CDA Region XIII EO

“TEAMWORK MAKES THE DREAM WORK”

By Anna Danica B. Cuadrasal, CDS II

While it seemed like a cliché the aphorism above is true for Dream Community Multipurpose Cooperative (DREAMCO MPC).

DREAMCO MPC is a medium category cooperative with a total asset of P24,973,483.00 as of Dec. 31, 2020, but before the cooperative became what it is today it started from a humble beginning.

Pooling their resources, twenty-one pioneering members, composed of employees from the Department of Trade and Industry Regional Office, registered a cooperative with the Cooperative Development Authority- Caraga on 22 January 2001 with a seed capital of P147,100.00. The cooperative started its operation by offering lending services to its members.

The “desire to help themselves” is the compelling purpose said one of the pioneering members. The organization of their cooperative means creating and offering services that will meet the felt needs of the members. They believed that it is thru cooperation that they will be able to achieve this.

Driven by their vision to “Make dreams come true”, DREAMCO MPC continuously work together to pursue its mission. Provision of a comprehensive credit facility, consumer/merchandizing, and consultancy services to the members who will engage in economic development projects towards financial upliftment.

Among the best features of DREAMCO MPC are the wide range and accessibility of their credit facility. The best examples are their livelihood and educational loan programs. The livelihood loan program gives opportunity to the members to become entrepreneurs by setting-up businesses and other economic ventures. The educational loan program, according to Chairperson, Ms. Gay A. Tidalgo really helped the members send their kids to school. DREAMCO MPC became an instrument to improve the quality of life of their members.

This positive impact that the cooperative brought to the members and the mission to imbibed the culture of savings led to the decision to extend services to the community (family members and DTI assisted MSME’s). This move increased the membership and its capital contribution thereby more services were offered. This initiative catapulted the cooperative from being a micro coop to a medium coop. As of Dec. 2020, membership increased to 199 and the total loan releases grossed around P22M. The net surplus amounted to P1.8M wherein P1.3M was allocated for distribution as interest on share capital (IOC) and patronage refund (PR).

One thing that members look forward during the annual General Assembly Meeting is the distribution of the interest on share capital (IOC) and patronage refund (PR), Chair Tidalgo added. This is one of the attributes of a cooperative which makes it distinct from other types of business ownership – the more you save by giving more for the share capital, the more you earn; the more you avail of the coop products and services, the more patronage refund you will get.


With the economic crisis that the pandemic brought, DREAMCO MPC remains resilient. DREAMCO has strong loan collection mechanism which sustains their operation through this COVID crisis.

There are also several noteworthy initiatives that the cooperative had done to help their members and the community during the pandemic. In fact, 43% of their community development fund for 2020 was utilized solely for this purpose. They launched the Public Health Crisis Emergency Loan Program with 1% interest per annum payable within 1 year.

They distributed food relief to all the members. DREAMCO donated intubation box to Caraga Regional Hospital and Butuan Medical Center. Distributed PPE’s to members and to the medical frontliners of Butuan Medical Center, Agusan del Norte Provincial Hospital, Butuan Doctors Hospital, MJ Santos Hospital, Caraga Regional Hospital, PDI Puericulture Center, Nasipit Provincial Hospital and Siera Ty Memorial Hospital.

DREAMCO MPC’s vision – “to make dreams come true”, held them together as they work hand in hand to truly make a difference not just in the lives of their members but to the community as well.

Together they will pursue the goal of making into reality the dreams of their members in the spirit of cooperativism. Teamwork really makes it!***

A quote:

“Cooperation is the thorough conviction that nobody can get there unless everybody gets there.” – Virginia Burden