THE Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) is still looking for sources to fund the P500 monthly subsidy for poor families covering the months of June to September to ease the impact of the rising prices of oil and other basic commodities.
DSWD Secretary Erwin Tulfo, in an interview with ANC, said the agency also has yet to complete the distribution of the first tranche of the Targeted Cash Transfer (TCT) for the months of April to May, adding the Department of Budget and Management has only released around P6 billion.
He said more than P10 billion is needed to cover the 12.4 million poor household beneficiaries, which includes four million households under the 4Ps, six million non-4Ps households and individuals who previously benefited from the Unconditional Cash Transfer Program under the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion Law which include the Social Pension Program beneficiaries, and 2.4 million households in the database of Listahanan that fall within the first to fifth income decile, or other poverty data sources of the DSWD.
“Unfortunately, we still have to scrounge for the second round and the third tranche, we have to look for that,” he said, adding the DSWD has already distributed the two-month TCT, worth P1,000, to 5.8 million poor families.
The TCT program, initiated by former President Duterte, seeks to provide a P500 per month, or a total of P3,000 for six months, subsidy to poor families.
He reiterated that efforts to clean the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) of unqualified beneficiaries is ongoing.
He said close to a million households may be disqualified and removed from the current 4.4 million 4Ps list. The disqualified households include those without school age children or whose children have graduated from senior high schools, and those who do not fall within or below the poverty threshold, among others.
Tulfo also warned money lenders, especially loan sharks, against accepting cash cards as pawns from 4Ps beneficiaries, which he said is against the law and may land them in jail.
He said some loan sharks are charging 20 percent to 40 percent from the monthly subsidy.
Tulfo said 4Ps beneficiaries usually receive a health grant of around P500 per household every month, a rice subsidy of around P600 per month and an educational grant of P300 to P700 per child depending if they are in the elementary, junior high school or senior high school.
