ADB turns over $1-M for Payatas slum upgrading

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has turned over its $1-million slum-upgrading project in Payatas, Quezon. The project is part of the ADB’s Japan Fund for Poverty Reduction program funded by the Japanese government.

The ADB said the experience gained from the project should result in the design of two proposed ADB loans – a $50-million Metro Manila Urban Services for the Poor Project and a 15-year urban upgrading strategy for Metro Manila.

The slum upgrading project directly benefited 500 urban poor families, 100 of whom were directly affected by a garbage landslide tragedy in 2000 that claimed the lives of over 200 residents.

The pilot project addressed urban poverty by taking a participatory approach that made available loans to provide better livelihoods and homes, undertook road and drainage construction, and started a water supply system.

ADB Philippines country director Thomas Crouch stressed the importance of the project as a model for urban improvement.

Around 300,000 informal settlers live around the Payatas estate, making it one of the largest slum colonies in the Philippines. It houses one of the country’s largest open-pit dumpsites, a source of income to about 3,500 scavenger-households.

The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) is the executing agency while other government agencies and local government units (LGUs) reportedly provided coordination and support to the two-year project.<