Kandiyohi-ILECO a Two-Way Connection
(International Tieline Newsletter March 2009)

There’s no shortage of generosity among the cooperatives who participate in NRECA International Foundation projects. And amid this wealth of philanthropy, Kandiyohi Power Cooperative (KPC) stands out.

Since 1994, Spicer, Minnesota-based KPC has maintained an extremely active sister relationship with Iloilo-I Electric Cooperative (ILECO-I) in Tigbauan, Iloilo, Philippines. It began when ILECO General Manager Wilfred “Fred” Billena came to the United States with a team of linemen for NRECA-sponsored training. He visited KPC as part of the program, and the connection was made.

“We happened to be in the right place at the right time,” said Dave Nelson, KPC’s  manager of Engineering.

A Legacy for the Future

Over the next 15 years, KPC would provide ILECO with trucks, equipment, volunteer linemen, and various supplies, including textbooks to distribute to local schools. ILECO in turn has sent linemen, transformer specialists, and even board members to the U.S. for training at Kandiyohi, to let them, in Billena’s words, “experience what American co-ops are all about.”

Nelson credits the professionalism of ILECO’s employees with the success of the relationship.

“The management and staff there are just really tremendous,” he says. He touts Billena as a man of unique talent, intellect, and energy. “The co-op there is fortunate to have him.”

Billena describes his work and that of his predecessors in building the relationship with KPC as “the legacy that we’ll give to the future GMs and employees of ILECO.”

ILECO, which now serves some 94,000 customers, is fully self-sufficient and is widely considered the most progressive of the nearly 120 Filipino electric co-ops. Though they’ve kept the sister designation, KPC considers the arrangement more of a trade partnership, providing ILECO with training, high-quality, low-cost equipment, and salvaged transformers to be restored at a special ILECO refurbishment facility. This commercial aspect allows KPC to run the ILECO relationship as a break-even project.

Not one to rest on its laurels, KPC took the rare step recently of establishing a second sister relationship. In 2005, KPC joined with the Electric Utility of the Municipality of Zacapa, Guatemala. It has since provided the utility with training and tens of thousands of dollars worth of equipment and materials, including safety equipment, tools, utility trucks, and computers. They’re in the process of developing a long-term plan for improving the Zacapa utility and broadening the relationship.

“A Life-Expanding Experience”

In sister co-op relationships, most of the technology and expertise tends to flow in one direction. But in the end, says Nelson, establishing long-term overseas connections, like the one with ILECO, it becomes as much about learning as teaching.

“When you first start out, you think, ‘We can go help someone,’” Nelson says. “You’re looking at what you can do for them. But what we found was…that we just learned so much about the world in general. It’s just been kind of a life-expanding, life-changing experience.”

Learn more about NRECA International Foundation.