforts which
individuals make for the purposes of
improving the welfare of o t h e r s
in t h e neighborhood, the
community and in society.

The United Nations has played a
particularly significant role
through the adoption of specific
resolutions on volunteering. The
first in 1985 invited governments
to observe 5th December each
year as an International
Volunteer Day for Economic and
Social Development and the
second in 1997, sponsored by
126 countries, proclaimed 2001
the International Year of
Volunteers. Both resolutions
noted the critical role of
governments in supporting and
encouraging volunteering

The contribution made by volunteers is
regarded as crucial to the achievement of the
eight Millennium Development Goals (MDG)
set in 2000 for achievement by 2015.

Volunteering in the Broader Context
Volunteering is increasingly viewed within a
broader environmental context defined
variously as civic engagement or community
participation.

Capacity Development
Multiplier

• volunteerism as a key means to achieving
desired results.
• by virtue of the mass of people involved and
the networks of like-minded organizations
engaged, volunteering is a capacity
development multiplier

Meaning of Volunteer
The word “Volunteer”, comes from the Latin
word “valo” or “velle”, meaning“hope,
determination, or willingness”.

In the western countries,
people believe
volunteers are the
ones who work not for
personal benefits, nor
are they forced by law
to labor, but work for
free to improve society
and provide charity to
others.

The majority of volunteers in some countries are engaged
in social and welfare services under local government
administration.
These include health, education and other welfare services
for the disabled, the sick and the aged. The voluntary
associations and individual volunteers which keep
schools, clinics, hospitals and residential homes
functioning are innumerable.
Another significant area is the contribution of volunteers at
national government level where, for example, many of
the national consultative groups, called upon by the
move towards democratic governance, usually operate
on a voluntary basis.

According to the American Social Work Board, a
group of people who are willing to work
together to pursue public benefits are called
voluntary groups; individuals who participate
in the work of these groups are called
volunteers; and this kind of group work is
called voluntary service.

The Volunteer Association of
China puts forward this
definition of volunteers:
“People who are willing to
provide services or assistance
to society or to others, not for
material gains, but from a
sense of conscience, faith and
responsibility.” In China, they
have different names in
different places for volunteers.
In Hong Kong we call them “YI
GONG (workers of duty)”, and
in Taiwan we call them “ZHI
GONG (workers of will)”.
Today, in China, the
development of voluntary
services has become a symbol
of civilization and social
progress. Volunteers can be
found in every walk of our
lives.

Features of voluntary services

(1) They are actions for others freely given. Voluntary service is provided by
individuals out of loving hearts. People choose to work for the good of
others, free of any compulsion by a third party or outside powers.
(2) They are contributions that are non-money-rewarding. People give of
their time, skills, resources and kindness to provide assistance to their
neighbors, communities and society, without expectation of receiving
payment.
(3) They are initiated by caring hearts. People help others to create a better
society.

“We are convinced that
volunteering enjoys wide-
range people
participation, and the
benefits from volunteering
encompass all ages,
gender, religion, cultures,
nationalities or socio-
economic status.”
Beijing Declaration, International
Conference on Voluntary Service,
27–28 May 2002

The Red Cross has long recognized the need for voluntary
action within countries where its member societies
operate, and enshrined this value in its found-ing
statements in the nineteenth century. Thus, many
millions of people have worked as Red Cross
volunteers. To ensure that National Red Cross societies
maintain adequate levels of capacity in key areas (e.g.
dealing with local emergencies/ first aid etc.), there
exist several programmes to develop the volunteer-
based character of the national societies. Some of
these programmes are coordinated by the
International Federation, while others are the products
of local initiatives.

Values associated with volunteerism which can
reinforce capacity development include the
following:

 commitment and solidarity
 value-based programmes
 belief in collective action for the public
good
 commitment to human rights and
gender equity

It is the individual farmer or fisherman… who decides
to adopt sustainable cultivation or fishing practices…
The active participation of rural people in pursuing
sustainability objectives can best be promoted
through local community organizations. Such
organizations are based on voluntary membership
and may include community councils, peasant
unions, water users, pastoral groups, workers
associations or cooperatives. UNDP/FAO 199612

Participation
Participation is not unique to voluntary action, but there is a
strong symbiosis between community voluntary action and
participation. An instrumental approach implies the use of
participation to ensure the better delivery of externally
designed and managed programmes. By contrast,
participatory programmes can use the empowering nature of
participation and its capacity to strengthen the autonomy of a
community.

