AsiaDHRRA and the Community Organizers Multiversity’s (COM) final collaborative meeting in BARMM was conducted with the Ministry of Social Services and Development (MSSD) on March 21, 2025.  The RISE-UP project team briefly presented the objectives, recent findings, target beneficiaries, particularly the people’s organizations, youth, and farmers, and the importance of multistakeholder partnerships and entrepreneurship to eliminate child labor in the identified barangays of South Upi.

Presided over by MSSD’s Minister Atty. Raissa Jajurie, the meeting discussed the baseline survey results showing the prevalence of child labor in agriculture and the potential strategic intervention with several ministries, rural people’s organizations, and youth engagement. A plan to present the findings to the local government units (LGUs) was also proposed to align the data with the LGU’s existing database. Further, the possibility of creating a child labor registry with the MSSD for monitoring was also studied during the dialogue.

AsiaDHRRA’s RISE-UP Project is an EU-funded initiative in “Harnessing CSO Capacities for ECL Action through multi-Stakeholder Partnerships and Agri-Entrepreneurship Project” in partnership with Kaanib Foundation Inc., Community Organizers Multiversity, and PhilDHRRA.