The True Measure of Success

Go Ching Hai believes that life’s replete with opportunities to be successful. As a 13-year-old boy orphaned by his father, he was hard-pressed by fate to seek out life’s purpose and fortune.

After shifting from one odd job to another, Go started trading goods using a second-hand, war-worn jeep that he restored. The jeep would frequently conk out, but he would always come up with sundry schemes to repair it. One time, he shaped a piece of bamboo to match connecting pistons, sparking the jeep’s engine to life. And even before non-oil-based gas became a buzz word, Go’s jeep was powered by coconut charcoal. To this day, the jeep, battered by time and experience, is still running.

The jeep’s longevity is a fitting metaphor for the life of this Cebu-based innovator-inventor. At 82, this unsung hero behind many innovative contributions to Philippine society–from corn-milling technologies to the prototype of the modern-day roll-on, roll-off (RORO) inter-island transport, among others–is far from retirement. A nimble storyteller with a mind still stirring like a workshop of bright ideas, Go has his sights set on addressing the nutritional needs of Filipinos, particularly in the marginalized sector.

"For you, you call it invention," the tall and kind-faced businessman says over lunch in his residence, which was spruced up with some of his creations including a three decade-old custom-made round dining table with an inconspicuous, built-in electric fan. "But I’ve just been trying to find something new that the people need."

If there is one admirable trait that moves Go Ching Hai, it is his single-minded pursuit of new-fangled projects that would benefit the people. In 1950, after graduating with a degree in mechanical engineering from Mapua Institute of Technology, Go set off from his home in Meisic, Binondo to the southern city of Cebu armed with no more than P25 in his pocket. "When I came to Cebu, I had nothing," he recalls.

A day after his arrival, he began working for the relative-owned Gotao Corn Mill. There, he upgraded and enhanced production output by 300 percent. Not too long after, he met his future wife, Martina–and found himself starting a family and a business…from scratch. But, call it good luck, the start-up entrepreneur shares that he had it easy striking out on his own thanks to the benevolence of others.

The 1,256 square meter lot where his engineering firm, Hayco Engineering (Hayco, after the nickname given by his former classmates), would rise was purchased from a local subdivision owner, Go Chan, with a deposit of only P1,000 and a monthly installment of P50 for 10 years. The latter simply noted their similar family names, asked about his Chinese roots and what he wanted to do with the land, and agreed on that first meeting to transfer the lot to Go Ching Hai’s name with the uncomplicated payment arrangement. "Even during that time, you already pay the same amount for rent, and you still wouldn’t get the land," the businessman reasons.

He got the same generous treatment from another local building supplies owner. "I don’t know why they were so kind to me," he wonders to this day, "but I was able to build a house, hire people and start to operate my business."

Taking his indebtedness seriously, he has become a stickler for fulfilling obligations, says his wife. Constantly reminding his employees and three children–Nellie, Edward and Paulette–"Ayaw panikas, ayaw panghambog (don’t cheat, don’t brag) and pay when you promise to pay," Go maintained such a good credit standing that even checks devoid of his signature were honored.

The succeeding years saw him employing more of his engineering ingenuity. Avante garde machines he brought to being include the degerminator (panitan in Cebuano), which pares off the skin and the prickly and indigestible husks of corn grains; a corn bagger that pours 50 kilos of corn grits into a sack with one push of a lever; horizontal and vertical dryers for corn and other kernels as well as for tropical fruits like mangoes, papaya, jackfruit and guyabano; and machines for processing seaweed, making cassava starch and processing rock phosphate into a feed additive.

In between machine work, he experimented with herbal medicines like ampalaya as early as the early 1960s, finding out that the bitter vegetable is good for diabetics and the improvement of blood circulation. He would also come up with dog food, sanitary paper, and local champagne derived from coconut juice which tasted like Asti Spumanti.

In 1966, he built what is now known as the RORO (roll-on roll-off) vehicular ferry. A rudderless barge that hit shorelines with nary a thud, M/V Martina carried passengers across the Cebu-Mactan Channel when the present bridges didn’t yet exist. His projects brought him all over the country, but each trip amplified his awareness of the sobering reality that more and more Filipinos, especially children, are going hungry.

In the early 1990s, after bouts with ailments that come with age, Go, who by then was already involved with carrageenan processing, told himself it was time to leap yet again into a void and realize a life-long dream of feeding the country with "affordable nutrition." He is strongly convinced that "a major cause of the country’s poverty is the underdevelopment of the physical and mental condition of the children" due to mass under-nourishment.

