From a construction worker kid to a successful marine-entrepreneur-cooperator

Fragile body, strong heart

While most of his peers are going to school and enjoying the carefree life of a growing kid, Mario is carrying 20 kilos of cement under the scorching heat of the sun.  His young, fragile body can barely carry the load.  At 12 years old, Mario D. Ganado had to deal with the harsh realities of life.  As the eldest among 6 siblings, he took on the role of contributing to the income of the family as a construction worker.  When he is not working at the construction site, he sells ice water as extra income in his small hometown in Iloilo.  For him, every minute counts, every peso counts.  Though life proved to be hard, it did not dampen his spirit.  The difficulties served as his fuel to dream and to work hard to realize the dream.  His enduring spirit and faith allowed him to finish school in 1981 with a degree of Bachelor of Science in Marine Transportation at the Philippine Marine Institute (PMI).  Doing hard labor while studying is not for the faint-hearted and Mario proved what Paolo Coelho said, “When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you achieve it.”

 

Establishing multiple sources of income (the challenging roles of the Sandwich Generation)

The province of Iloilo is known to be a place where the best mariners are trained.  For most Ilonggos, Marine Course is a sure way to achieve gainful employment.  In Iloilo, if you are an “overseas,” you own one of the bigger homes with well-manicured loans.  The course is not just a course but an aspiration that young men in the province are drawn into.  This is also the motivation behind Mario’s decision to take up Marine Transportation.  Fate and love brought Mario to a beautiful city, Zamboanga, where he met his wife Nenita.  As to most seafarers in the province, though already married and building your own family, the role of helping your parents and siblings will not stop.  This was one of the challenges that the young couple dealt with, on both sides.  While supporting their four children, they need to provide support also to their siblings and aging parents.  This is mostly the dilemma of the Sandwich Generation which is largely practiced in the Filipino culture.  The Sandwich Generation is a generation of people (usually in their 30s or 40s) who care for their aging parents while supporting their own children.  Though already working as a seafarer, Mario still experienced financial difficulty.  To augment the family income, Nenita also took an active role in the family’s income.  She has a knack for cooking and marketing and she used this to start a small bukayo and ice candy stall at Paseo del Mar, a food hub near the pier in Zamboanga City.  The small stall became a hit and paved the way for the family to venture into other enterprises.

 

Finding another partner for life in MEMPCO

Mario and Nenita's daughter happened to have a friend working at Micro Entrepreneurs’ Cooperative in Zamboanga City.  She shared to her friend about their family’s growing business and their desire to make the most of their savings by investing in a safe and high-yielding investment products.  As an organization that was established to support the entrepreneurial Zamboangenos, Nenita and Mario saw in MEMPCO a partner to achieve their life’s goals.  Through MEMPCO’s products and services, the couple made their business grow and slowly built their wealth.  The interest rate of MEMPCO and its inherent goal of helping entrepreneurs grow their business has drawn more than 15,000 Zamboangenos to become active members.  For Mario and Nilda’s family, MEMPCO helped them build their emergency savings.  They also admired the way MEMPCO serves its members, fast and hassle-free.  Mario is regular depositor of MEMPCO's Kinabukasan Ko 'To Wealth Building Product for Overseas Filipinos and their Families.

Today, Mario is a ship captain in an international shipping line.   His entrepreneurial wife, Nilda, is managing their various businesses, which include an apartment, fruit farm, and a grocery store.  From a humble stall in Paseo del Mar, their business has grown tremendously, with Nilda’s strong business acumen, supported by the business development services and loan and savings facilities of MEMPCO.

Mario can only look back with kindness and gratefulness to his hometown in Iloilo, to a 12-year old boy who braved the afternoon heat while carrying bags of cements.  He concluded that though life is unpredictable, we can still walk and work in the eyes of faith—and being consistent in our values of hardwork, endurance, prudence, love of family sprinkled with “diskarte sa buhay” and support from trusted development organizations like MEMPCO, our chances of success will surely be high.

 

All about MEMPCO

Micro-Entrepreneurs Multi-Purpose Cooperative (MEMPCO), a cooperative located in Zamboanga City, envisions to enrich the lives of the members and the community in Zamboanga Peninsula. Its mission is to provide responsive financial products and allied services to its members through strong financial performance, engaged and empowered officers and employees, technologically abreast operation, and strategic collaboration and partnerships.