Batangas Governor Vilma Santos-Recto announced that the provincial government will be providing cash incentives to all the parent leaders of the Department of Social Welfare and Development’s (DSWD) Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program in the province. Gov. Recto shared this news before more than 3,000 parent leaders during the Parent Leaders’ Congress held last September 18 in Batangas City.

The provincial government will provide a PhP500 monthly honorarium to all 3,332 parent leaders in Batangas. The provision of incentives will start this October 2015 and according to the Governor, this has an ensured budget allocation for the year 2016.

Gov. Recto said that the incentive is a form of recognition to the parent leaders’ efforts, especially in ensuring that other beneficiaries of the program comply with their co-responsibilities with the Pantawid Pamilya program.

“Maliit lang po ito, pero tanggapin po ninyo bilang pasasalamat namin sa inyo. Hindi po biro ang trabaho n’yo bilang mga parent leaders. Saludo po kami sa inyong sipag at tiyaga sa paggabay sa mga beneficiaries at ‘yan po ay hindi dapat balewalain,” she shared before the crowd.

In the implementation of the Pantawid Pamilya program, beneficiaries are clustered into groups of 25 to 40 members, which are led by their designated parent leaders. The parent leaders are the partners of the DSWD field staff in monitoring the other beneficiaries at the barangay level.

For the DSWD, the parent leaders are volunteers and are not provided any form of incentive other than capacity building such as leadership skills trainings.

DSWD Secretary Corazon Juliano-Soliman shared her gratitude to the provincial government for this effort.

“Alam naming kayong mga parent leaders ay kumikilos nang boluntaryo sa inyong pagnanais na tumulong. Pero ang incentive na ito ay isang pagkilala sa inyong pakikipagtulungan sa pagpuksa ng kahirapan dito sa lalawigan ng Batangas,” said Sec. Soliman to the parent leaders.

Rosita Cruzat, a parent leader from Bauan town, shared her gratitude and committed to continuously work towards achieving the goals of both the national and local governments—which is to bring them out of poverty.

The Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program is a human capital development program of the national government that provides conditional cash grants for the needs on health, nutrition and education of children age zero to 18 years old.#