Download 3. Integrated Area Development

PHILIPPINE RURAL RECONSTRUCTION MOVEMENT (PRRM)
1.
PROFILE:
The Philippine Rural Reconstruction Movement (PRRM) is the oldest (born in 1952) and largest
(covering 20 out of 80 Philippine provinces and cities) non-governmental rural development
organization in the Philippines.
The Credo of Rural Reconstruction spells out the philosophy, approach, and lifestyle guiding
every PRRM worker who is trained to live, dream, plan, work with the people.
Rural Reconstruction Credo
Go to the people
Live among them
Learn from them
Plan with them
Work with them
Start with what they know
Build on what they have
Teach by showing
Learn by doing
Not a showcase but a pattern
Not odds and ends but a system
Not piecemeal but integrated approach
Not to conform but to transform
NOT RELIEF BUT RELEASE
PRRM has followed this Credo for nearly 60 years in its effort to change and build the
countryside, and to strengthen the civic infrastructure of Philippine Society.
PRRM was founded in 1952 by Dr. Y.C. James Yen and a group of prominent
Filipinos led by Dean Conrado Benitez. The roots of PRRM are traced to China
where, in the early 1900s, the rural reconstruction movement was born, inspired
and led by Dr. Yen. In the 1950s to the 1960s, PRRM’s rural reconstruction
workers went to the countryside to assist rural communities around a four-fold
approach of: Education to combat ignorance, Livelihood to fight poverty,
Health to fight disease, and Self-governance to combat civic inertia.
After a decline in operations during the Marcos years, PRRM was revitalized in 1986 with an
enhanced four-fold approach with an additional emphasis on environmental sustainability,
PRRM since then has expanded operations to 20 provinces, and is an active civil society
participant at the local, national and global arenas.
Field programs are aimed at improving the quality of life in the communities where PRRM
directly works and building a grassroots base for sustainable development. Lessons from area
development “models” demonstrated through these programs provide basis for advocacy for
policy reforms.
Implementation of sustainable
area development programs
Policy advocacy at the local,
national and international levels
The inclusion of policy advocacy as a key strategy recognizes that conditions in the smallest
village are affected by policies and the overall development environment at levels far beyond the
village – a dynamic that has become more stark in the age of globalization. Recent national
policies the PRRM has actively advocated for include:
Climate Change Act of 2009 (RA 9729) - PRRM participated in the discussions, consultations
and drafting of the law and its Implementing Rules and Regulations (IRR) as an active founding
member of a number of climate action networks.
Organic Agriculture Act of 2010 (RA 10068) - A bill which seeks to develop and promote
organic agriculture in the Philippines.
Philippine Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Act of 2010 (RA 10121) – a law that
strengthens community-based disaster preparedness, risk reduction and management that
conforms to universally-accepted norms, principles and standards on DRR and humanitarian
assistance.
PRRM’s area development work adheres to participatory processes – building on what the people
know, and enhancing this indigenous knowledge through education and the demonstration of
community-based models.
AREA PROFILE
 Number of towns: 19
 Number of villages: 487
 Number of program
participants: 34,549
 Number of sectoral
federations: 5 (rice farmers;
coconut-based farmers;
fishers; women; & youth)
Projects respond to specific needs, but are undertaken within the framework of an entire areaspecific development model.
Field projects are aimed at generating impact on the communities’ quality of life: food security,
basic needs self-sufficiency, improved health conditions, enhanced physical habitats, and
regenerated environments.
Beyond these, field projects seek to transform development processes, promote equitable
distribution of development gains, and build empowered communities -- “not relief but release”.
2.
THE PRRM’S CORE STRATEGIES: Sustainable Development through Good
Governance
The key to sustainable development is the effective participation by and cooperation among the
local people, the local government units, and the local business sector and other actors in local
development.
For the past 50 years, PRRM has been educating the masses in democratic governance, especially
at the local level. The passage of the Barrio Council Act in 1954 which paved the way for the
election of barrio (village) officials has been duly credited to PRRM’s efforts at building
democracy at the grassroots. In 1990-91, it participated in processes leading to the enactment of
the Philippine Local Government Code of 1991, a local autonomy law which provided for
people’s representatives to have seats in provincial, municipal and village planning and
development councils, and special bodies such as local school boards and local health boards.
PRRM has been helping implement this law in its areas of operation.
In 2002 PRRM undertook a Strategic Planning Process to assess lessons from its work over 50
years and to develop scenarios for the future. Its success is measured in how it has been able to
show a different way of doing development and in having this adopted into government policy
and practice. Its community-based programmes cover agriculture, fisheries, energy, health,
environment including climate change, and entails a great deal of community organizing and
capability building to enable the rural poor and local citizens find their way out of poverty in
cooperation with a capable, accountable and responsible local government (see Figure 1 below).
Figure 1 - The Good Governance
Framework, which is anchored on
sustainable development principle.
being followed by PRRM in its
programmes and projects
3.
