The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) said that the result of a recent survey conducted by Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) finds that the government assistance has widely reached Filipino families coping with the effects of the COVID-19 health crisis.

According to the IPA Research for Effective COVID-19 Response (RECOVR) survey, 89% of surveyed Filipino households have received support from the government in response to COVID-19. The survey was conducted from June 18 to July 1 and covered Filipino households with TNT prepaid mobile phones. Of those that are receiving support, 97% received food while 45% received cash.

DSWD emphasized that the survey result affirmed that the Department and other national government agencies have been very responsive to the basic needs of the Filipino people in the midst of the pandemic by delivering much-needed aid in the form of food and cash.

The government, through DSWD, has been implementing the emergency cash subsidy under the Social Amelioration Program (SAP) to support almost 18 million low-income families in the informal sector who have been assessed to be most affected by the pandemic. The survey showed that 79% of cash aid recipients reported benefitting from the SAP program. Aside from DSWD, other government agencies have implemented their own SAP to assist formal sector workers and small businesses hit by the pandemic.

In addition to SAP, DSWD delivers family food packs (FFPs) and other food and non-food items to augment the resources of local government units and to help them respond to the food needs of their constituents.

The DSWD emphasized that this new survey further strengthens its commitment to continue to implement its social protection programs and services and deliver aid, amid the threat of the COVID-19, to the poor and vulnerable who are most-affected by the pandemic.

The IPA RECOVR survey, which was rolled out in nine countries including the Philippines, tracked how people’s lives have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic to enable policymakers to better understand the situation in their countries and make data-driven policy decisions. In the Philippines, the survey is providing information about health and COVID-19 mitigation behavior, preparedness for distance learning, social safety net support, and the impact of the pandemic on employment. The survey randomly sampled users of TNT prepaid mobile numbers throughout the country.

In an earlier survey conducted by the Social Weather Station from July 3-6, 2020, it was found out that an overall 72% of surveyed adult Filipinos said their families received money-help from government since the start of the Covid-19 crisis, with the DSWD being the most mentioned source of help getting 41 and 28 percent ratings for DSWD in general, and for DSWD’s Social Amelioration Program (SAP), respectively.  ###