Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Secretary Rex Gatchalian thanked the Asian Development Bank (ADB) for recognizing the importance of community-driven development (CDD) projects and providing crucial funding support for the most vulnerable communities across the country.

Secretary Gatchalian and ADB executives conducted inspections and monitoring visits to two CDD projects in the town of Tanauan in Leyte on Thursday (January 30).

“This is very important to us, thank you for visiting and joining us in this inspection of successful CDD programs,” the DSWD chief said in his message during the team’s visit to the Bislig Elementary School in Tanauan.

The elementary school is among the local infrastructures that was hard-hit at the height of Typhoon Yolanda in 2013. It was rehabilitated in 2015 through ADB funding.

Also in the town of Tanauan, DSWD and ADB officials inspected the gravity-fed water system in Barangay Calsadhay that has brought access potable and utility water closer to the residents of the community.

“The well symbolizes the entire community’s effort. Small as it may be, but the effect is tremendous for the whole community and we are happy that a couple or more successful CDD programs are here — both the school and water system,” Secretary Gatchalian said.

These ADB-funded projects were implemented under the CDD approach of the DSWD’s Kapit-Bisig Laban sa Kahirapan-Comprehensive and Integrated Delivery of Social Services (KALAHI-CIDSS), which puts a premium on giving the villagers control over the development process, decision-making, and resource management of community-based projects.

The DSWD chief said the implementation of this approach has been instrumental in promoting active citizenship and ensuring that even micro-projects can have a wide-scale impact.

“In CDD, it’s a template of empowering the community to enliven the barangay spirit. They have the power to identify what they need, and they execute their vision and they run it and sustain it after a couple of years,” Secretary Gatchalian pointed out.

ADB Vice President Scott Morris of the East and Southeast Asia department, who led the bank’s executives in the site visits, said he is ‘immensely grateful’ to witness how their partnership with the DSWD have truly made a difference in Filipino’s lives.”

“Thank you all once again for the opportunity to see these up close as a measure of tremendous success in our partnership,” ADB Vice President Morris said.

Tanauan Mayor Gina Merilo also thanked the DSWD and the ADB, saying that their projects have inspired the local government unit (LGU) to institutionalize the CDD approach to better respond to the needs of its communities.

“I am pleased to say that our Sangguniang Bayan has passed a resolution institutionalizing the community-driven development and its implementation as strategies in attaining the development goals and objectives of our municipality,” Mayor Merilo said.

The DSWD officials who accompanied Secretary Gatchalian during the visit include Undersecretary Monina Josefina Romualdez of the Operations Group; Assistant Secretary Ada Colico of the Statutory Programs under the Operations Group; Asst. Secretary Juan Carlo Marquez for External Assistance and Development; Director Bernadette Mapue-Joaquin of the Kapit-Bisig Laban sa Kahirapan-Comprehensive and Integrated Delivery of Social Services (KALAHI-CIDSS); Director Miramel Laxa of the Sustainable Livelihood Program (SLP); Deputy Program Manager Rosalie Dagulo for Program Services and Interventions of the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps); and Regional Director Grace Subong of Field Office (FO) 8 – Eastern Visayas.

The ADB officials who joined the inspections were Country Director Pavit Ramachandran; Principal Country Specialist Christina Lozano; Country Operations Head Alain Morel; and Social Sector Specialist Amir Hamza Jilani. (LSJ)