Roxas City, February 6 2015 — On February 5 and 6, UN-Habitat and the Social Housing and Finance Corporation (SHFC) held a learning exchange event at the San Antonio Resort in Roxas City. The two-day event aimed to familiarize the participants on how the People’s Process works through exposure trips to communities in Capiz that are partners in UN-Habitat’s Post-Yolanda Support for Safer Homes and Settlements project.
Participants were comprised of community leaders from SHFC’s Community Mortgage Program (CMP) communities in Quezon City and Coron, Palawan, and local government representatives from Coron and the province of Palawan.
People’s Process
Under the People’s Process, a community-driven approach being used by UN-Habitat for the post-Yolanda shelter support project in Panay Island, the community leads and manages projects with technical assistance and monitoring from UN-Habitat. Projects are implemented through community contracting with legitimate homeowners’ associations.
During the exposure trips, the learning exchange participants received firsthand accounts of how the People’s Process works. Household partners and homeowners association (HOA) officers from Roxas City, Panay, and Pontevedra discussed the various steps involved in the People’s Process ― from household partner selection to actual construction. Each community also had a representative to discuss financial management and auditing, as well as material storage and distribution. After which, the household partners answered questions on the specific details of the project during the site visit.
Feedback
The participants were impressed with the technical knowledge displayed by the household partners. Flora Nagamos, the Municipal Social Welfare and Development Officer of Coron, said, “They are very good. They know the ins and outs of construction.”
Flora Dela Cruz, a community leader from Narra HOAI of Quezon City, has this to say: “the People’s Process looks good on paper and even better in your communities. I hope we could replicate that in our community in Payatas.”
This was the second learning exchange conducted by UN-Habitat and SHFC. The first one was with representatives from Cagayan de Oro in September regarding learnings from Typhoon Sendong.
