A total of Php 26,798,000.00 in capital assistance, under the Sustainable Livelihood Program (SLP) of the Department, was released in year 2012 for Region Eight, reported Hermanito Mangalao, the Regional Project Development Officer of the DSWD Field Office Eight.

Eighty percent of the total 2,757 recipients, or 2,223 are beneficiaries of sets one and two areas of the Pantawid Pamilyang Program (Pantawid Pamilya) a Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) Program of the Department, which invests on the health, nutrition, and education of zero to 14 – year-old children of poor households.

Mangalao reported that Pantawid Pamilya Program was implemented in ten municipalities of Northern Samar, and 24 towns and one city of Samar – the priority target areas of the DSWD’s Convergence Strategy Program.

Said Field Office Eight Regional Director Remia Tapispisan, the SLP forms part of the convergence strategy, the goal of which is to ensure sustainability of the beneficiaries’ income. They are being prepared to graduate from their previous economic state of survival, to a level of self-sufficiency, after the five – year span of the CCT, she further said.

It was learned that Northern Samar got the biggest slice of the fund, amounting to over Php 18 M or 68 %, while Samar and Eastern Samar shared the next biggest part of the amount, which is 14 %.

There were but 534 or 20 % of the total recipients who were non – Pantawid Pamilya beneficiaries of this non-collateral and interest – free loan program of the agency.

Mangalao revealed that in the past year, the SLP has achieved a good repayment rate – 66 % in the first semester and 72 % in the second semester. He stated that such is attributed to the strategies the agency has initiated, like accessing the beneficiaries to loan protection insurance, making it mandatory for every loan applicant.

He also mentioned that the support of the local government unit (LGU) has been contributory to the success of the program, as in the case of the municipalities of Mahaplag and San Isidro in Leyte, Calbiga in Samar, and Ormoc City. The said LGUs have put value in the SLP by hiring its own livelihood focal person, for an effective monitoring of the program.