UN-Habitat leads launch of Roxas shelter project

CAPIZ, Philippines – Nine months after super typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan), housing remains a problem for many survivors.

The UN-Habitat Philippines – together with the government of Japan, the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC), and the Social Housing Finance Corporation (SHFC) – launched the “Post-Yolanda Support for Safer Homes and Settlement Project” on Thursday, August 7, at the Don Conrado Barrios Memorial School, Barangay Baybay, Roxas City in Capiz.

The project, with a subsidy of $2.5 million from the Japanese government, is designed to accomplish the following by end of this year to early next year:

• Training of approximately 250 local semi-skilled artisans in disaster risk resilient housing construction
• Construction of 610 core houses by these local trained artisans for families throughout communities in the Visayan provinces of Capiz and Iloilo who were left homeless or whose houses were hazardous to live in after Typhoon Haiyan
• Training of 4,000 families in the beneficiary communities on house assessment under the principles of disaster risk reduction
• Support for a national campaign with SHFC and other government agencies on disaster-resilient housing techniques
• Information, education, communication materials for national advocacy on people’s process for recovery and rehabilitation
• Community action planning workshops
• Infrastructure support for 20 communities

The launch, which showcased the first of the 610 houses to be built, started off with a covenant signing between: the project-managing agencies such as the UN-Habitat, the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council, the Social Housing Finance Corporation (SHFC), Couples for Christ,  the United Architects of the Philippines Capiz Chapter, the Hilti Foundation, Inc., and the BDO Foundation.

Partner local government units (LGUs) were also there; led by Governor Victor Tanco, together with representatives from the Embassy of Japan and the Capiz Provincial Rehabilitation and Recovery Coordinator of the Office of the Presidential Adviser for Rehabilitation and Recovery (OPARR).

This was followed by a community contract signing between SHFC which is the agency that enabled affordable land acquisition for beneficiary families, the UN-Habitat which is the project’s key implementing agency, Homeowners Association representatives, and community leaders who represented the beneficiaries.

The real star of the show, however, was Emelia Doriendes, a mother of five and owner of the inaugural house. Hundreds of locals and residents who flocked to the covered court cheered and hooted when video footage showed Emelia relaying her own account from the moment Yolanda slammed into her neighborhood to the explosive elation she felt when she saw her name on the list of beneficiaries for whom houses would be built.

The morning event culminated with guests being ushered to the project site for ribbon-cutting of the pilot house. – Rappler.com