We are thrilled to share the meaningful and transformative impact of UN-Habitat’s ‘Huy-anan nan Bajau sa Surigao’ project, through the empowered voices of our home partners and local stakeholders, the Sama Bajau indigenous group in Surigao City.
With support from the Spanish government, through the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID), the project was launched to make housing and sustainable livelihood accessible to the Sama Bajau families who were left homeless and displaced when Typhoon Rai hit Surigao in 2021.
The project also aims to capacitate the local government to provide adequate support to vulnerable populations like indigenous peoples.
One of the most marginalized communities affected by disasters, the Sama Bajau is a nomadic sea-based tribe mostly living in Mindanao. In Surigao City, they have lived in informal settlements for decades, usually in makeshift stilt houses over shallow coastal waters, with very little access to basic amenities and services like education and healthcare.
20 Sama Bajau families are now owners of climate resilient and culturally appropriate houses, complete with rainwater harvesting systems and solar panels, located in a resettlement site that is part of the Ecovillage being developed by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR). These structures are situated along a mangrove-forested coastline, which the Sama Bajau will also help protect and conserve.
More than 100 community members, mostly women, were also given sustainable livelihood trainings and opportunities.
For many members of the Sama Bajau community, having a house with separate rooms and toilet and sanitation facilities is life-changing. Their new homes are more than just dwellings that will allow them to feel secure from typhoons and have a dignified existence in the community.
Their new homes symbolize a new beginning, as they continuously strive to be better leaders and members of their community, stewards of the environment, and vanguards of their unique tradition, carrying on their vibrant cultural practices for generations to come.
