DEPARTMENT of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Secretary Rex Gatchalian has maintained that the new First 1,000 Days (F1KD) of Life conditional cash grant under the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) is not a dole-out program.
Gatchalian said the 4Ps F1KD grant aims to help household-beneficiaries, especially those living in far-flung areas, to access education and health services.
“This is a mechanism that is there to help them with the cost of availing the services. Whether we like it or not, the health centers are sometimes far away from our far flung areas, the schools are far away, there needs to be financial assistance so that they can avail those services,”” Gatchalian explained in Pilipino.
He pointed out that the monthly F1KD health grants worth P350 would be useful for 4Ps beneficiaries, particularly pregnant women and households having children from up to two years old to help defray the cost of essential health and nutrition needs during the critical period of a child’s developmental stage.
To receive the monthly F1KD grants, qualified 4Ps beneficiaries must comply with the requirements of the program including the availing of pre-natal services at DOH-accredited health facilities, tracking pregnancy, and receiving ante-natal care services, child birth, or delivery at a DOH-accredited health facility, attending post-natal visits, participating in counselling sessions, and obtaining micronutrient supplements and immunizations.
Launched in 2008 and institutionalized by Republic Act (RA) 11310 in 2019, the 4Ps is a national poverty reduction strategy and human capital investment program that provides conditional cash transfer to poor households for a maximum period of seven years to improve their children’s health, nutrition and education.
The 4Ps F1KD is set to be rolled out this year with the DSWD’s issuance of the implementing guidelines last Jan. 6.