Our History

In the early 1990s, two Divine Word Missionaries, Fr. Heinz Kulueke and Fr. Maximo Abalos, started to journey with the poor and marginalized sectors of Cebu city. They got involved in the concrete life situations of the fisher folks, urban poor, informal city settlers, prostituted women and children, and the scavengers of the four dumpsites of Metro Cebu.

Being members of the administration team of the University of San Carlos (USC), in Cebu city, both Frs. Kulueke and Abalos brought the activities of the Community Extension Services (CES) of the university from the occasional charitable activities into programmed, sustainable and liberative approach to development. Thus, students, faculty and staff volunteers of the university began to be involved in organizing the fisher folks and dumpsite dwellers and in teaching the preschool children.

Karl Kuebel Stiftung of Germany opened its consultancy office through the CES of the University of San Carlos in 1997. The activities and the projects which the CES office have conceptualized and implemented have since then been supported partly by KKS. In 1999, Fr. Heinz Kulueke, Fr. Maximo Abalos and Ms. Rhoy Dizon, together with the a group of the like minded people organized Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation - Integrated Development Center (JPIC-IDC) as a Non Government Organization (NGO), separate from the CES office of the University of San Carlos. In June 2001, JPIC-IDC was officially registered with Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) under Philippine laws. The organization is governed by 7 board members elected regularly by the JPIC General assembly.