BRIDGING THE GAP: PBSP evaluates the gains of its 15-year peace and development program in Mindanao
Mindanao has always been rich in natural resources – verdant hills, abundant seas teeming with marine life, and fertile lands that yield significant produce. Ironically, it has also been poor in many aspects.
For one, these assets have always been overshadowed by its negative image caused by insurgencies and rampant kidnapping in some areas.
One of its root causes? Poverty.
But 15 years ago, the region wasn’t just at a standstill due to violence and poverty. A study done by Philippine Business for Social Progress (PBSP) unearthed a second and much poorer Mindanao which was wallowing in a serious crisis in education.
MAKING PBSP MORE RELEVANT
“Mindanao is the area in the country that has had high levels of poverty. It also had probably the most widespread cases of insurgencies. PBSP has always wanted to be where the need was greatest and this was the logic for its major contributions that it has been trying to make in Mindanao. That is why 15 years ago, PBSP decided to review its operations in Mindanao and plan out what to do in the succeeding years by doing an analysis of where Mindanao was,” explained Paul G. Dominguez, vice chairman of PBSP, and chairman of its Mindanao Regional Committee.
Former PBSP senior executive Prof. Ernesto Garilao was commissioned to do the study in 1999 which became the basis of the organization’s strategy for intervention in the Mindanao peace and development effort.
“The study showed that while there were areas in Mindanao that were obviously very progressive such as Davao, there were also areas that have fallen behind because of a variety of reasons, and continue to have very limited prospects for growth. This is where the term “the second Mindanao” emerged. It was PBSP’s decision then to focus its efforts and to make a contribution to accelerating growth, addressing poverty in those specific areas that were identified in the Garilao study,” he said.
STRIKING FINDINGS: A SECOND MINDANAO
There were very revealing findings that came out of the study. One, there was a social volcano that was about to erupt then as development was skewed in several areas and there was a lot of discontent.
According to Dominguez, there were gaps in human resource development, specifically education, that were very serious.
“It was in the human resource sector where the gaps have become widest. A lot of the schools, education system had been heavily affected, at the same time, interrupted by the intermittent conflict that had plagued certain areas in Mindanao over the last 30 years,” he said.
The 1998 statistics showed that the conflict-affected areas (usually in Region 11) had lower rates of performance, income, enrollment and other important metrics than the lowest scoring areas in Luzon and Visayas. Development assistance was also not reaching this so-called second Mindanao because most of the donors shied away due to the peace and order situation. There was also the lack of delivery mechanisms in these areas.
Most of the casualties of the conflict then were young people aged 14 to 21 – those who were supposed to be in school but weren’t. Statistics also showed that only 10 out of 100 students were able to graduate from high school on time in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM). The drop out rate in elementary was 12 percent. Among the Mindanao regions, ARMM had the highest drop out rate at 20 percent.
Moreover, the quality of education that the children received was also not at par with their counterparts in Luzon and Visayas.
In the health sector, the most urgent need were health services and simple facilities for storage of vaccines. Few people in these areas were not health conscious, compounding the challenges facing the sector.
RESPONDING TO THE CHALLENGES
To respond to the challenges, PBSP launched in 1999 the Mindanao Peace and Development Program (MPDP) which focused on improving interventions in education and literacy, health and water, and productivity and income improvement in the most impoverished areas.
These 10 priority areas are Basilan, Agusan del Norte, Tawi-Tawi, Zamboanga Sibugay, Lanao del Sur, Sulu, Maguindanao, Sarangani, Zamboanga del Sur, and North Cotabato. These programs were augmented by governance and constituency building initiatives to improve the management capacities of local governments.
A 10-year Catch-up Program was implemented to bring the living standards in the poorer provinces in ARMM and other conflict-affected areas at par with the more progressive ones in Mindanao.
The study was also shared with the media to create awareness, and attract donor support.
At that time, PBSP was the only NGO working in Mindanao with such a wide scope of services. Its program became the benchmark for other donors and organizations because it had models to show. In 2000, a budget of ₱800 million was initially targeted to be raised for the program but over the course of 15 years, PBSP was able to raise a total of ₱1.1 billion from donors, member-companies and partners who believed in the cause.
Later, PBSP focused on education and health and deprioritized some of the initial projects on productivity and income enhancement to organizations who had more funds and were better equipped to implement it.
