Last week, Pasig and Roxas cities celebrated the graduation of nearly a thousand families from the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program, or 4Ps, the government’s flagship poverty reduction program. Pasig City Mayor Vico Sotto aptly dubbed the program, Pugay Tagumpay, as truly, it is a tribute to triumph over poverty achieved by beneficiary-families. Roxas City Mayor Ronnie Dadivas commended the perseverance and willpower of the families that achieved this life-changing milestone.
Launched in 2008 during the administration of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, and continued by President Benigno S. Aquino III, the 4Ps was institutionalized in 2019 by Republic Act No. 11310, as the national poverty reduction strategy and human capital investment program that provides conditional cash transfer to poor households for a maximum period of seven years, to improve health, nutrition and education.”
This was a major paradigm shift in governance from the trickle down approach — which assumed that the government’s macroeconomic programs would eventually bring relief to the poorest families — to direct extension of financial and material support to targeted recipients who are languishing at the bottom rungs of the socioeconomic ladder. Based on the latest self-rated surveys as well as hard data compiled by the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA), an estimated 17 to 18 million Filipinos are still mired in this deplorable situation.
Administered by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), the 4Ps supports 4.4 million households, provides monthly subsidies ranging from ₱300 to ₱700 per child, depending on their educational level, for up to 10 months each year. It also offers ₱750 per month for health and nutrition and a ₱600 monthly rice subsidy.
The PSA recently reported a sharp decrease in the number of working children aged five to 17 years, from 1.48 million in 2022 to 1.09 million in 2023. This indicates a high level of school attendance and, conversely, lower dropout rates in the early grades which had been the bane of earlier government programs of a similar trajectory. Government has been walking the talk. The proposed 2025 national budget includes a ₱114.2 billion allocation for 4Ps cash grants, a ₱7.9 billion increase from the current year’s ₱106.3 billion funding.
Evidently, the DSWD has been implementing sound management — through the Kilos-Unlad Case Management Framework — to further ensure that families who have graduated are able to maintain their self-sufficient status. This enables the LGUs to continue supporting the families with existing programs to prevent them from falling back into poverty. This framework assesses the level of development on different aspects of social protection systems, including, among others: a) social spending as a percentage of GDP; b) indicators of social differentiation or social organization; and c) indicators of social conditions and concerns. Such quantitative evaluation establishes connections between welfare and factors such as GDP, education, unemployment, and social care protection.
The latest indicators reinforce President Ferdinand R. Marcos’ upbeat assessment during his third State of the Nation Address (SONA) last July that truly, the 4Ps has served as a major catalyst in improving the well-being of Filipinos whose liberation from the clutches of poverty has become the primary focal point of the government’s Bagong Pilipinas program. After all, one of the key indicators of an administration’s performance is this: In what way has the quality of life of Filipino families been improved?