In preparation for this year’s second cycle assessment of poor households, the Department of Social Welfare and Development recently launched the Listahanan as the new brand of its targeting of poor households in Iloilo City and Bacolod City.

Both events were attended by partner national government agencies, local government units, local social welfare and development officers, public information officers and the media.

Lucita Villanueva, chief of the Policy and Plans Division of DSWD 6 and focal person of Listahanan said the launching was part of the project’s preparatory phase. “This is for us and for everyone to already start using Listahanan so we will get used to it and the public will already become familiar with it once we start the second cycle assessment this year.”

The Listahanan, formerly the National Household Targeting System for Poverty Reduction (NHTS-PR),is combined words “Listahan” (list) and “Tahanan” (home/house). It is an information management system that identifies who and where the poor are in the country. The system makes available to national government agencies and other social protection stakeholders a database of poor households as reference in identifying potential beneficiaries of social protection programs.

During the launching, the new logo and tagline of the project were also revealed.

The Listahanan logo uses a check mark, which is appreciated universally as a symbol for accuracy and correctness. The tick box is shaped as a house to emphasize that the household assessment covers families in the target households.

On the other hand, the tagline “Talaan ng Pamilyang Nangangailangan” defines the project as it is – a list of poor families who are in need of assistance from social protection programs.

The design in general uses a simple, clean line which conveys in plain and direct manner the meaning of the visual. It also uses the colors dark blue and red which are derived from the palette of its implementing agency – the DSWD.

During the launching, Villanueva also oriented the participants about Listahanan and what it aims to accomplish this year especially the upcoming re-assessment of poor households in the region.

Villanueva said the DSWD 6’s National Household Targeting Unit has already hired more than 4,000 field staff who are now awaiting training and deployment to the different provinces of the region.

The NHTU will also soon conduct orientations with local government units and local social welfare and development officers who will play a very important role during the conduct of the enumeration in their respective areas.

The DSWD seeks to update the old database of poor households gathered in 2009, wherein 385,516 households were identified as poor out of the 986,640 that were assessed. This year, the Listahanan targets to cover 1,323,778 families who will be visited and assessed one by one by the hired field workers.

Meanwhile, 93 local government units, three congressional districts, two national government agencies and one non-government organization are using Listahanan’s data in the region. There are nine LGUs that have pending requests for data sharing and they may also soon start utilizing Listahanan’s list of poor households once the processing of their request is done.

The National Household Targeting Unit have also sent copies of the memorandum of agreement to partner national government agencies like Department of Labor and Employment, Department of Interior and Local Government, Department of Agriculture, National Housing Authority, Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources, Department of Trade and Industry, and Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council, who may also want to use Listahanan’s data in targeting beneficiaries of their programs and projects.

Executive Order No. 867 issued in March 2010 has directed all National Government Agencies (NGAs) to adopt the results of NHTS-PR in identifying prospective beneficiaries for their social protection programs nationwide./dswd6/WennaBerondo-Bendol