Capitol to award P26.5M disaster consultancy soon

CEBU, Philippines - The P26.5M consultancy project of the Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office for climate change and disaster preparedness will be awarded within this year.

PDRRMO head Baltazar Tribunalo said that the bidders are Freedom from Debt Coalition, Center for Disaster Preparedness and Kaabag sa Sugbo.

He said that among the three bidders Kaabag passed all the requirements included the number of years in disaster risk reduction management.

The staff of Kaabag sa Sugbo know how to speak Cebuano dialect, which is important because they will be dealing with the locals to gather data and most of all the organization is accredited by the government to ensure that it is not bogus.

According to Tribunalo, all the process in hiring the consultancy had been observed to avoid any conflict. He said that soon the province will have a handbook or manual on disaster preparedness and climate change.

The consultancy will make a five year local climate change adaptation plan, five year local risk reduction management plan and comprehensive contingency plan.

All of the LGU in the province will have community-based disaster preparedness.

The NGO will also negotiate with the local government unit to get the exact data on how many residents in the area and what are the most vulnerable areas in order to have solutions to the problem. The term of the consultancy is seven months. — (FREEMAN)