Filipino at heart

MANILA, Philippines - When Frenchman Louis Faure arrived in the Philippines in August 2014 at the age of 21, he had never heard of Filipino boxing superstar Manny Pacquiao but he knew of Gawad Kalinga.

Straight out of a top business school, he took a detour to the Philippines, that is, in what he called the “hub for social entrepreneurship in Asia” in Angat, Bulacan.

As he describes it himself, while his friends, it was a departure from the ordinary. While his friends pursued careers with big-name brands in Paris, Hong Kong and New York, he chose to work in a farm to learn, to be challenged and to step out of his comfort zone.

“It all started when I had to look for an internship last year. I was looking at emerging countries where there are opportunities – South Africa, Brazil, Chile, and Philippines. When I had an offer in the Philippines, which was with Gawad Kalinga, I told my school about it and I decided to say yes, because the Philippines is one of the well-known countries for social entrepreneurship.”

It was only when he set foot in Manila that he discovered what he was going to do for his internship program.

“When I arrived at the GK Enchanted Farm, which is a social enterprise incubator, I was asked what I wanted to do, where I can help, where the opportunities are – and we found out that the animal farms where we grow chickens, pigs, and ducks are not well-managed – so I took the challenge of handling it, until I realized I could do more than that – and that was when the idea of having a social enterprise that produces organic native chickens came in,” he shares.

This, he said, was the “easiest” way to get started.

““So I dropped my case studies about Apple or Coca-Cola from my business school and researched about azolla, Newcastle disease, slaughter techniques, effective micro-organism, composting, etc.,” he recounts.

In the past eight months, Louis has been exploring the agribusiness industry, particularly that of raising organic chickens, as agribusiness development officer of the Gawad Kalinga Enchanted Farm.

He admits that the work is too much for him to do on his own, so he collaborates with other farmers with diverse backgrounds.

“We work with farmers who were communist rebels, drug addicts, school dropouts, but we’re not doing this because of charity. We do it because we are tapping their talents. That’s the whole principle of social entrepreneurship – we’re not giving jobs to poor people, we’re giving jobs to people who can provide us the best service, and those people are talented. They are genius,” he added.

Apart from providing jobs for the community, GK also has a school for social entrepreneurship where it has 83 scholars. These students, he says, are learning to become actors of change in their communities.

 “We teach them value and character. The academic education – they can get that from other schools, but the character, it takes time to develop. We turn liabilities into valuable assets,” he said.

Aside from being a social entrepreneur, Louis is a farmer, a mentor, a lecturer, and a role model for the youth who want to combine passion and purpose.

He is driven by a desire to feed Filipinos with healthy meat and eggs from chicken that did not come from crowded factory farms, surviving “from a heavy dose of antibiotics, hormons and GMOs imported from Western countries”.

On a larger scale, he dreams of helping erase poverty in the country.

“My vision for your country is that it will soon realize that its people have unique, wonderful skills. When Filipinos realize that they can do something, that is the only time when the bottom of the pyramid will disappear,” he said.

In his Instagram account, Louis describes himself as a “retired Parisian” who is now a “Filipino at heart”.

In an emerging country such as the Philippines, he does not gain any material wealth – but “I had 50 mothers, 50 homes, 200 brothers and sisters, and… 400 chicks,” he says.

And by the way, he has no return ticket to Paris.