AusAid, ILO support sustainable livelihood

MANILA, Philippines - To help workers and their families affected by Typhoon Pablo, the Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID) recently signed a A$900,000 (P37.8 million) grant agreement with the International Labor Organization (ILO)’s Country Office for the Philippines to help create jobs, improve earning opportunities, and promote sustainable agricultural livelihoods using local resources in the municipalities of Boston and Cateel in Davao Oriental.

The project will assist over 1,000 families to have immediate income through emergency employment, and help them transition to longer-term and more sustainable jobs through further reconstruction work in the affected areas. The project will also take into account environmental protection and conservation to help prevent another Pablo in the future.

AusAID and the ILO will work with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA) for this project, together with the Departments of Labor and Employment, Social Welfare and Development, Interior and Local Government and Agrarian Reform, as well as local community groups.

The project extends additional support to Pablo victims following AusAID’s earlier grant of A$300,000 (P12.6 million) to help provide livelihood recovery initiatives in Baganga.

“This project comes at the right moment when on-going humanitarian aid is gradually transferred towards medium-term interventions that focus on sustaining livelihoods. Workers who lost their income after the typhoon will have the chance to learn and to develop new skills, while earning within a decent and safe working environment,” says Lawrence Jeff Johnson, director of the ILO Country Office for the Philippines. 

AusAID also partnered with ILO to provide community-based emergency employment and reconstruction support to areas in Cagayan de Oro and Iligan cities that were badly hit by Tropical Storm Sendong (Washi) in 2011.

With Australian Government support, the project has employed 1,600 workers and reached out to over 6,400 typhoon-affected families. Workers were trained and mentored by engineers on construction. They were given starter kits such as tools, hammers and saws with their own safety gears. These workers have now organized themselves into an association that enables them to enter into contracts to rebuilding activities, including slope and riverbank protection and prevention of environmental threats. The association ensures that workers get fair wage, under decent and safe working conditions.

The project has also developed a database of affected families using computer systems applications to facilitate identification and prioritization of typhoon-affected victims. A study on livelihood impact prepared by Mindanao State University – Iligan Institute of Technology guided the design of the livelihood recovery options and skills training programmes in Cagayan de Oro and Iligan.   This support also contributed to standardizing approach on delivery of community-based emergency under the Inter-Agency Standing Committee cluster on livelihood.