Find out more about social enterprise Dr. Gerry's Coco Nectar and how the simple act of reaching out to make a dream come true together has opened so many doors for GK Liwayway!

Find out more about social enterprise Dr. Gerry's Coco Nectar and how the simple act of reaching out to make a dream come true together has opened so many doors for GK Liwayway!

Get to know GK Liwayway, their hopes and dreams, and the challenges they're trying to overcome day by day here.

Note: Some of the interviews conducted in Filipino were translated into English.

Uncle Frank's Green Honey

"We started developing the coco nectar plantation in Mauban around the third quarter of 2013," starts Tito Frank. The plantation, dubbed as Uncle Frank's Green Honey, is just a minute of leisurely walk away from the community. And as soon as you step in, the quiet lull is replaced with a small hum of activity, your nose taking in the sweet scent of coco nectar permeating the air and your eyes scoping the landscape lush with greenery, bright skies and overall serenity. 

Tito Frank and Tita Riza pose behind their plantation which includes small pockets of space where you can just be by yourself. The place is scattered with prayer benches overlooking the beautiful mountainous view and even has a full-scale labyrinth that you can walk through to clear your head.

 

"[When putting up the plantation] we decided to locate it beside GK Liwayway to give them livelihood opportunities, health support and supplementary values guidance," further shares Tito Frank.

Both big believers of investing in the wellness of body and mind, Tito Frank and his wife Tita Riza built the plantation on this philosophy and it's something Tito Frank also incorporated into his business model for Dr. Gerry's Coco Nectar. "We do not hire on the basis of educational attainment," explains Tito Frank, "We hire on the basis of character and attitude. Any and every job can be learned, even management, without having to go to school."

Currently, the plant consists of 14 employees involved in the production of coco nectar, two in administration and 11 cocosap gatherers, or more often called by their Tagalog term mangagaret ("Karets for short," injects Tito Frank).  Every day, they climb a collective 850 coconut trees twice a day to gather coconut sap from the trees' inflorescence (flowers). The buckets and buckets of coconut sap are then delivered to the manufacturing plant to be processed into the finished good, coco nectar. 

 

L-R: Ruel (“Alyas Payat!”), one of the first karets for Dr. Gerry’s Coco Nectar, posing before climbing a coconut tree, cutting the coconut flower to get the sap flowing, and moving on to the next tree through a bamboo bridge. 

Being a karet requires a unique skill set that usually takes one to two years to perfect. The risk definitely outweighs the reward as a karet can earn anywhere from Php12,000 – Php21,000 a month. They're also provided a simple but comfortable lodging within the plantation where their families can stay with them.

Even here, Tito Frank's philosophy is seen in how the karets take care of the coconut trees. They make sure the trees are free from infestation and that they get enough time to produce more sap. It's amazing to witness how the farmers are at one with the trees – they take care of their trees just like how the trees take care of them and their families. This is a big contrast from the usual practices seen in gathering coco lumber wherein people simply cut down the trees and then move on to the next. But with gathering coconut sap, there is sustainability and harmony.

  

Rising in the Aftermath of Typhoon Glenda

With wind speed that reached a daunting 250 kilometers per hour, Typhoon Glenda wiped through Luzon last July 2014, leaving behind sorrow and wreckage, some beyond repair. Back at Uncle Frank's Green Honey, some people thought the same for the production.

"It was really scary," recalled administrative assistant Jaycel delos Santos, "Almost all of the coconut trees fell and we thought it was all over, that we couldn't recover from the aftermath. But then Tito Frank said to us, 'Come on, let's start producing coco nectar again' and we did and here we are."

 

In image: one of the plant’s hardworking operators, Cris Fabula. To keep the production going and consequently preserving the good quality of coco nectar, people at the plantation work until as late as 2AM. “But no one forces them. Ultimately, they don’t work for me or the company. They work for themselves,” says Tito Frank, proud of his team’s professionalism.

 Experiencing a stalemate for two whole months, the whole coco nectar team worked on overdrive, trying to meet the growing demands from clients, one of which is Human Nature. To accommodate all 28 branches, Tito Frank and his team had to deliver as many as 1,000 bottles of Dr. Gerry's Coco Nectar every week! "Usually, we'd send one to two boxes to retail stores from time to time. But Human Nature was a whole other level," jokingly exasperates Tito Frank. 

And even though Typhoon Glenda tested their resiliency and their bayanihan during those two months, Tito Frank and his team saw something to celebrate. "Because of its strong winds, Typhoon Glenda wiped away all of the coco lisap," he exclaimed, laughing in mirth and slight disbelief.

Coco lisap has always been the number one enemy in the coconut industry, sapping the coconut trees of their nutrients and killing them from the inside out. And with a permanent solution to the problem still undiscovered, farmers have to make do with temporary fixes of their own.

 

Win-Win for All

As of this October, Dr. Gerry's Coco Nectar is back to smooth sailing and is even opening up an even bigger production plant to accommodate the growing demand. With this budding success, Tito Frank hopes to reach out to more people in GK Liwayway and offer them stable jobs with big benefits. But beyond that, he hopes to help them solve the concerns of the community for the long-term.

"When we decided to put up our plant beside this community," says Tito Frank, "These are the things we wanted to help them change for the better – their culture and consciousness."

L-R: GK Liwayway pangulo Ate Chatto, Jaycel and her mother, Ate Bacion, all residents of GK Liwayway. When asked what’s the best thing about working for Dr. Gerry’s as Admin Assistant, Jaycel replied with a smile, “Three of my siblings are now in elementary and I help my parents in paying for all their school needs.”

The simple act of reaching out to make a dream come true together has opened so many doors for GK Liwayway and has stayed true to Tito Frank's advocacy of uplifting communities and the coconut industry. This growing partnership may have only just begun, but together they already hold big dreams for each other!

 

Goodness tidbit: All of our natural shampoos and even our Furry Kind Cocomutt Shampoo have coco nectar as one of their active ingredients, especially sourced from Mauban, Quezon! So with ever purchase of these shower buddies, you also help provide a sustainable job for our farmers. Hooray!

Interested in visiting or partnering with a GK community? Visit Gawad Kalinga's official website for more information.

Get to know how Dr. Gerry's Coco Nectar all started! Check out our interview with its founder, Tito Frank, here. You can also get your own bottle of health and drink up! Every bottle you buy brings a better life for the coconut farmer and hope for the coconut industry.