Together, working
in the same direction

Many people are willing to participate.
Why?
1. Spiritual Pursuit
“A person’s value shall be decided by what he
contributes, not by what he obtains,” said Albert
Einstein. When volunteers contribute of
themselves, they feel they are needed and
subsequently rewarded by the praises of others.
This is not money, nor material reward, but an
internal spiritual value. It gives meaning to life,
fills society with warmth and kindness, and
encourages volunteers to devote themselves to
these activities.

2. Social Mission
Voluntary service originates from charity donation. Today’s
volunteers carry forward this mission and actively
respond to the calling. In many ways they devote
themselves to this work and blessings to others around.
When volunteers work for the public interest, they not
only contribute themselves, but they also establish an
active interaction with society. They stimulate people’s
sense of duty to society. When they demonstrate a spirit
of humanism and service, they also help reduce
responsibilities of the government, solve social
problems, and they are in fact changing society. Again as
Albert Einstein said, “Only in devoting oneself to serving
society, human being will discover the meaning of his
short and risky life.

3. Knowledge Learning
When a volunteer serves, he/she is not only helping others,
but also learning new knowledge and skills. This will help
them mature and build good character. Voluntary service is
team work. In the team, volunteers learn how to establish
good relationships with others, as well as how to
strengthen a spirit of teamwork and effective team
coordination. This is especially helpful among young
volunteers because they can improve their professional
skills in the process of learning good teamwork. They will
know society better, understand the theories (which they
learned from school) better, and also receive inspiration
and education. Today’s voluntary service is becoming more
professional and more formal. Before beginning their work
of service, volunteers have to receive formal training. This
is a very important aspect toward a comprehensive
improvement in the quality of voluntary service.

4. Self - fulfilling Values
The famous American psychologist Abraham H. Maslow
believed that the ultimate goal of life is self-
fulfillment. In his definition, self-fulfillment includes
caring others and going beyond oneself. Though
people seek material gains in their daily lives, their
hearts never stop seeking a mere fulfilling sense of
personal goodness. To fulfill one’s spiritual needs, to
pursue higher personal spiritual level, to develop one’s
potentials and to fulfill personal values are perpetual
goals of volunteers. Voluntary work not only makes
their lives meaningful, also satisfies their spiritual
needs and fulfills their personal goals for doing
something valuable in life.

5. Life Experience Enhancement
Different experiences make our lives colorful.
Voluntary service, even if it is of short duration,
can be delightful and beautiful. Some volunteers
have tasted much of the spice of life, and at the
same time have received the experience of a life
time. The teachers who participated in the
Supporting Rural Area Education Program said,
“We are touched by the villagers and the villagers
also touched us.” As volunteers, they felt deeply
the heart-to-heart communication. In order to
broaden their sense of life experience and build a
more meaningful life, more and more people are
joining the team of volunteers

6. Mental Well-being
Voluntary service can help volunteers cultivate a joyful heart
and a more active mentality. When caring for and helping
others, volunteers’ own mental stress is relieved and more
wholesome characters are built. We learned the story of
Katherine Pener from an introductory article on American
volunteers.
Katherine, as a volunteer, counseled cancer patients for 22
years. She writes, “I can guarantee that all the volunteers
will feel better emotionally, physically, and mentally, no
matter whom you are and what you do. All the volunteers I
know are always smiling.” Through serving voluntarily,
people build good character of self-respect, self-reliance,
and independence, all of which contribute to sound
mental health.

The world if full of
characters. Story of
Humanity
Some forms of volunteerism

Subic Bay Surprisingly the departure of the Americans did not
spell doom. Subic Bay was converted into a
Philippines commercial zone largely through the efforts of some
8,000 residents of nearby Olongapo City, under the
leadership of their mayor, Richard Gordon, who
volunteered to protect and preserve 8 billion dollars
worth of facilities and property from looting and
destruction. Subic has since been transformed and
became a model bases for bases conversion into
commercial use
Subic Bay, the Philippines‘ continues to be one of the country's
major economic engines with more than 700 investment
projects, including the 4th largest shipbuilding facility in the
world (Hanjin Heavy Industries and Construction (HHIC)).
Currently upgrading its port facilities through the Subic Bay Port
Development Project and forging ties with the
Clark Special Economic Zone in Angeles City, Pampanga to form
the Subic-Clark Corridor via the 45-kilometer
Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway, these once bastions of western
military might are now being positioned to become the most
competitive international service and logistics center in
Southeast Asia

