One of the good practices of the Philippine Rural Development Project (PRDP) is ensuring that proposals are in line with their infrastructure standards.

Recently, the Regional Project Coordination Office XII facilitated the “Joint Technical Review and Technical Assistance to Local Government Units (LGUs) in the review of Documents” in Koronadal City.

This activity aimed to assist five LGUs in Region XII with proposals for the infrastructure portfolio of PRDP.

Consultants from the RPCO XII, Project Support Office Mindanao and National Project Coordination Office provided technical assistance to proponent LGUs of Sarangani, Kidapawan, Antipas, Isulan and Lambayong.

All-in-all these LGUs have a total of 17 infrastructure subproject proposals amounting to P1.2-billion consisting of farm-to-market roads, potable water systems, slaughterhouse, and warehouses and dryer to be funded under the PRDP Scale Up.

National Project Coordination Office I-BUILD alternate head Engineer Roy Abaya said that documents like the program of works (POW) and economic and financial analysis (EFA) must be polished ahead of the respective project deadlines.

“In order for you to fully comply with the standards of PRDP and beat the deadline, your significant document requirement like POW and EFA, must be refined… that is why we are extending this technical assistance workshop,” Abaya noted.

He also urged the LGUs present to abide with the agreements and timeline of compliance to avoid delays.

The crafters of the proposals and the technical teams of each proponent group presented their outputs and were reviewed by the pool of consultants from PRDP.

Aside from their POW and EFA, the team also went over with the deeds of donation, detailed engineering designs, feasibility studies, and other important documents which are part of the requirements for subproject approval.

Cheryl Cawagas, the City Planning, Monitoring, and Implementing Unit focal person of Kidapawan City, expressed her gratitude to PRDP for the technical assistance given to them.

“From the very start, PRDP consultants have aided us in the compliance of the subproject requirements since the process is so tedious,” she said.

Cawagas also added that even though the project is implementing stricter rules compared with other implementing agencies, the preparation was made easier with activities like the joint technical review. (Carl Ulysses Aguillon | RPCO 12)