The Negros Island Region has an allocation for grants in the amount of P3.7 billion this year to fund different projects of the agency including the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program or the Conditional Cash Transfer, Kalahi-CIDSS, and for Sustainable Livelihood Development programs.
This was announced by Department of Social Welfare & Development-NIR Regional Director Shalaine Lucero during a Kapihan sa PIA forum recently in highlighting the agency’s core programs for deeper understanding.
Covered under the Pantawid Pamilya program throughout the region are 199,792 poorest among the poor families out of the target coverage of 244,951 based on the 2013 assessment.
Lucero is hopeful the number of beneficiaries will be increased under the next administration.
She said coverage to the 4Ps program may create a dent but it will not totally change the face of poverty in this part of the country, in stressing the program is merely an abag, aid or assistance to poor families but with all the other interventions like the Kalahi-CIDSS program that is pouring over P700 million this year, Lucero fully believes it will contribute to the economic upliftment of the 4Ps beneficiaries.
She further said only the Philippines has a family development session as a condition compared to other cash grants in the rest of the world. Even the World Bank observes the CCT in the Philippines is the best CCT ever implemented, Lucero disclosed.
During family development sessions, values are being taught including discipline that would change their outlooks in life.
Most of the attendees, however, are the wives because their husbands are at work. Thus, change is actually occurring among women and to DSWD this is the story of change that they are proud of.
On the other hand, poverty incidence in Negros Oriental is higher than that of Negros Occidental. When Kalahi-CIDSS started in 2011, the province was among the Top 20 poorest among the poor provinces in the whole country with 50 percent but with the interventions it has gone down to 45 percent, still higher compared to only 25 percent in Negros Occidental.
This is the reason why most human developments and investments of so much infrastructure projects by national government agencies are focused in the province.
For Kalahi-CIDSS it has already covered 24 municipalities all over the island, while sustainable development programs has also benefitted more than 13,000 households with 35,196 beneficiaries under the social pension program, supplemental feeding program to all daycare centers with 115,000 day care children and 90 projects under the Bottom Up Budgeting in the entire region.
Lucero said all the programs are ongoing, with high concentration on the package of employment facilitation and micro enterprise extending additional capital to small businesses.
She said these are all geared towards removing the island from the cycle of poverty.
Meanwhile, DSWD reported that for this year,71 children of 4Ps beneficiaries have graduated from college and are now professionals.
Asela Bella Tse, provincial link of the CCT program, told a Kapihan forum that 71 students have graduated out of the students grants for Negros Oriental, 45 of them graduated from the Central Negros University, and 26 from the Negros Oriental State University.
Of the 71, three are cum laudes from the municipalities of Bindoy, Jimalalud and Vallehermoso.
Negros Oriental has 67,528 active households who are 4Ps beneficiaries plus 1,413 members of the Indigenous Peoples (IPs) that are found in Basay, Bayawan, Sta. Catalina, Mabinay and Pamplona or a total of 68,940 active beneficiaries of 4Ps in the Province. (PNA)
