Philippines: LGUs, private sector push for disaster resilience

The government and the private sector came together this week to make the country more resilient to calamities.

Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) undersecretary Jonathan E. Malaya today kicked off the second quarterly Nationwide Simultaneous Earthquake Drills (NSED) with governors, mayors, and ‘punong barangays’ joining in nationwide. The program seeks to employ a calibrated response to typhoons, earthquakes and other types of disasters. 

Partnership with private sector

The DILG’s partnership with the private sector dovetails with the latter’s efforts towards disaster resilience in the country. In September last year, the Duterte administration launched the Resilient Cities/Municipalities Leadership Program for local chief executives at Taguig City. It was hailed as the first public-private partnership (PPP) for disaster resilience.

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Learning from the magnitude 6.1 earthquake last April 22, the DILG is prodding Local Government Units (LGU) to do an infrastructure audit within their respective areas to ensure public safety.

Malaya said LGUs will be stricter when appraising the structural integrity of government-owned and private sector buildings, taking into account that all these should be periodically inspected for compliance to the National Building Code of the Philippines and the Fire Code of the Philippines.

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