The Department of Social Welfare and Development Kapit-Bisig Laban sa Kahirapan – Comprehensive and Integrated Delivery of Social Services (DSWD KALAHI-CIDSS) has allotted PHP 570,619,700.00 of community-based projects for 37 municipalities of Bicol Region as part of its recovery efforts from the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Additional Financing – Community-Based Response for COVID-19 (AFCBRC) modality will be implemented in Albay, 1; Camarines Norte, 6; Camarines Sur, 13; Catanduanes, 6; Masbate, 5; and Sorsogon, 6 this year.

“The municipalities were identified based on the poverty incidence, income class, number of barangays that were affected by disasters from 2014-2020,” Director Leo Quintilla said.

He also added that the municipalities underwent a capacity assessment to ensure that the local government units (LGUs) are ready to participate in this year’s implementation.

“The modality will be implemented in two (2) groups of municipalities in which 37 municipalities belonging in the 1st group will implement this July until December while the 2nd group of municipalities will start in August 2021 until 2022,” he explained.

Director Quintilla also stated that the 2nd group of municipalities is still on its enrollment phase.

The AF-CBRC will be using the Disaster Response Operations Procedure (DROP), a simplified version of Community Empowerment Activity Cycle (CEAC) to hasten the process of approval of community-identified projects and implementation while still following the basic principles of Community-Driven Development (CDD) approach.

KALAHI-CIDSS is a poverty alleviation program of DSWD that uses CDD approach to help communities in poor municipalities to identify challenges, make informed decisions, and control resources to address poverty.

In 2020, the program has completed 573 community projects amounting to PHP129,316,552.89 in 15 municipalities of Bicol Region.