Kapit-Bisig Laban sa Kahirapan-Comprehensive and Integrated Delivery of Social Services (KALAHI-CIDSS) — one of the Philippine government’s poverty-reduction programs implemented by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) — will conduct an LGU Enrolment Forum on May 23–27, 2011, at the GV Tower Hotel in Cebu City.
Dubbed “Building Communities of Practice on CDD for Good Local Governance,” the Forum will be participated in by officials and department heads from targeted municipalities in Central Visayas as well as by other stakeholders, to discuss the conditionalities and the enrolment requirements that each municipality needs to comply before approval or acceptance to join.
KALAHI-CIDSS, which started in 2003, has already served a cumulative 4,583 barangays in 200 municipalities all over the country. With a fresh $120-million grant fund from the Millennium Challenge Corporation, the Project will, once again, embrace municipalities it formerly covered and expand its scope to new areas in Luzon and Visayas. Chosen beneficiaries belong to the 25% poorest municipalities in the provinces identified, with poverty incidence of at least 33%.
In Region VII, the Bohol towns of Danao, Bien Unido, Buenavista, Getafe, Talibon, Ubay, San Miguel, Carmen, Pilar, Mabini, Carlos P. Garcia, and Trinidad; and the Siquijor municipalities of Enrique Villanueva and Siquijor were recipients of the KALAHI-CIDSS Project. For this year, KALAHI-CIDSS is returning to these 14 towns for one more round of implementation using an LGU-facilitated modality known as the Makamasang Tugon (MT), also known as the Community-Driven Development - Local Planning Process (CDD)-LPP) Harmonization Initiative.
With this MT implementation scheme, KALAHI-CIDSS aims that the Project’s CDD teachings can be infused or harmonized with the municipalities’ local planning process and budgeting system.
The KALAHI-CIDSS works to minimize poverty using the CDD approach wherein the communities are taught how to select, design and implement subprojects that attend to their most vital need. These sub-projects are common infrastructure facilities such as farm-to-market roads, school buildings, potable waterworks systems, electrification, and day care centers.
The LGU Enrollment Forum, spearheaded by the Regional Project Management (RPMO) Team of the DSWD Field Office VII, is part of the preparatory activities that will lead to the Project’s commencement this year. *
