ITOGON, Benguet – Some one thousand residents from the town’s four barangays recently received their assistance sourced out by the municipal government from the labor department’s Tulong Pangkabuhayan sa Ating Disadvantaged and Displaced Workers (TUPAD) program.
Mayor Bernard S. Waclin said that the recipients of the assistance came from barangays Ampucao, Tuding, Gumatdang and Dalupirip.
He added that that identification of beneficiaries from the other barangays will follow soon after the local government shall have liquidated the PhP5 million downloaded by the Cordillera office of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE-CAR) for the grant of this assistance to the earlier recipients screened for the said purpose.
Earlier, the local government identified some 400 beneficiaries in barangay Ampucao, 300 recipients in barangay Tuding, 200 grantees in barangay Gumatdang and 100 individuals from barangay Dalupirip.
Mayor Waclin expressed his gratitude to DOLE-CAR regional director Nathaniel Lacambra for prioritizing his request for the allocation of funds under the TUPAD program to be distributed to qualified and screened beneficiaries from the various barangays of the municipality.
According to him, the local government aims to distribute the financial assistance of PhP5,000 each to the identified recipients so that it will be able to liquidate the downloaded funds and eventually request for additional slots under the TUPAD program for beneficiaries from the other barangays where the distribution will be scheduled within the year.
“We will continue to aggressively establish linkages with the concerned government agencies for us to be able to access whatever available projects and funds that will be implemented in the municipality to augment our meager resources for us to realize our desired goals and objectives in improving the current status of our municipality,” Mayor Waclin stressed.
The mayor underscored that the beneficiaries were appropriately screened pursuant to the TUPAD program guidelines to ensure that those receiving the assistance are qualified to avoid future issues that may arise from the release of the assistance.
The labor department’s TUPAD program is a package of assistance that provides emergency employment for displaced workers and other members of the vulnerable sectors.
The funds that have been recently distributed to the recipients were separate from the earlier assistance given out by the agency through other offices such as the Office of Benguet Rep. Eric Yap and the provincial government.
Waclin stipulated that the funds distributed to the beneficiaries from the four barangays came from last year’s allocation of the department while the funds that will be distributed to future benefices of the program will be sourced out from this year’s allocation to be able to complete the cycle and provide avenues to plan for the implementation of similar initiatives in the coming months. By Dexter A. See