CCC Helps Lanao del Norte LGUs Access Climate Change Adaptation Funds
March 22, 2020 Sunday
CAGAYAN DE ORO, 23 MARCH 2020 – The Climate Change Commission (CCC) extended technical assistance to the local government units of the Province of the Lanao Del Norte on accessing the People's Survival Fund (PSF)—the country’s climate finance mechanism for local climate change adaptation projects.
The technical assistance forms part of the Communities for Resilience Training Workshop held from 9 to 13 March 2020 in Cagayan De Oro, which capacitated municipal planning and development officers and municipal disaster risk reduction and management officers of Lanao Del Norte on formulating and/or enhancing Local Climate Change Action Plans.
As part of the workshop, resource speakers from the CCC’s PSF Unit discussed the fundamentals of accessing the fund, including the considerations for designing risk-informed and viable climate change adaptation project proposals. Participants were also given the opportunity to present project ideas and draft PSF proposals for critiquing and mentoring.
"Hindi na hadlang ang limited resources [to implement our plans] because mayroon namang inintroduce na People's Survival Fund na pwedeng mag-augment sa gaps," Ms. Donna Bella Aguilar, Tubod Municipal Planning and Development Coordinator, said at the sidelines of the PSF workshop.
Since the PSF grant approval and disbursement system was established in 2015, the PSF Board, which is chaired by the Department of Finance, has approved six climate change adaptation projects amounting to P330 million. It has also approved project development grants worth PHP6 million for three projects.
Pursuant to its mandate under the law, the CCC has been working towards widening the scope of technical support to LGUs for accessing the PSF. In 2019, it rolled out one-on-one mentoring sessions and launched an e-Learning platform to assist LGUs in develop full-blown proposals from their concept notes.
The one-on-one mentoring sessions, which are being implemented with the National Panel of Technical Experts (NPTE) and other development partners, aims to enhance the enhance the quality of submissions, based on the standards of the law. Coaching sessions are now ongoing for the Province of Occidental Mindoro and the Municipality of Tolosa, Leyte.
The e-Learning Platform, meanwhile, provides a 12-week online course to enhance the knowledge of project proponents on climate and disaster risk and vulnerability assessment, the PSF and its approval processes, and other sources of climate finance.
To date, the online course has served 50 individuals, mostly planning officers and disaster risk reduction and management officers of LGUs from the Yolanda corridor.
The second batch of the PSF eLearning is now running with forty-five participants representing national government agencies, local government units, academic institutions, and civil society organizations. This will run until June 2020.
The third batch will open on July 2020. For inquiries, interested groups could contact the PSF Unit through [email protected], or through their Facebook page, People's Survival Fund.
