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Focusing on the Ultra Poor in the Philippines

Hunger is a critical issue for many during the COVID-19 emergency, with shutdowns and slowing economic activity adding woes and numbers to those already facing poverty. In the Philippines the estimate is that some 30 million people are facing hunger. An often heard refrain is echoed there: “It’s not the coronavirus that will kill us. It’s the hunger.” 
 
Among groups mobilizing in response is International Care Ministries (ICM), a Filipino non-governmental organization. They report that they have delivered 10 million food packs to at-risk families in the Visayas and Mindanao, thus reaching more than 1% of the Filipino population (1.7 million people) in the first 100 days of the quarantine. ICM builds on its long-standing work with the country’s ultra-poor. When the crisis broke, they suspended their regular poverty-reduction operations and pivoted to large-scale aid distribution.
 
ICM works closely with national, provincial, and local governments to meet quarantine requirements. Cooperation is strong, and both ICM and government officials remark that each is acting heroically to help the poor. ICM meets gaps that public assistance cannot fill, and it has a capacity to identify the families in greatest need. ICM works with more than 5,000 pastors, who send requests through ICM’s Rapid Emergency and Disaster Intervention (REDI) system. ICM receives requests through text and social messaging, verifies those requests, and distributes relief packs to ultra-poor communities in remote areas.
 
ICM intends to distribute 20 million seeds to the poorest families so they can grow their own food, along with hundreds of thousands of booklets about COVID-19 in five languages.

(Based on: June 25, 2020, Inquirer.net article.)