House wants more targeted poverty reduction efforts

THE  HOUSE of Representatives wants the government to focus its poverty reduction on the identified regions with the highest incidence of poverty in order to help the Duterte administration achieve its goal to reduce poverty incidence to just 14 percent or lower by 2022.

During Wednesday's plenary session, the chamber adopted House Resolution No. 2390, which calls for the creation of an integrated poverty framework to link poverty data with the effectiveness of government anti-poverty programs.

The resolution also recommends the implementation of a whole-of-government and even a whole-of-society approach to address poverty, in order that unified and concerted actions among government agencies and the private sector are undertaken to address the multi-faceted nature of poverty.

It noted that the community-based monitoring system (CBMS) is considered to be the best way to capture the incidence and severity of poverty at the city and municipal levels.

The CBMS national data collection is targeted to commence in July 2022, preliminary CBMS data to be released in January 2023, with prioritization of data collection from the fourth to sixth class cities and municipalities.

Meanwhile, the result matrices of the updated Philippine Development Plan (PDP) 2017-2022 clearly identify the areas of poverty alleviation programs where target outcomes are being achieved, and where the country is lagging.

The resolution urges the Philippine Statistics Authority, in coordination with the Statistical Research and Training Institute (PSRTI) and with the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG), to undertake capacity building of all local government units (LGUs) of fourth to sixth class classifications for the immediate data collection, processing, and use under the CBMS.

It encourages the DILG to incorporate in the criteria in the selection of awardee-LGUs for the Seal of Good Governance the implementation of the CBMS and the effective use of generated data for evidence-based development planning, particularly data for progress and performance monitoring on the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the PDP.

The National Economic and Development Authority shall utilize the results matrices in monitoring the performance of government agencies that implement programs for the poor and marginalized sector.

Lastly, the performance scorecard of each government agency implementing poverty alleviation programs to be aligned with or cognizant of the results matrices of NEDA in monitoring and evaluating the effectiveness of said programs. (         Filane Mikee Cervantes)