Filipinos embrace Hero of the Year,
classrooms' for poor
Cavite City, Philippines (CNN) -- Not many people
recognized Efren Peñaflorida as he left the
Philippines last fall to attend a Hollywood gala for
CNN Heroes. But when Peñaflorida returned from
the event as CNN's Hero of the Year, he was greeted
by hundreds of screaming fans at the airport in
Manila. "The moment we got home, I ... seemed to
have become a celebrity," he said Peñaflorida was
honored for creating mobile "pushcart
classrooms," carts stocked with books, chalkboards
and other supplies, that bring education to poor
children in the Philippines. Since 1997, he and more
than 12,000 teenage volunteers have taught basic
reading and writing skills to more than 1,800
children living on the streets. "The award and the
title [are] really significant," said Peñaflorida, 29. "It
gave me and my co-volunteers an affirmation that
what we are doing is a worthy cause."

• CNN quoted him as saying: "Serve, serve well,
serve others above yourself and be happy to
serve. As I always tell my co-volunteers... you
are the change that you dream as I am the
change that I dream and collectively we are
the change that this world needs to be."

FILIPINO-AMERICAN midwife was
named by media giant CNN Inc. on
Sunday as its 2011 Hero of the Year
for her leadership of a group helping
poor women in Indonesia have
healthy pregnancies and births.
"Every baby's first breath on Earth
could be one of peace and love.
Every mother should be healthy and
strong. Every birth could be safe and
loving. But our world is not there
yet,"

Pitong Pinoy’ – The 7 Modern Day
Filipino Heroes

1. Alexis Belonio – He
created a cooking
stove designed to
help poor people
have access to hot
meals.

2. Jean Enriquez –
She is the head of the
Coalition Against
Trafficking in Women-
Asia Pacific, which
vigorously fights sex
tourism, the mail-order
bride trade,
pornography, and
sexual exploitation.

3. Jay Jaboneta –
His advocacy
“Zamboanga Funds
for Little Kids” has
raised money to buy
bright new yellow
boats for kids in
Layag Layag,
Zamboanga who had
to swim to get to
school everyday.

4. Tomas Leonor –
She organized
“StepJuan” and
volunteered to travel
without any motored
transportation to
raise funds for
cancer-stricken
children at the
Philippine Children’s
Medical Center.

5. Heidi Mendoza – She
made headlines and risked
her life to expose
supposed corruption in the
military, allegedly led by
ex-Armed Forces of the
Philippines comptroller
Carlos Garcia, Heidi
Mendoza photo by
www.cfamedia.org

6. Anna Oposa – She
initiated the “Save the
Philippine Seas”
campaign to combat the
massive coral reef
destruction.

7. Tzarina Saniel –
She collects and
preserves old Filipino
books, even original
manuscripts from Jose
Rizal, in her attempt to
keep Pinoy literature
alive..

Presently, there are more than twenty thousand
cooperatives operating in the country with a total
membership of more than seven million people - farmers,
fisherfolk, women, workers, lumads, small vendors,
people with disabilities, teachers, government
employees, the military, and even former commanders of
the Moro National Liberation Front – mostly people from
poor and disadvantaged sectors who believe in
cooperativism and seek to build a better life for
themselves and their families through association and
cooperation.

These people have pooled together their meager
resources and harnessed their collective potentials and
experiences to help one another and make their
Cong. Jose R. Ping-Ay cooperatives work for the common good.
COOP NATCCO Starting with a pooled fund of a few hundred pesos,
Partylist these cooperatives have grown and prospered through
self-help, mutuality and service to the members as their
prime objective. Presently, the country’s more than
twenty thousand cooperatives have combined assets of
PHP 158.6 billion.

Countries that have a strong cooperative
sector report significant contributions of
cooperatives to their economies. In Japan,
agricultural cooperatives generate outputs
of USD 90 billion, with 91% of farmers
being members of cooperatives. In 2007,
Japan’s consumer cooperatives had a total
turnover of USD 34 billion and a food
market share of 6%. In South Korea, 90% of
farmers are members of agricultural
cooperatives which have outputs of USD 11
billion. Korea’s fishery cooperatives have a
Cong. Jose R. Ping-Ay market share of 71%. In Vietnam,
cooperatives contribute 8.6% of the
country’s gross domestic product.
The Philippine cooperative sector is still a growing sector. Yet the country’s
cooperatives were able to contribute 4.2% of the country’s gross regional
domestic product in 2007, contributing PHP 53.1 billion to the Philippine
economy. Over my decades of cooperative service and volunteerism,