In education, literacy programs were the entry point of interventions in Basilan and Jolo. Review classes were organized for Education graduates who would like to take the Licensure Exam for Teachers (LET). At that time, these graduates didn’t know how to fill up forms and to follow instructions. But the bigger challenge was that they didn’t have birth certificates and diplomas as well so they couldn’t comply with the requirements of the LET exam.
These issues prompted PBSP to focus instead on formal education. To address access to education, it expanded its classroom assistance project by including classroom construction to increase the number of children that could attend school. Classrooms came complete with chairs and tables. Teachers’ trainings were given and facilities like science laboratories and audio-visual materials were provided to improve content and delivery. Educational assistance was given to address daily needs such as school supplies, uniforms, and transportation expenses. Feeding programs were also implemented in target schools in Basilan and other areas.
PBSP helped Parent-Teacher Associations (PTA) engage in livelihood activities.
Facilities were also given to schools to further improve their Technology Livelihood Education (TLE) subject while technical schools were encouraged to offer more technical vocational short courses that could cater to the industries within their areas. In Tawi-Tawi for instance, many students studied cellphone repair and started earning their own income.
Volunteer teachers were also funded. School heads (principals and teachers-in-charge) were trained to be effective instructional leaders and managers. Local school boards (LSB) were empowered and taught how to put to good use their special education fund.
PBSP introduced the concept of the Municipal Education Agenda to local government units to encourage a more collective approach to solving problems in their respective towns and cities. Among the most cooperative LSBs who continued PBSP’s programs were those in Sarangani under former Governor Miguel Dominguez and Bongao, Tawi-Tawi under current Mayor Jasper Que.
For the health sector, PBSP’s goals were to bring the health services nearer to the communities and to espouse a health-seeking behavior among the populace. Hence, local people were mobilized and deployed while health centers were equipped and upgraded in Zamboanga City and Agusan del Norte.
Water systems were set up to address health problems. Maternity and lying-in clinics were built and equipped with facilities so they could be accredited under PhilHealth. Barangay health workers (BHWs) were trained on first-aid, and maternal and child care services as well as equipped with medical kits.
Rural Health Units or Centers (RHUs/RHCs) were encouraged to deploy midwives in barangays where there were BHWs. Refrigerators and ice chests (coolers) were provided to store vaccines that were being transported to RHUs.
Among the donors with long-standing assistance for the MPDP are Fundacion Humanismo Y Democracia and Philam Foundation.
TAKING GREAT STRIDES
While there is still a lot of work to be done in Mindanao, the Mindanao Peace and Development Program was able to yield positive results in the areas of intervention for both education and health.
Fifteen percent (860 schools and 359,950 beneficiaries) in the 10 priority areas were reached. A total of 568 classrooms were constructed, 75 science laboratories and 76 TLE workshops were set up, 183 audio-visual rooms provided, 131,654 books provided, 30,767 received educational assistance, and 141,945 were recipients of supplemental feeding.
About 8,080 teachers and 535 school heads were trained. Thirty-four LSBs were assisted while 353 PTAs were trained.
For health, 38 health center facilities were upgraded, three maternity clinics were constructed, 1,636 medical kits provided, and 2,386 health personnel were trained.
National Achievement Test (NAT) scores in elementary registered a 47 percent increase (73.99% in 2012-2013 from 50.21% in 2000-2001, and 10 percent in high school (57.71% in 2012-2013 from 52.38% in 2000-2001) in Region IX, Region XII, CARAGA and ARMM. High school enrolment increased to 64.60 percent while 84 percent of students are now able to finish high school in these areas.
Beyond these numbers comes the most significant accomplishment which is the improvement in the lives of many people in Mindanao.
“I think PBSP’s major contribution has been to focus local government attention to the gaps of human resource challenges. Mindanao is no longer an island whose growth is going to be dependent on its natural resources, simply because our population has become very large. Our (Mindanao’s) growth and performance in the future is going to be directly dependent on how well we are able to educate our people because they are now our principal resource that have to be mobilized to address poverty and bring about economic growth, especially in the rural areas. I’m certain that PBSP will continue to make a contribution not only in the human resource sector but also in addressing the income gaps in the rural sector through this inclusive business imperative (IBI) model that we’re trying to promote,” ends Dominguez.
This article was also published on http://www.pbsp.org.ph/news/bridging-the-gap/.