By Dominic I. Sanchez
ZAMBOANGA CITY –
The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD)-9 here is gearing up
for the second round of assessment for Listahanan, which will identify poor
households this June with an estimated target of 149,253 households in
Zamboanga City and a total of 688,496 in the entire region.
The assessment will be done to update the list of the poor
households. Some 1,768 field workers from the different provinces will be hired
to conduct the assessment. These workers will personally visit the households
to observe the family’s situation and interview them. The timeframe for the
assessment is scheduled for a month.
All households will be evaluated through the Barangay
Community Characteristics and pass through the Proxy Means Test (PMT), a
computer system that will analyze every data entered to come up with the
results. As for the assessment, every household will be re-assessed or be given
random re-assessment after a few weeks by different field workers so that they
will be able to validate the results.
Households that will be tagged as poor will qualify as
beneficiaries of not only DSWD poverty-alleviation programs, but also that of
other government agencies.Listahanan will be the basis for the government agencies
to come up with certain interventions for these poor households.
Yuri Choi, Information Officer of the DSWD-IX said “the
results will be confidential but can be shared with government agencies if they
need it for poverty-alleviation programs.” He added that those already assessed
recently would no longer be re-assessed since their database would still
reflect as the latest data. (Shiela May Aquino)
