The Philippine Rural Development Project (PRDP) has reported that although Mindanao has cornered about 40% of the total fund for infrastructure sub-projects, most projects are in roads, bridges as there are fewer irrigation projects.
Engr. Danilo Alesna, PRDP Mindanao deputy project director said during the weekly Wednesdays @ Habi at Kape – Abreeza yesterday that most local government units “are afraid they will not be able to pass the validation (if they submit proposals for irrigation projects. But we are not strict; we just follow standards (imposed by the World Bank, the funding source of the project).”
He added, LGUs are also conscious in submitting irrigation proposals because of the tedious evaluation processes and that these proposals are lower in terms of being priority compared with roads and other infrastructure projects.
He added that another main reason maybe that the LGUs are waiting for the National Irrigation Administration to come with projects because the agency has funds for these projects.
Under the PRDP, LGUs are required to submit proposals and that these are subjected to a rigorous evaluation before these are approved. He said there were proposals but these rejected during the evaluation processes.
