MANILA, Philippines — President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. has said the Department of Social Welfare and Development’s proposal to introduce “food stamps” to aid Filipinos may be financed by the Asian Development Bank.
Following a meeting with ADB President Masatsugu Asakawa on Monday, Marcos said the “food stamps” program, which DSWD Secretary Rex Gatchalian said would help bring relief to hungry Filipinos, may be funded by the ADB’s official development assistance to the Philippines.
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“One of the things in the pipeline that is being developed that is going to be of great assistance to our people is a proposal by the DSWD for a food stamp program, which I was surprised we have never had but it is something that we can look at as it has been effective in other countries,” Marcos said at the sidelines of the event.
A Social Weather Stations survey conducted from March 26 to 29 found that 9.8% of Filipino families or around 2.7 million experienced being hungry and not having anything to eat in the first three months of the year. This is down from the 11.3% logged in the fourth quarter of 2022 but still higher than the 8.8% record-low in December 2019
The DSWD has proposed to make the food stamps digital to allow recipients to buy food and other provisions in supermarkets.
In September last year, the ADB was planning to tap its $14-billion fund allocated for Asia and the Pacific's food crisis to help set up a food security program in the Philippines.
The ADB’s assistance to the Philippines has expanded to agriculture and climate change courses, among others. As of April 2023, the ADB has provided $31.12 billion worth of assistance via 736 projects that span from public sector management, transportation, energy, education, to health projects.
“We are very grateful to ADB and the other multilateral development banks for all the assistance and we discussed what it is that we can anticipate in the next few years in terms of large-scale programs,” Marcos Jr. said. — with a report from Louella Desiderio / The Philippine Star newspaper