by Ram Bill G. Bautista, RPCO3 Writer

Enterprise proponent groups of the Department of Agriculture – Philippine Rural Development Project (DA-PRDP) Central Luzon received financial management training on October 2-4 in Cabanatuan City, Nueva Ecija. This training aims to equip them of basic competencies in overseeing the management of their financial resources.

Senior Cooperative Development Specialist Maribeth De Jesus from the Nueva Ecija Provincial Cooperative and Entrepreneurship Development Office and Business Development Officer Karl Gio Ocampo from the I-REAP Component were invited as speakers for the training.

De Jesus discussed basic concepts of cooperative financial management, cooperative accounting, financial statement analysis and interpretation, and budgeting. “When it comes to our cooperatives, recording or accounting is one of their common problems especially if they don’t have a background in it,” De Jesus said.

Financial management in a cooperative involves identifying and managing sources and uses of funds in order to increase business value. It helps the cooperative in financial planning and making critical financial decisions. “Financial management is important so that the business and services provided to their members are orderly executed. There are many services, programs, and projects that are provided to our cooperatives by the national and local governments that needs to be administered properly,” De Jesus said.

The training also included the KITA Mo Na! (Kita at Ipon Tungo sa Asenso) financial education game developed by the Agricultural Credit Policy Council. Facilitated by Ocampo, the game was structured around key messages on savings, insurance, and loans.

On the other hand, the participants, mostly officers of their respective cooperatives, were eager to learn more about financial management like Fatima Gutierrez, Secretary of the Licaong Agriculture Cooperative from the Muñoz City, Nueva Ecija.

“It is very important that the leaders of our cooperative pay utmost attention to [financial management]. Through this, our finances are properly managed and we’d be able to report the status of the cooperative to our members,” Gutierrez said.

As part of the enterprise development component, the I-REAP component also provides supplementary trainings that would help the proponent groups in ensuring the sustainability of their enterprise. Participants included proponent groups who received approved subprojects under the project’s 2nd Additional Financing with a total worth of over PhP420 million.##