PH taps foreign grants, dev't partners' aid to address classroom building needs

The Philippine government is seeking grants and loans from foreign governments to be able to fill the shortage of hundreds of thousands of classrooms nationwide. Department of Education Undersecretary Epimaco Densing said Thursday that grants from other countries or foreign governments as well as loan programs from the Philippines' development partners would be welcomed by the government to finance its infrastructure concerns in the educational sector. "These are also other sources that we're looking at," Densing told reporters in an interview. The education official made the pronouncement as Japan, through its embassy in Manila, signed on Thursday four grant contracts worth at least P25.2 million for the construction of various facilities, including classrooms in Negros Occidental, in the country. Apart from foreign grants, Densing said the government is also tapping civil society and non-government organizations as well as business groups "to bring in the gap." Currently, the Philippines has a shortage of 165,000, based on a seven-year projection, according to Densing. "We need at least P100 billion a year to be able to zero out the shortage of classrooms all over the country," he said. So grants like the one given by Japan are among the "sources outside of national budget where we can put up more classrooms," he added. "So this is our strategy right now with the shortage of classrooms all over the country, we're looking at sources outside the national budget," Densing said. In his speech during the ceremony, Japanese Ambassador to the Philippines Koshikawa Kazuhiko said Japan will continue to become the Philippines' devoted partner in improving the quality of life of Filipinos. Koshikawa also expressed his belief in the uniqueness of the Japan's Grant Assistance for Grass-Roots Human Security Projects (GGP), which a small scale yet valuable tool that he said can make "significant contributions in directly empowering local communities by responding to the specific and growing needs of the people."