Some form of volunteerism thru cooperativism

The Empowerment Budget of 2013
• On behalf of your constituents, I ask you to examine and
thereafter approve this proposed P2.006-trillion National
Budget for 2013.
• The proposed Budget is 10.5 percent higher than this year’s
budget of P1.816 trillion. The expenditure program is
consistent with our macroeconomic and fiscal aspiration for
the next fiscal year and in the medium-term. Above that, this
budget is a crucial step in our continuing pursuit of good
governance—governance that will give our impoverished
countrymen the opportunity to lift themselves out of their
situations; governance that will ensure that this country moves
forward together. The idea has been clear from day one: Kung
walang corrupt, walang mahirap.
• We can succeed in this goal only if government continues to
empower the people. This means enabling them to take
control of their own lives. It means listening to them intently,
and consulting with them as regards the services that affect
their day-to-day lives. It means recognizing their power over
their own government. It means giving them back that power,
and, together with them, shaping the destiny of our nation.

• The Department of Agriculture aims to increase
the farmers' income and to reduce poverty in the
Philippines by harnessing the country's
agricultural potential towards economic growth.
Through its Medium Term Philippine
Development Plan,
• it plans to develop over two million hectares of
land to use for agribusiness purposes and to
reduce the necessary costs required to enhance
productivity, to make the logistical processes of
the agriculture industry more efficient, and to
effectively distribute the resulting agribusiness
commodities.
• The Department also implements a number of
Administrative Orders and Memos regarding the
utilization and the development of the
Philippine's agricultural sector.

Agricultural Development
• Agricultural Development. We will continue to pursue full self-
sufficiency in terms of food production next year to support the larger
demands of our growing population, as well as to maximize the
agricultural resources already at our disposal. More importantly,
however, food self-sufficiency will decrease our nation’s dependence
on the importation of grains and give local farmers more opportunities
to contribute to the local economy and to their own financial success.
• We have provided the Department of Agriculture (DA) with a budget
of P73.6 billion in 2013, which is 19.9 percent higher than the current
year’s P61.4 billion. Of this amount, P15.3 billion has been allocated
for our banner agricultural programs. This amount will go towards
helping our farmers improve their incomes and produce 20 million
metric tons (MT) of rice next year—the amount we need to attain rice
self-sufficiency, as well as 8.4 million MT of corn, 5.4 million MT of
fishery products, and 3.13 million MT of coconut-based products.

Agricultural Development
• This Administration will allot P7.4 billion for our banner rice program,
while P1.5 billion and P1.75 billion will go to our corn and coconut
development programs, respectively. Meanwhile, the Bureau of
Fisheries and Aquatic Resources will receive P4.6 billion, a sizeable
increase from the P3.0-billion budget given them in 2012.
• Irrigation development will receive an allocation of P27.3 billion. These
funds will be used for new irrigation systems for 61,215 hectares of
agricultural land, for the restoration of irrigation systems over 42,219
hectares, and the rehabilitation of systems over 112,699 hectares. Farm-
to-market roads will also receive an allocation of P7.0 billion, which will
translate to 750 kilometers worth of roads.

This is why we have crafted a budget of
empowerment
This Budget pursues empowerment by creating more opportunities for public
participation in governance. It invests significantly in the people’s
capabilities by prioritizing funding for public services that provide jobs,
educate our youth, ensure a healthier citizenry, and empower each
Filipino to participate in economic activity.

Needless to say, this is not a budget that government crafted in an enclosed
room that will work only for the benefit of a select few; this is the budget
that the Filipino people entrusted to us; and this is the budget that will be
the framework of our efforts to give our people a government that truly
works for them. With that, let me share with you the principles and
strategies that guided us in crafting this budget

http://www.gov.ph/2012/07/24/2013-budget-
message-of-president-aquino/

Workshop?
How can the DA strengthen and sustain
volunteerism?

What are the issues and challenges
confronting volunteering?

“At the heart of volunteerism are the ideals
of service and solidarity and the belief that
together we can make the world better. In
that sense, we can say that volunteerism is
the ultimate expression of what the United
Nations is all about.”
Kofi Annan
Secretary-General, United Nations

Sources:
• 2002 UN Volunteers Volunteerism and Capacity
Development
• Sha Cordingley. Strengthening and sustaining
volunteering in Australia 2000
• Volunteers and Volunteering. Beijing 2008
• Mark A. Hager,Jeffrey L. Brudney. Balancing Act:
The Challenges and Benefits of Volunteerism.
December 2004
• Beth De Long, The Meaning of Volunteering in
Canada (2005)

Sources:
• Arthur Gillette. A (Very) Short History of
Volunteering 26 December 1999
• CNN: 2009; 2011

Volunteerism: A Way of Life and Community Service

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