Funds to be used for education and health grants for poor families

(Eagle News) — The Philippine government obtained additional funds to address the COVID-19 pandemic with a “fresh US$500-million financing package from the Asian Development Bank (ADB).”
The Department of Finance said that this will “help support the country’s immediate budgetary requirements” particularly in funding the Pantawid Pamilya program for poor families, as the virus crisis continues to take its toll on the Philippine economy.
The financial package would be made available with the signing of a loan agreement for the Expanded Social Assistance Project (ESAP).
“This budget-support loan under the ESAP is part of the Philippine government’s external financing program for 2020, with US$450 million of the fund proposed for accelerated disbursement by next month,” the DOF said.
Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III and ADB Country Director for the Philippines Kelly Bird signed the loan agreement on Monday, June 15.
“We thank the ADB for again extending its support to our sustained efforts to mitigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our economy and our people. This budget-support loan will not only help bridge our funding gap for our COVID-19 response but will also strengthen our social protection program as we restart our economy and help people get back on their feet amid the pandemic,” Dominguez said.
The funds will be used in the continued implementation of its conditional cash transfer initiative, or the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps), particularly in funding education and health grants to eligible 4Ps household-beneficiaries for a period of four years starting 2020.

-ADB says their evidence show 4Ps program working-
ADB Vice-President Saeed said that the ADB believes in the government’s 4Ps program, as it has observed that this had helped around 1.5 million people since 2008.
“The 4Ps program provides vulnerable households with an income supplement to help their children become educated, stay healthy, and leave poverty for good. Our evidence shows that this is working,” Saeed said.
“The 4Ps program has helped 1.5 million people escape poverty since it began in 2008. Through this project loan and technical assistance support, ADB is helping the Philippines expand these gains,” he said.
On top of the loan, the ADB said it will also provide a $3.1 million technical assistance grant to “help improve the family and youth development sessions, update the list of eligible poor households, provide a package of livelihood and other support to help up to 3,000 households graduate out of poverty, support information technology (IT) reforms to automate compliance verification and grievance redress, and prepare for the integration of the 4Ps database with the government’s national ID system.”
The DOF said that the ESAP loan covers a maturity period of 29 years inclusive of an 8-year grace period. It brings to US$ 2.6 billion the total financing package extended by the ADB so far to the Philippines for its programs to address the COVID-19 crisis.
-DOF lists other ADB loans to help PHL-
The Philippines and ADB also signed an agreement for a US$400-million loan for the Support to Capital Market Generated Infrastructure Financing, Subprogram 1 (SCMGIF1) on June 4. This “aims to assist the government’s efforts to strengthen domestic capital markets as the country recovers from the economic fallout triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic,” the DOF said.
On April 28, the Philippines and the ADB also signed a US$200-million loan accord to provide additional unconditional emergency cash assistance to poor and vulnerable households hit the hardest by the work stoppages due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Five days before this, on April 23, the ADB and the Philippines also signed a loan agreement that would let the Duterte administration access up to US$1.5 billion in budgetary support from the Bank to augment funds for its COVID-19 response efforts, the DOF said.
So far, the US$1.5-billion credit facility for the COVID-19 Active Response and Expenditure Support (CARES) program is the largest budget support ever extended to the Philippines by the ADB.
The ADB was among the first multilateral development institutions to provide assistance to the Philippines’ COVID-19 response with its delivery of a US$3-million grant for the government’s purchase of medical supplies for its frontline health workers, and another emergency grant of US$5 million to leverage private-sector donations for a food distribution program that has benefited 55,000 poor households in Metro Manila and neighboring areas.
(Eagle News Service)