About Us

As the country branch of the Geneva-based International Social Service-global, we take pride that ISS-Phils, in 25 years, has provided assistance to victims and members of their families through domestic and cross-border tracing services, provision of half-way house facilities, psycho-social interventions, financial support and legal assistance with the support of partners.

Who We Are
The International Social Service Philippines (ISSP) is a Non- profit, Non-Government voluntary organization duly registered under the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Department of Social Welfare and Development.

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Our History

     The ISS-Philippines or ISSP has been formally operating as an international non-governmental organization (INGO) duly registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission since 2004. It was also accredited by the Department of Social Welfare and Development that same year as an agency authorized to provide social services in response to the needs of individuals and families in distress. However, the ISSP has actually been rendering its services to those in need regardless of race, social, political and/or religious affiliation, in solidarity with the 150 branches of the International Social Service global community, since 1990, when officials of the Philippine National Red Cross (PNRC) first organized the ISSP to assist ISS-Hong Kong with programs for Vietnamese refugees at the Philippine Refugee Processing Center (PRPC) in Morong, Bataan. Built with funds from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the PRPC could house as many as 18,000 refugees at any given time. In the 1980s, during the height of the exodus of Indochinese refugees from Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, there was noticeable shortage of basic necessitieis such as food, clothing, and toiletries, especially for adult women refugees and their infant children, many of whom had been born either in transit or at the PRPC itself. This came to the attention of ISS-Hong Kong, which then reached out to the Social Service Unit of the Philippine Red Cross to see about providing bath and laundry soap, water containers such as pails and dippers for washing and bathing, toothbrushes and toothpaste, combs, face towels, and feminine hygiene products to women, and layettes, diapers, blankets, baby clothes, binders, mittens, socks, and wraps for infants. Thus was born the partnership between ISS-HK and the PRC, which became known in the refugee community as ISS-Hong Vuong. ISS-Hong Vuong later expanded its donations to include snack packs, caps, and scarves for those leaving to be resettled in third countries. With the departure of the last refugees and asylum-seekers from the Philippines and the eventual shutting down of the refugee program and the PRPC itself in 1995, the focus of ISS-Hong Vuong—the result of the partnership between ISS-Hong Kong and the Philippine Red Cross—now shifted to looking out for the health and welfare of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) in Hong Kong, Singapore, and other ASEAN countries. In fact, ISS-Hong Kong had long been aware of the vulnerabilities of Filipino domestic helpers in the former British Colony, many of whom had fallen prey to unscrupulous recruiters and become victims of human traffickers, sex syndicates, and downright abusive employers. ISS-Hong Kong was in fact a regular refuge of these domestic helpers fleeing their situations. Thus, because of the need for referrals for assistance and follow-up, the ISS-Hong Vuong in the Philippines was transformed into a satellite office of the ISS-Hong Kong. In time, the ISS-Hong Vuong evolved into the ISS-Philippines. Continuing its work in the Philippines with vulnerable populations, in 1998, the ISS began a livelihood project for families in Pampanga who had been internally displaced by the eruption of the Mount Pinatubo. With funding from the Mackintosh Foundation, the ISS was able to provide them with assistance with which to rebuild their homes and their lives.

    Three years later, in 2001, then Secretary of the Department of Social Welfare and Development Corazon Alma De Leon initiated the first strategic planning meeting with Mr. Stephen Yau of ISS Hong Kong and Ms. Adrielle Panares, the ISS Migrants Program Coordinator. This resulted in four target areas being identified, namely the trafficking of women and children, overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) and their families, and foreigners experiencing difficulties in adjusting to life in the Philippines. This defined the service direction and mode of operation that the future ISSPhilippines as an inter-agency network was to take, and during a visit to Hong Kong to attend a conference as guests of the ISS, a five-person delegation from the Philippines composed of Justice Leonor I. Luciano, Ms. Lourdes R. Loyola, Mr. Rubin Magno, Judge Aurora N. Recina, and Ms. Lourdes C. Quezon, paved the way for a new phase of organizational development: The Hong Kong conference provided a forum for ISS institutional policies and guidelines to be articulated and services of ISS branches worldwide to be harmonized. It also presented other countries without dedicated agencies the chance to provide specialized services and solutions to problems related to inter-country adoption, the cross-border separation of family members, and labor migrants, especially cases involving human trafficking and sexual abuse. Delegates from several countries took the opportunity to apply for accreditation as full-fledged branches of the International Social Service. In the case of the Philippines, after a careful deliberation and assessment of the merits of their application, approval was granted for the establishment of an ISS branch office. With that, work immediately commenced on the crafting of the Articles of Incorporation and By-Laws of the ISS-Philippines and the securing of certifications from the appropriate government agencies, namely the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Department of Social Welfare and Development, the Bureau of Internal Revenue, and the Social Security System.

   In 2004, the ISS-Philippines was officially registered as a legal corporation, with Justice Leonor I. Luciano and Mrs. Lourdes R. Loyola assuming positions of leadership. Within the year, the ISS-Philippines had organized its first General Membership Drive and Assembly and formulated its first Strategic Plan, which contained the ISS-Philippines Vision and Mission Statements. By 2006, the ISSP had been granted official acceptance as a branch of the ISS International at the ISS International Council Meeting held in Hong Kong. This meant that from being a delegation office operating under the guidance of ISS-Hong Kong, the ISSP was now an independent body, developing and implementing its own programs and working on its own with members of the entire ISS global network. The ISSP chose to continue with their initiatives in assisting victims of human trafficking and people caught up in difficult circumstances. Within two years, in 2008, the ISSP, through the generosity of the Board of Governors of the Philippine Red Cross led by Chairman Richard J. Gordon, had received the use of a 500-square meter piece of land in the City of Mandaluyong through a usufruct agreement. It had also received from the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (PAGCOR), the amount of PhP 5 million for the construction of the ISSP Transit and Processing Center. This center, which has the capacity to house eight people at any given time, was inaugurated the following year and visited by ISS Secretary General Mr. Jean Ayoub. Despite the passing of Justice Luciano in 2011 and the retirement for health reasons of Mrs. Loyola in 2012, the ISSP, in the words of Mr. Yau, has continued to move forward, building on its past progress to navigate the maze of the future. By 2015, it had developed and implemented an Alternative Elderly Care Program for the senior citizens of Barangay Namayan, its home community. This program proved to be very popular. For its Silver Jubilee in 2016, the ISSP is exploring the possibility of replicating it as well as other programs that will benefit multiple vulnerable sectors of society at the grassroots level, not just throughout Metro Manila but also hopefully, the rest of the Philippines.