DSWD explains CCT selection
We are writing… to clarify the issue raised in Ana Marie Pamintuan’s column “Sketches” entitled “Reaffirmation” which was published in your newspaper on Feb. 12.
You mentioned that “election choices are personality-based and that among the questions the voters ask in deciding who to vote is “Who will endorse my application for inclusion in the conditional cash transfer program?”
We thank you for bringing up this issue as it will give us the opportunity to clarify public misconceptions on the selection of beneficiaries of Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program.
We would like to emphasize that no one, not even a politician or any government official, can endorse a person to become a beneficiary of the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program. Likewise, a family cannot become a beneficiary by submitting an application. DILG is not involved in identifying beneficiaries.
A beneficiary of the Pantawid Pamilya is identified through the Listahanan or the National Household Targeting System for Poverty Reduction (NHTS-PR), an information management system that identifies who and where the poor are.
The current 4.4 million household-beneficiaries were all selected from the 5.2 million poor households identified through the Listahanan assessment that was conducted in 2009. This assessment covered 10.9 million households nationwide.
To identify the poor, the Listahahan field staff uses a questionnaire, which items are derived from official poverty surveys such as the Family Income and Expenditure Survey (FIES) and Labor Force Survey (LFS). The data gathered through the assessment are encoded and subjected to a Proxy Means Test (PMT) application which approximates the households’ annual per capita incomes based on specific household characteristics such as housing materials, education and occupation of household members, and access to basic services, among others.
Their approximated incomes are then compared with the official provincial poverty threshold to determine if they are poor or non-poor. Consistent with the definition of poor in RA 8425 or the “Social Reform and Alleviation Act,” households whose incomes fall below the poverty threshold are classified as poor. Initial results are posted at the barangay level for validation of the community before the final results are shared with implementers of social protection programs and services.
To update the 2009 database, DSWD conducted a second assessment of poor families in 2015. DSWD is now completing the assessment of more than 15 million families. The final results will be released in April 2016. This will serve as basis for developing programs and services that are responsive to the needs of the poor and a tool in determining the potential beneficiaries of existing social protection programs and services including the Pantawid Pamilya. – CEZARIO
JOEL C. ESPEJO, Director, DSWD-Social Marketing Service