It was a quiet, laid-back afternoon and the barrio people were just about to wind down after a day’s work. When they saw visitors approaching, they blithely gathered around. A vibrant conversation ensued and those huddled in a circle gazed at one direction—it was toward an outmoded hut that has gotten along in years, drearily sitting on the dirt road leading to the neighborhood.

The group was particularly looking at the sooty and decrepit tarpaulin hanging on the frontage that says: “Welcome! Blessing and Grand Opening of Baclay Multi-Purpose Cooperative (BMPC)”. On the lower leftmost corner of the banner is an italicized announcement that says: We are accepting members…

Judging by the content of that banner, the house must have been a place for some modest business activity in the barrio sometime ago.

“This used to be Baclay’s [Multi-Purpose Cooperative] old office. We [DA-PCC] happened to stumble upon them here when we were trying to locate an old recipient of a bull from DA-PCC,” Fe Academia said. She is the carabao-based enterprise development coordinator of DA-PCC at Mindanao Livestock Production Complex (DA-PCC at MLPC) who ushered BMPC to carapreneurship.

The old BMPC office can be found in Ocampo St., Sto. Niño, in Tukuran, Zamboanga del Sur. Its new headquarters is located in barangay Baclay in the same town.

That banner was perched high up on that hut during BMPC’s grand event in 1993—a key moment that saw the beginning of transformed lives among the Zamboangueños. 

From only 33 members in 1993, the cooperative has grown to 10,000 members. It is rapidly improving not only in numbers but in social stature as well.

“It was difficult for us to grow the cooperative with only lending as a business. But when DA-PCC introduced us to dairying in 2019, it has been one big ride for us. It was not all roses but looking at where we are now and what we were able to accomplish for our families and our community, every challenge that we had to go through and overcome was all worth it,” Richard Hidalgo, the general manager of BMPC, said.

From hundreds of thousands, the cooperative is now worth millions of pesos or over PHP50 million in assets.

“The carabao is not recognized then as an animal that can be utilized for business much less as a dairy animal. But because of DA-PCC and the cooperative taking a chance in carabao-based business, the carabao is now a revered animal here,” Richard added.

With that shift in mindset about carabao, the fate of BMPC also changed. A complete opposite of their low-key start in that far-off barrio, BMPC now bustles with carabao-based ventures making it famed in the region as a multi-million carabao-based dairy cooperative.    

BMPC served as the milk supplier for the national milk feeding program in eight Schools Division Offices (SDOs) in Zamboanga Peninsula and Region X in 2020 to 2022.  This covered 150,000 schoolchildren benefitting from the program. 

“We can process 44,000 200-ml sachets of milk a day. That’s about 150,000 sachets weekly. For our KaraBun production, we have previously served 37,000 buns covering only one SDO. This has increased to 92,000 for three SDOs,” Edmund Calvo, the production supervisor of BMPC, said.

BMPC’s participation in DepEd’s national milk feeding program has brought a myriad of benefits to the cooperative’s members.

Edmund said he witnessed how their members were previously unable to afford their children’s school expenses but are now providing them for their needs more than they thought they could ever manage.

“We’d like to believe that our farmers are typical farmers no more. They are no longer ‘just farmers’ but carapreneurs. More than providing for their children’s education, they have also built for their families a decent shelter. Our dairy venture has led us to experience the life that we thought we could never have,” Edmund added.

The cooperative was able to generate employment in Tukuran and adjacent towns with the increased requirement for milk and KaraBun production personnel. BMPC is currently maintaining 140 employees and providing practicum for the youth who want to earn money while studying on a part-time basis. This was especially so during the pandemic when high schoolers have more free time because of modular learning. 

His statement still rings true with “Dalan sa kalambuan, sa kaugmao’ng haruhay!”, the theme that was written on that banner hanging by the old BMPC office hut in 1993. Translated, it means: “Road to Success Toward a Better Future”.  

From that small beginning in Ocampo St., BMPC has traveled bigger roads and its three-decade journey has finally led to a season of harvest. Today, its vision is set on charting a road toward modeling successful carapreneurship in the region. Those who have already benefited from the harvest all agree: it’s a trip worth taking.  

We desire for inclusive progress where our members and employees will both succeed. As stewards of this opportunity, we commit to continued success by giving this project our best.