A loan helped to provide her community of weavers with stable income and pay for materials needed in making native bags made from seagrass.


Renee Olivia's story

Renee is a Filipino designer who works with women from 50 villages in Eastern Samar to manufacture and export high-quality bags made from Pacific seagrass.

Renee’s family comes from Eastern Samar, which is one of the poorest provinces in the Philippines. Thirty percent of the population live below the national poverty line. This is because the province is constantly bombarded by the frequent typhoons originating from the Pacific Ocean.

Renee started this project using her own savings to develop contacts and international interest. Now that she is receiving bulk orders, she needs a capital infusion to pay for the materials, labor and processing fees for the products, so that they can be delivered on time and in good condition.

Renee is borrowing PHP 1,008,000 through NWTF and Kiva, so that she can sustain the momentum of her growing enterprise and provide her community of weavers with a stable source of income.

Renee's goal is to create a social enterprise environment where women are provided with the opportunity to earn a stable income for themselves and their families by maximizing the use of seagrass, which is abundant in the coastal areas of the island; also developing value chains that could energize the economy of the communities she is working with.



Loan details


Lenders and lending teams



Loan details