The Listahanan project of the Department of Social Welfare and Development targets to assess 1,323,778 million poor households in Western Visayas in 2014.

These households will be visited one by one by the field staff who were hired by the National Household Targeting Unit starting last year for the purpose.

A total of 3,740 field staff–110 area coordinators, 553 area supervisors and 2,758 enumerators will saturate the entire Western Visayas region. In addition, 320 encoders will also be hired to do the encoding of the data that will be saved in the database.

A rebranding of the National Household Targeting System-for Poverty Reduction or NHTS-PR, the Listahanan aims to update its database of 385,516 poor households who were identified through the 2009 assessment.

Regional Focal Person Lucita J. Villanueva said this time NHTU will ensure that previous mistakes like double entries and non-inclusion of names for households that don’t have occupants at that time of visit or enumeration will be corrected. The enumerators will be issuing stickers to households that are already assessed to avoid double entries. Enumerators will also go back to unoccupied households three times to make sure that families are included in the enumeration.

Through the reassessment, Villanueva stressed “no one will be left behind” as the NHTU will ensure that all households will be covered. Those who were not included during the regular assessment will be given the chance to apply through the on-demand application (ODA), she added.

Field enumerators will be using Family Assessment Forms (FAF) in collecting data during their house-to-house enumeration of poor households. The data collected will then go through Proxy Means Test for poor and non-poor identification. PMT is a statistical formula that estimates the income of households based on the proxy variables included in the FAF.

The first cycle of household assessment was done in 2009 and according to Executive Order 867, the updating of the database should be done every four years.

The database of these identified poor households is used in prioritizing beneficiaries for anti-poverty programs of the government.

Applicants’ qualifications

Hiring of field staff to work for the second round of assessment is still going on. Those who wish to apply may personally submit their applications to the DSWD regional office in Molo, Iloilo City and may opt to take the qualifying exam right away or wait for the schedule.

To qualify as area coordinators and area supervisors, applicants must be Bachelor’s Degree in Social Science or any related course, must have at least two years experience in a supervisory role, must possess excellent communications and writing skills, should have experience in conflict resolution/mediation work and must be computer literate with knowledge and skills on Microsoft Office.

For enumerators, they must have completed at least two years in college, should have good interviewing and communication skills, must be residents of the municipality where they will be assigned, computer literate with knowledge and skills on Microsoft Office and must have initiative to learn and contribute to the success of the project.

Meanwhile, applicants for encoders should have completed at least two years in college or any IT-related courses, must have initiative to learn and contribute to the success of the project and must have an encoding speed of at least 35 words per minute./DSWD6/Wenna Berondo-Bendol