Tugdaan Mangyan Center for Learning and Development
Ailyn Lintawagin
Ailyn is one of the three IP leD Fellows sent by Tugdaan to the IP LeD training program. She has two children with Andres, his 44 year-old husband- Irish (5) and Irene, 4. They are both college graduates. Irish is now studying in a Day Care. The couple wants to provide a good education for their children; however, Ailyn is not sure if they could still afford to send them to school in the future. Compared to before, they are now having a hard time in saving because of their kids' growing needs.
Her involvement in Tugdaan's enterprise greatly helped her family. She is currently the production manager of Tugdaan's food processing center (producing honey, calamansi, ginger and hibiscus concentrate). Aside from this, the family owns a small portion of sakahan (farm) and a little tubigan (for the rice paddies). They also have a motorcycle and some pigs, chickens and a carabao.
Being one of the first students of IP-LeD, Ailyn saw the benefits of the program. She says that it greatly helped her in gaining more confidence in dealing with other people.
Cayetana Lintawagin
Tugdaan Mangyan Center for Learning and Development
Tugdaan Mangyan Center for Learning and Development
Cayetana Lintawagin
58 year old Cayetana Lintawagin is also one of the many Mangyan Alangans directly benefiting from Tugdaan's kapihan. Her husband is the sole supporter of the family. One of their four children already finished college. One is in high school, and the other two are still in elementary. Their income mainly comes from growing coffee, calamansi, coconut and other fruit trees.
Cayetana's family often has no budget for school fees especially during off-harvest season. Most of their farm products during harvest season had very low prices.
When Tugdaan started training them on better quality production and marketing, her income dramatically increased. She has become concerned both in the quality of their coffee trees and how they present it to consumers.
Cayetana says that even before, they already knew that they were being cheated in the price, but because of fear they chose not to speak anything about it. Now, with the help of her fellow Mangyans who underwent IP-LeD training, she and her fellow farmers became more empowered and confident in interacting with customers.
Now her goal is to produce more high quality coffee and calamansi so she can continuously support the education of her children.