TAGBILARAN CITY, Bohol (PIA) – The government has commissioned the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) to conduct the survey for the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Listahanan, or the National Household Targeting System (NHTS) for poverty reduction as a tool to identify who and where the poor in the country are.
Serving as the database of poor families as basis for eligibility to the government’s social protection programs and services, the Listahanan, which uses the data collected from the DSWD enumerators, is now to be performed by 1,100 census enumerators, 300 team supervisors, and 60 census area supervisors implementing the Census of Population (PopCen) and the Community Based Monitoring System (CBMS).
“No more Listahanan teams,” said Bohol PSA statistician Jessamyne Anne Alcazaren Alcazaren.
That also means entertaining and properly responding to the survey enumerators could be crucial in getting into that list that has always been disputed by supposedly poor beneficiaries who have been skipped by the list, the PSA emphasized.
“Always give correct information, as this matters,” PSA supervising statistical specialist Emmanuel Galab said.
PopCen was originally conducted as a mid-decade activity and is scheduled to be done in 2025, but the President has seen the need to conduct the PopCen once in every three years to update the CBMS, according to Bohol’s chief statistician.
“The survey, while it carries with it the usual mid-decade PopCen, also has the CBMS, which seeks out and identifies the country’s poor while still keeping the provisions of the Data Privacy Law,” added Galab.
After extracting the PopCen data, the enumerators proceed to explain the details of the CBMS and the need to set up a database that would be the basis for its social protection programs’ beneficiaries on who becomes eligible for conditional cash transfers, work for food programs, and other key services.
Due to the sensitive personal information that can be generated in the survey, respondents have to fully understand the terms and agree to giving honest information.
“There is this real chance that they can be included or excluded from the list of next year’s beneficiaries for government social protection programs,” Alcazaren said.
In short, this survey will update the beneficiaries of the government’s social programs in Bohol’s 48 towns and one city.
“Please support and accommodate the PSA enumerators. They have a schedule to beat and a quota, please do not waste their time,” she said.
Speaking during the weekly Kapihan sa PIA forum, Alcazaren and Galab announced that the ongoing PopCen and CBMS enumeration had started on July 15 and will run until Sept. 15.
According to the PSA, as of Aug. 8 or three weeks after the start of the enumeration, PSA has covered around 20.08 percent of their target. (RAHC/PIA Bohol)
