DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 2 April) – The Department of Social Welfare and Development asked beneficiaries of its modified conditional cash transfer program to inform their social workers in case there are plans to migrate from their registered address to avoid being delisted from the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program.
DSWD indigenous peoples focal person Audrie Perez said this has become an emerging problem for the agency’s city and municipal links who frontline the agency’s poverty reduction program.
Perez said the DSWD personnel would have to trace the beneficiary in case they move out of their homes without the knowledge of the DSWD.
The beneficiary risks being delisted from the program.
The agency has 30,710 registered households for the MCCT program for IPs.
Last year, the city government through a city council resolution, asked the agency to include IPs from Paquibato District in its conditional cash transfer program, prior to a pilot testing also conducted last year.
The DSWD responded that they were already on their way to include IPs from Paquibato, as well as Marilog and Baguio in the program.
Not all residents, the agency said, took part in the 2009 census, which added to the problem.
The agency will be conducting its next batch of listing under its Listahanan program this summer to update its list of beneficiaries for the government’s anti-poverty programs.
Perez said they aim to monitor the progress of their existing beneficiaries and, if need be, add new names to the list.
“We want to know if the poor are still poor, and if they are not poor anymore, we want to know how government can assist them,” he said.
Carmela Duron, DSWD information officer, said in a text message that the agency is targeting to conduct the assessment of households from April 15 to June 30.
There will be 2,543 encoders, enumerators, verifiers and area supervisors who will head out to each household in the region to initiate a survey of the demographics of each family.
The DSWD is targeting 793,770 households for Region XI.
Households listed under the program will be identified under a database that government and nongovernment agencies can use for their own programs.
DSWD regional director Priscilla Razon, in an earlier interview, warned residents not to be fooled by ambitious politicians into voting for them in exchange for staying in the DSWD list.
“There is no such thing,” Razon said, adding that it was only the DSWD that would determine the membership of all beneficiaries.
