BAGUIO
CITY -- Eight local government units in Cordillera are set to be
given by the Department of Interior and Local Government with the Seal of
Good Local Governance (SGLG) award and corresponding grant from the Performance
Challenge Fund for passing the SGLG 2014 assessment.
The provinces of Abra, Benguet and Kalinga,
City of Baguio and municipalities of San Juan (Abra), Tublay (Benguet),
Lamut(Ifugao) and Calanasan (Apayao) passed the 2014 SGLG,DILG Cordillera
regional director John Castañeda announced during Regional Development
Council’s State of the Region Address forum on August 12.
Each awardee will receive a grant from the
Performance Challenge fund - P7 million for provincial LGUs, P5 million for
city LGU and P3 million for municipality.
The SGLG is a two-pronged program that
promotes transparency and accountability in local governance and a more
rigorous or challenging version of the Seal of good Housekeeping that was
introduced in 2010.
Basing on the SGLG Good Financial
Housekeeping component (which was the sole criteria then for the Seal of Good
Housekeeping), the six provinces, two cities and 71 of
the 75 municipalities in the region passed the 2014 assessment.
However, only eight LGUs will be
awarded with the SGLG as the others did not met the requirements in the other
criteria, whi ch include Disaster Preparedness, Social Protection,
Business-friendliness and competitiveness, Peace and Order and Environmental
Management, Castañeda explained.
He assured that they are focused on the
goal that all LGUs in the region will eventually be SGLG awardees.
This, as the RDC bared vibrant economy in the
region in 2014 even as the Gross Regional Domestic Product (GRDP) slowed
down to 3.2 percent compared to the 5.4% GRDP growth recorded in 2013.
RDC chair and Abra Gov.
Estaquio Bersamin, noted that the region’s economy continues to grow
at a lower rate of 3.2% driven by the industry sector contributing 50.9% of the
GRDP growth, followed by services at 38.9% and Agriculture at 10%.
Bersamin reported better employment in
the region with unemployment rate of 5.5% and underemployment rate of
13.3% which are below the national level at 6.8% and 18.4%,respectively.
Poverty incidence level is also declining.
the poverty threshold in the region of 22.8% (based on 2012 data) is
close to attaining the 2015 regional target of 21.4%, he added.
Bersamin also reported a substantial increase
in investments, increase in tourist arrivals, better accomplishments in paved
roads with increased budget allocations in 2013 to 2015 and reforestation,
No comments:
Post a Comment