By Minerva Newman

Cebu City – The Department of Social Welfare and Development in Central Visayas has cashed out P2,606,168,300 to some 28,942 poor families in Central Visayas who are beneficiaries of the government’s anti-poverty programs (4Ps and modified cash transfer and more) for the period January to July 2017 and is continuing for the last quarter payout.

DSWD-7 regional director Evelyn Macapobre, in her yearend Kapihan with media, reported that the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program or 4Ps has 4.4-million beneficiaries nationwide of which 286,787 are in Central Visayas. It covers the provinces of Cebu, Bohol, Negros Oriental, and Siquijor, 132 cities and towns with 257,438 beneficiaries.

According to Macapobre, aside from the 4Ps, the department also implements programs that include the modified cash transfer for the street families, indigenous peoples (IPs) in geographically isolated and disadvantaged areas, and families displaced by natural and man-made calamities.

“We also take care of families with persons with disabilities (PWDs), child laborers, children in conflict with the law, families with members with terminal disease, and victims of human trafficking. Overall, we are supporting 28,942 poor families in the region in the form of financial and material or ‘in-kind assistance,'” Macapobre added.

She said her region posted a 95.58-percent compliance rate in programs implementation compared to the national average rate of 94.92 percent.

Macapobre bared that an additional grant of P600 per family per month as rice subsidy had been included in the 2017 budget of P78.2 billion following the directive of President Duterte after the July 2016 SONA as part of the anti-poverty program of this administration.

Currently, the DSWD has updated its ‘Listahan’ or the National Household Targeting System for poverty reduction that identifies who and where the poor families are in the country.

Macapobre said that in 2009, there were more than 200,000 poor households in the list but only 43,729 were considered near poor. The current updated ‘Listahan’ has identified 525,588 poor households in Central Visayas.

“The 525,588 poor households are now our focused beneficiaries. The list has increased because we have expanded and saturated the coverage to all households in the rural barangays,” Macapobre added.

Those 4Ps beneficiaries that have crossed over the poverty threshold with improved income and children have gone to schools and graduated college and are working—they will be taken off or delisted from the ‘Listahan’, she said.