Asian Development Bank to help keep Philippine kids in school

Sep 2, 2010, 12:38 GMT

   Manila - The Asian Development Bank on Thursday approved a 400-million-dollar loan to expand a Philippine government programme to help keep children of poor families in school.

   The Manila-based bank said the loan would support the government's conditional cash transfer programme, which pays families to keep their children in school.

   The loan would allow the project to provide a 20-per-cent boost in income to an estimated 1.37 million families, up from around 788,000 families currently served by the programme, the bank said.

   Philippine Social Welfare Secretary Corazon Soliman welcomed the loan and said it would help the government's plan to increase the number of families receiving monthly cash grants to 2.3 million by the end of 2011.

   'The additional funding will go a long way in expanding the reach and coverage of the programme,' she said.

   Camilla Holmemo, poverty-reduction specialist in the bank's South-East Asia Department, said, 'This project will help families escape poverty while ensuring young people have better opportunities for advancement.'

   According to the bank, one in five children in the Philippines never gets to attend primary school because of financial constraints while another three out of every 10 drop out before finishing their elementary educations.

   Since the Philippines launched the programme in 2007, initial results showed significant increases in school enrollment.

   The programme also supports the provision of health care to pregnant women and young children among the poor and has increased child immunizations and pre-natal medical care.