Memories of his self-sacrificing mother would come into play. As a small boy in Fujian, China, he fondly remembers that his mother, uneducated but very wise, kept the family well-fed and healthy. "My mother would say, ‘You can save on anything but not on food.’ Do not sacrifice nutrition for other expenses,’" says Go. His mother would put soya-based fare on the table which she made herself–tokwa, tofu, soy sauce and soya milk instead of cow’s milk. "Soya was able to feed many generations of poor Chinese," says Go.

In 1993, Meat Magic was born under Geltech-Hayco, Inc. Soy forms part of the raw materials of this award-winning meat alternative, which includes wheat, corn and carrageenan. In the course of our interview, we were served Meat Magic cooked in various ways–barbecue, dinuguan, menudo–and surprise, surprise! There was hardly any difference from real meat in terms of taste and texture. And it’s cheaper, too. For one kilo of Meat Magic, soaked in three liters of liquid, one gets the equivalent of four kilos of real meat, with at least 50 to 60 percent savings.

Go would take things further by establishing GCH Foundation, Inc. in 2001. "What I really want to do is to find a solution for poverty, how to really help the poor," repeatedly shares Go. With that in mind, the non-stock, non-profit organization hopes to accomplish its core mission-vision of finding and providing correct, healthy and economical food primarily through feeding programs integrated with nutrition education. Main beneficiaries are underfed preschoolers, pregnant women and the oft-neglected elderly, being the groups hardest hit by a widespread condition dubbed as micronutrient malnutrition, otherwise known as "hidden hunger".

At the center of the feeding activities are micronutrient-fortified products Go himself formulated. For families to have protein in their diet without having to spend a lot, there’s Hi-Protina, a tasty, rich-in-protein rice topping made of soy protein, rice, dilis, liver, Omega 3 and 6 and iodized salt. Best for mixing in with lugaw (congee) or cooked rice, a 40-gram sachet of Hi-Protina priced at only P5 is enough to feed a family of four for one meal. Actual pricing is about P8 per sachet, but the foundation subsidizes the cost.

Another product is MyMilk, a full cream, sweetened and high in calcium soya beverage, which at P7 per sachet can actually make two cups of milk. Each foil packet contains 40 grams and can be mixed with hot or cold water. The foundation also gives expectant mothers iodized salt to prevent iodine deficiency, which adversely affects the development of a baby’s mental and physical faculties.

For all these inventions, Go Ching Hai received the 4th Dr. Jose P. Rizal Award for Excellence in Science and Technology last June, though this man should merit much more recognition befitting the impact and sincerity of his contributions.

Yet, for someone who dismisses other people’s concerns about his seeming lack of patents (which could have made him a billionaire) with reasons like he hates the paperwork, Go is never one to blow his own horn. When news of the recognition came, relatives share that he was a most reluctant awardee who was more than willing to have another person receive the award for him, an honor that surprised him in the first place.

You can easily tell why excellence comes naturally to Go Ching Hai by his guiding tenets: "Never, never be satisfied with what you know" and "If you look for a business that will benefit others, you will be successful."

Earlier this year, more than 400 pre-school children, pregnant women and the elderly overran the entire Sitio Rotunda, Banilad in Cebu City, for a feeding program of fortified porridge and chilled milk. With the backing of two industrial firms, another 341 malnourished kids in 11 barangays in the southern municipality of San Fernando were also fed five days a week for three consecutive months beginning July.

These are just two of the several adopt-a-barangay feeding programs that the foundation has successfully embarked on in different communities in Cebu–plus one in neighboring Bohol–in cooperation with civic organizations, government agencies and corporations.

According to Martina, who serves as president of the foundation, even a P15 contribution could provide one hot meal for a hungry child, and for only P1,500, you’ll be able to feed 100 children. It’s just a little act of kindness that goes a long way, in the same way that the foundation’s efforts, perhaps smaller in scale compared to other much more publicized philanthropic endeavors, effectively and immediately address a problem that cannot afford to wait.

Go Ching Hai is much more than a successful inventor and businessman. He is the model that we must hold up for our leaders to emulate and our children to learn from. All the people that his inventions have fed, the lives that have been changed for the better through his innovative efforts, are the measure of true success.

To help in the feeding programs, call GCH Foundation Inc. at tel. (032) 231-0388.