Public officials must think of cobenefits

Imagine that you were elected barangay chair in the last elections. You now have to craft a development agenda to fulfill several important responsibilities under various laws. However, you might not have sufficient resources to fulfill all of them, a situation that is not uncommon among our local government units (LGUs).

For example, under the Urban Development and Housing Act (Udha), your LGU shall provide low-income families with affordable housing, complete with water and electricity, in locations that give access to livelihood. Under the Climate Change Act, you must also ensure that your communities are able to adapt to climate change impacts such as flooding and heat stress. Failure to adapt will worsen poverty in the communities, an existing challenge that you also have to address.

How do you fulfill all these equally important mandates competing for your meager resources and time?

Think cobenefits. It is a very simple concept: hitting two birds with one stone, with a potentially huge impact on your constituents.

I recently gave a presentation to the League of Vice Governors of the Philippines as part of a short course on “mainstreaming affordable resilient housing strategies for vulnerable communities in local development plans and policies.” It was organized by the Institute of Housing and Urban Development Studies of Erasmus University in the Netherlands.

Together, the participants and I explored the opportunities to reap cobenefits in social housing. And there are many, if we look at social housing holistically and creatively, as they did in a government resettlement site in Calauan, Laguna.

Like many resettlement projects, it did not have water and power connection, contrary to the provisions of the Udha. Because of its remote location, the families there did not have access to livelihood, thereby impoverishing them further. They also had to deal with heat stress as a result of climate change, but could not resort to artificial cooling (electric fans) because they did not have electricity.

And even if there was electricity, it would have been unlikely for them to afford it because of their poverty. Social cohesion was also very weak among the resettled families who came from various areas of Metro Manila.

What did they do? With the help of a priest, the women in the resettlement site organized themselves and enlisted the expertise of professors from the Asian Institute of Management who helped them successfully obtain funding for a project to build small vertical gardens in front of their houses.

What cobenefits did they reap from these gardens? First, they were able to feed their families nutritious vegetables such as pechay, tomatoes, ampalaya and malunggay. Second, they were able to get income from selling their excess produce.

Third, the gardens had a cooling effect on their houses, a climate change adaptation benefit. Fourth, the gardens helped capture carbon, no matter how small; thus, it had a mitigation effect, too. Finally, the activities strengthened community
cohesion. They were hitting five birds with one stone!

Thinking in terms of cobenefits, whether in social housing or other development interventions, ensures resource efficiency. Additionally, because such thinking enables one to highlight many possible benefits and issues, it allows a proponent public official to access many funding windows. Thus, gardening can be framed as a livelihood issue, or as a climate change adaptation and mitigation intervention, or as a health and nutrition advocacy, depending on the priorities of the funder.

Similarly, thinking of cobenefits allows you to get support from many groups with disparate advocacies simply by underscoring the particular benefit from your project that matches their particular interests.

So, before you waste your internal revenue allotment on a basketball court or waiting shed, ask yourself if that project has significant development cobenefits that optimize taxpayer money.

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Junefe Gilig Payot is corporate executive officer of Social Housing Finance Corp.