Conditional Cash Transfer Program of the Philippines: A Number of Queries

You can never have international peace as long as you have national poverty.
---Stephen Leacock, Last Leaves

With the great potential posed by Progresa-Oportunidades of Mexico and Bolsa Familia
of Brazil, developing countries, even the Philippines itself accepted the risk of alleviating poverty
through implementing Conditional Cash Transfer schemes. The CCT Program was dubbed by
the Department of Social Welfare and Development (2009) as the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino
Program or locally known as the 4Ps. This was first introduced by the Arroyo Administration in
its pilot implementation during the year 2007 and continued by the Aquino Administration giving
increasing allotment of funds in the yearly budget. The target goal of 4Ps is to promote human
capital development through improving the health and education of the children and pregnant
mothers among the poor households, all aiming to break the intergenerational cycle of poverty
(DSWD, 2009). It is defined as a social contract where the state provides financial resources
ranging from 500 pesos to 1400 pesos for a family in exchange for that family's fulfillment of
certain conditions such as ensuring their children's attendance in school, regular visits to
community health centers and attendance in a number of specific trainings, to name a few
(Somera, 2010). The impact of the said program was more evident on the individual families,
but such progress is macroeconomically not substantial. This creates arguments as to the true
benefits of the CCT Program, digging into flaws, weaknesses and further into anomalies.
Looking at the beneficiaries' view, among the questions relating to 4Ps is about the
inclusion and exclusion errors, where there is an inclusion of non-poor beneficiaries while
extreme poor beings are excluded as program beneficiaries. This is a question as to the
effectiveness of the whole process, especially as to the approval of the list of beneficiaries and
the monitoring and evaluation process taken. Another issue creating variances is the cost spent
by the beneficiaries in complying with the requirements, which is seen as too much for these
poor households knowing that their stipends are already allotted for their children's health and
education. They are required to spend much for documents, shirts, identification cards, food
during meetings and transportation, unless they want to be delisted. The demand-side
intervention characteristic of CCT program, where one must concede with the government's
demands and conditions (Coady and Parker, 2002), is so strict that the threat of being delisted
could dominate the feeling of satisfaction. There are also cases that payments are delayed or
denied undermining the benefits from human capital investments and increased household
consumption (Bhargava, 2015). Currently there was a report by Asian Development bank saying
there was a leakage in CCT operations were in a of the 62 billion allocated for the CCT
program last year did not go to the intended beneficiaries. This is the reason why critics called
the 4Ps as a dole out of resources that would open up to corruption. There was also a

question as to the ability of the DSWD to monitor its implementation and troubleshoot corruption
tendencies. In every government program political intervention is inevitable, so CCT schemes
may also create threats of the reform coalition where the program is used to generate mass
base that would ultra-left politics (CCT, from beneficiaries view, 2012). These inefficiencies
causes the deterioration of trust and satisfaction in CCT programs and the government at large
(Bhargava, 2015).
The Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps), the governments conditional cash
transfer (CCT) is implemented to provide health and education grant to household beneficiaries
belonging to the lowest class (poor families) in the country. The program compels the parents of
beneficiaries to send their children to school, thus, enabling the less fortunate children to attend
classes instead of working for pay all day, assuming the responsibilities of their parents; to visit
clinics to seek pre and post-natal cares to pregnant and should be attended by health
professionals until giving birth and for preventive-health checkups of children; and obliged the
parents to attend family development sessions conducted by the partners of DSWD or the
DSWD itself. The beneficiaries automatically become a member of PhilHealth.Moreover, this
year, the program has already widens the coverage of beneficiaries by granting scholarships to
students and introducing the parents to livelihood programs. It makes the parents become
aware and conscious to education and health. In totality, it somewhat alleviates the status of the
beneficiaries from poorest states to poor. Intriguing issues have been raised because of the
misappropriation of CCT Funds but it doesnt deny the fact that it really helps those families
belong to the bottom status of our society. It is, maybe, the only means by which the
government can directly help those who needs more of the attention. Yes, it is a dual purpose
because the government is granting cash benefits to the poor and at the same time reducing the
poverty rate of our country. Middle-class and higher-class might view the program as a waste of
money because they can feed themselves and send their children to school. They dont know
how the small value grant means to those who cannot even eat thrice a day. Giving empathy to
the beneficiaries, they really deserve the grant. Though there are anomalies, misappropriation
of funds, undeserving beneficiaries, pawning and other not so good issues, looking at the bigger
picture, the benefits exceed the costs.
The 4Ps offered by the government is facing issues not because the purpose is so
unconstitutional, but because of those CORRUPT again trying to steal funds. It is the
government's duty to secure that the peoples need is provided even at minimum and their rights
are protected and 4Ps is a good example of the concurring responsibilities of the government
and citizens. The program should be prospered at most and studies should be conducted to
really target the desired outcome of the government: reduce poverty rate, increase employment
rate, promote health wellness, increase literacy rate and decrease child labor issues and risks.