Images from the Philippines
by Don Hinrichsen

	The Women’s Association of Awile Barangay (municipality) meet in the fishing village of Bigat. The group has 35 members, 19 of them are practicing family planning.
	At the Teen Health Center in Cavite, Presdient Aurora Silayan-Go (center) talks with teenage girls about their reproductive health and rights.
	Rosie Cacho is one of the 35 members of the women’s group of Awile. With a loan from a revolving fund, established with a grant from UNFPA, she was able to set up her own micro-business buying fresh fish from her husband and other village fishermen and selling them to a middle-man who buys fish for restaurants in Manila. Her family’s income has jumped from 1,000 pesos a month to 4,000  per week!
	Jena Apigo is another woman who set up her own business with a loan from the Awile Women’s Association. She now farms fish (mostly groupers and milkfish) and fattens crabs for sale to restaurants.
	In the Manila slum area of Apelo, Dr. Junice Melgar (far right) runs a reproductive health and family planning clinic for poor women and their children. The Likhaan clinic provides services for over 300 clients a month.
	At the main offices of Reachout, a Manila-based NGO which addresses the needs of  sex workers, two young prostitutes attend a counseling session and are given supplies of condoms, provide free by Reachout.
	Dr. Junice Melgar, director of the Likhaan clinic in Apelo. Established in 1990, Likhaan means “creation”. The clinic was built with funds provided by the women of this slum community.
	A young woman gets a health check-up at the Likhaan clinic in Apelo.
	Water from stand pipes and pumps, like this one in central Manila, is often polluted with sewage and industrial wastes. Health conditions are appalling and services often inadequate.
	Nearly one-third of Manila’s 10 million residents live in slums and squatter settlements. In this slum community in central Manila, some 3,000 people live cheek-by-jowl along a fetid canal.
	In the community of Taytay, about one hour’s drive from Metro Manila, a local NGO, Klinika Medico, has launched a project to involve men in reproductive health decisions. They target young tricycle drivers, like this young man, providing counseling for the men and their wives, reproductive health services and contraceptives. Half of the 3,700 members of the local tricycle’s association are regular visitors to the clinic (a tricyle is a motor bike with a side-car for passengers)
	At the Likhaan clinic in Apelo, 6 community health volunteers assist with outreach and help out in the clinic.
	This young girl is is a member of the Teen Health Center in Cavite, a coastal suburb of Manila.
	These children all belong to members of the San Fabian Women’s Cooperative. Established 1992, it now has six women’s groups totaling 140 members. A revolving fund allows women to take out low interest loans to develop micro-enterprises. The repayment rate on the loans is over 90%.
	Teenagers attend a workshop at the Foundation for Adolescent Development’s Teen Health Center in Cavite.

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