‘2025 budget to boost disaster aid’

MANILA, Philippines — Amid successive typhoons that battered the country, the passage of the proposed 2025 national budget would reinforce the calamity fund to bring timely relief to communities, according to Sen. Grace Poe.

The Senate finance panel report containing the proposed P6.352-trillion budget for 2025 has allocated P21 billion for the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Fund, Poe said.

The amount is P500 million higher than this year’s appropriation, she noted.

“The increase is for our people’s urgent and essential needs during calamities,” said Poe, chairperson of the Senate finance committee.

“This budget is not just to give food to typhoon and calamity victims for a few days. This will also help in the recovery of our countrymen who were devastated,” she said.

The calamity fund should not only provide immediate relief but also address the repair and rehabilitation needs of affected areas, she noted.

Pre-disaster operations such as early evacuation are also critical measures to avert the more serious impact of calamities, Poe said.

Poe said she supports increasing the quick response fund of the Department of Social Welfare and Development, which is at the forefront of disasters.

At Thursday’s interpellation on the Department of National Defense’s proposed budget, Sen. Nancy Binay inquired about the DND’s preparedness, through the Office of Civil Defense, in responding to disasters and calamities.

Typhoons are getting stronger in recent months due to climate change, she noted.

Eleven or 12 tropical cyclones already hit the country this year, damaging at least P150 billion of crops and infrastructure and depleting calamity funds, Binay pointed out.

“I would like to know, in terms of equipment, how prepared we are for disaster rescue operations. Do we have a helicopter that can rescue people? Do we have that capability?” the senator asked.

Sen. Ronald dela Rosa, who is defending the DND budget, said the country has four C-130 and four rescue helicopters.

The Armed Forces of the Philippines is planning to procure three more C-130s and 17 Black Hawks in 2025, Dela Rosa said.