The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) is in talks with the Senate Committee on Social Justice, Welfare, and Rural Development to revisit the law on the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) for possible amendments.

The enhancement of the 4Ps is aligned with the instructions of President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. in his 4th State of the Nation Address (SONA) last July 28 to amend Republic Act 11310, otherwise known as the 4Ps Law.

“We know that the 4Ps program is the country’s flagship anti-poverty program. It’s really meant to break intergenerational poverty. It’s an investment to human capital. It’s something that the Department has been working on for quite some time, and admittedly, there must be program enhancement,” DSWD Secretary Rex Gatchalian said in television interview on Monday.

Last week, Gatchalian had a meeting with Senator Erwin Tulfo, chair of the Senate Committee on Social Justice, Welfare, and Rural Development, to discuss the necessity of having an aftercare program for families that exit the 4Ps to ensure that they will not slip back into poverty.

“We were looking at program enhancements like micro-entrepreneurship for 4Ps graduates. There are other tools in the Department, such as the Sustainable Livelihood Program (SLP), that we spoke about as being part of the toolkit that we can use to make sure that people graduating out of the 4Ps don’t slip back into poverty,” Gatchalian said.

The DSWD chief said he also had an agreement with Tulfo to re-sharpen the government’s anti-poverty programs to alleviate the culture of mendicancy among the poor, and instead create a culture of empowerment to help them decide for themselves.

“I think that was the meeting of the minds last week when he [Tulfo] came to visit the DSWD — that while social welfare is important, we also have to put equal weight on the development side, making sure that there are long-term solutions that will uplift lives of Filipinos, empower them to take the open economic opportunities for themselves and their families,” he said.

Meanwhile, Gatchalian said President Marcos wants the graduation of 4Ps household beneficiaries to be based on living conditions, instead of the mandated seven-year period as prescribed by the law.

“So, what the President meant was we have to conceptualize exiting the program. The seven-year number is quite arbitrary. Sometimes you might be able to exit earlier than seven years, and in some cases where there are unexpected crises that hit a family, then there might be some that might need longer than seven years,” he said.

The 4Ps is the national poverty reduction strategy and human capital investment program that provides conditional cash transfer to improve the health, nutrition, and education of children aged 0-18.

Currently, more than 4.4 million households continue to benefit from the program. (PNA)