National Anti-Poverty Commission (NAPC) Secretary Noel Felongco announces the creating of Kasambayanihan volunteer program or Kaisa ng Sambayanan laban sa Kahirapan, which aims to bring the commission’s poverty-combatting efforts in the barangay level. CDN Digital photo | Brian J. Ochoa
CEBU CITY, Philippines—The National Anti-Poverty Commission (NAPC) eyes a more locally participative approach in achieving its goal to lift at least 6 million Filipinos out of poverty in the next five years.
Lawyer Noel Felongco, who was installed as NAPC secretary and lead convenor in November 2018, said he will rally a five-year program dubbed as Sambayanihang Serbisyong Sambayanan (SSS) to achieve President Duterte’s goal of reducing the national poverty incidence from 21.6 percent to 14 percent
In a press conference in Cebu City on Tuesday, March 5, 2019, Felongco announced the creation of the Ka-isa ng Sambayan Laban sa Kahirapan (Ka-sambayanihan) volunteer program, which is aimed at echoing the presence of NAPC in the grassroots and in the implementation of the SSS.
“Ka-sambayanihan is designed to help people in the ground to give feedback whether or not the development programs of the government reach them,” Felongco said.
Among the components of the SSS are provision of urban poor settlements, microfinance mechanism for those who want to start a livelihood, strengthening agro-economic chains between the rural and urban areas and enhancing food security.
In its program timeline, NAPC dedicated 2019 for social preparations for the SSS program while anticipating a decrease in magnitude of poor population by 500,000 in 2020, 1 million in 2021, 1.5 million in 2022 and 3 million in 2023.
Felongco added that they will also focus on the establishment of a Provincial Consultative Body (PCB) composed of local government units, national line agencies and civic organizations in coming up, implementing and monitoring of anti-poverty programs of the government. /bmjo