A FILIPINO website that chronicles how overseas Filipinos give back to the motherland is already in cyberspace.

The Philippine Diaspora Philanthropy Portal (www.filipinodiasporagiving.org) is perhaps the country’s first website that synergizes varied efforts by Filipinos abroad to support development initiatives in the native land.

Developed by the nonprofit group Institute for Migration and Development Issues (IMDI), the portal features some Filipino migrant organizations that give back to the Philippines, as well as data, statistics, and media-produced articles related to what experts call “diaspora philanthropy”.

The website strives to promote the values and examples of Filipino diaspora giving and development cooperation, even while it is not primarily concerned with promoting the financial promises of diaspora philanthropy to support homeland development programs.

Opening viewers’ eyes to the country’s international migration issue is another objective of the website. IMDI hopes that Filipinos abroad will continue their support to the country so that there is somewhat a dent on the factors that force Filipinos to migrate overseas – joining the already 7.6 million migrants who are in 193 countries.

The Philippines is a global model of diaspora philanthropy as Filipino migrants (apart from sending back remittances for their families) also send remittances as donations, according to studies done by IMDI.

In the most recent data from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’ balance of payments (BOP) records, the amount of remittance-donations from overseas Filipinos was worth US$218 million in 2003. Filipinos abroad sent home US$7.6 billion in remittances that same year (in 2004, US$8.5 billion of remittances reached the country’s banking system).

IMDI is a one-year old nonprofit that does research, advocacy and journalism to analyze the issues surrounding Filipinos’ international migration and the development conditions of the Philippines.

The Asia-Pacific Philanthropy Consortium (APPC), two overseas Filipinos, and three homeland-based advocates of philanthropy supported the development of the website.

For inquiries, you may reach the Institute at ofw_philanthropy@yahoo.com