INTEGRATED AREA DEVELOPMENT
At the field level, PRRM has evolved a sustainable area development strategy on the scale of
what it calls a sustainable rural district, or SRD. The concept of PRRM’s SRD assumes a certain
scale of sustainability in demonstrating a community-centered area development model. Efforts in
small, isolated villages cannot go far enough as the policy and institutional set-ups affecting
development (e.g., trading and marketing systems) transcend the level of the village.
The identification and selection of a potential SRD is based on a set of ecological, economic,
demographic and socio-political criteria. The SRD can be described as a habitat of at least two
contiguous ecosystems, with at least one major market center serving a cluster of 5-12 towns, and
a population of 200,000-450,000.
4.
BUILDING SUSTAINABLE LOCAL ECONOMIES
PRRM has decades of experience in rural development and sustainable agriculture in particular,
addressing issues of food security, hunger and malnutrition, agricultural production and natural
resource degradation.
It has developed and transferred a range of technologies from LEISA (Low External Input
Sustainable Agriculture) in partnership with ETC from The Netherlands, to DIFS (Diversified
Integrated Farming Systems), organic and natural farming systems to specific technologies of SRI
(Systems of Rice Intensification).
Nearly half of the covered provinces of PRRM now have organic farming practitioners, assisted
by a cadre of SA educators and trainors. One of the five (5) national federations of farmers,
fishers, women and youth, the Samahan ng mga Magsasaka para sa Likas-Kayang Pananakahan
(SAKAHAN), is dedicated to the promotion of sustainable agriculture. SAKAHAN’s objectives are:
(1) to further develop sustainable agriculture technologies through sharing of experiences among
member organizations; (2) to continuously campaign for the adoption of sustainable agriculture
by local government units (LGUs); (3) to strengthen the membership through capability building
initiatives; and (4) to implement livelihood programs. These aims are addressed to the various
challenges confronting the sustainability of local agriculture and the empowerment of small
farmers and farmworkers.
PRRM is now fully involved in the entire value chain from production to the table through the
following programs:
SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE
 PROMOTION OF AGRICULTURAL PRACTICES WHICH PROTECT THE SOIL &
WATER RESOURCES, REDUCE FARMING COSTS, INCREASE FARMING
INCOME: LOW EXTERNAL INPUT AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION,
INTEGRATED FARMING SYSTEMS, & CROP DIVERSIFICATION
SUSTAINABLE FISHERIES
 PROMOTION OF NON-DESTRUCTIVE FISHING PRACTICES
 REGENERATION OF COASTAL RESOURCES
SOCIAL ENTERPRISE DEVELOPMENT
 HELPING BUILD ALTERNATIVE TRADING AND MARKETING SYSTEMS
 OFF-RESOURCE LIVELIHOOD DEVELOPMENT IN AREAS WITH THREATENED
NATURAL RESOURCE BASE
 SUPPORT FOR VALUE-ADDING ENTERPRISE
ALTERNATIVE RURAL FINANCE
 SAVINGS PROMOTION
 CREDIT DELIVERY FOR GROUP PROJECTS/ MICROFINANCE
SCHEMES
 DEVELOPMENT OF CREDIT COOPERATIVES
The current active movements for implementing sustainable development programmes aimed at
addressing extreme poverty among farmers, fisher folk, and other marginalised groups are being
affected by the negative impacts of globalisation and climate change on small producers. Because
of threats on food security, decreasing incomes and worsening poverty, PRRM is developing
appropriate risk transfer mechanisms with local farmers, particularly exploring the possibility of
micro-insurance. There is an urgent need to build cooperation and strong linkages between the
movements to jointly address these issues, find the best strategies from the various practices, and
establish strong South-South movements that will result in a better global policy framework for
the poor.
5.
COMPLETED PROGRAMMES AND PROJECTS (PARTIAL LIST)
PRRM has implemented the following programmes and projects:
Sustainable Area Development Programmes
 Sustainable Rural District Development Programme (SRDDP): implemented in five
provinces, supported by the Oxfam-NOVIB Netherlands Organization for International
Development Cooperation (NOVIB) from 1988 to 2002. The contract for the withdrawal
phase (2000-2002) was in the amount of US$814,286. 600-720 M
 Sustainable Area Development Programme (SADP): implemented in three provinces,
supported by German Agro-Action (GAA) from 1995 to 2002 in the amount of
US$1,413,560.
Major Sustainable Agriculture and Technology Transfer Projects
 Organic FIELDS Support Project
Proponent
Location of the action
Donors
Amount
Dates
Philippine
Alaminos City in Pangasinan, Guimba in
Department
PhP20,000,000 Nov.
Rural
Nueva Ecija, Samal and Dinalupihan in
of
2008 –
Reconstruction Bataan, Naujan in Oriental Mindoro, Baao in Agriculture
April
Movement
Camarines Sur, and Tabaco City in Albay.
(DA)
2009
(PRRM)
Object and results of the action
 This project involved building partnerships, training and organization of farmers, research and
development, and public promotion of sustainable and organic agriculture.
 For the project component on training for organic farming and establishment of learning farms, at least
100 farmers participated in each of the six (6) provincial sites. Learning farm outputs included the
establishment of one-hectare learning farms in each of the six (6) sites, with a half hectare devoted to
pure organic rice production and the other half to mixed or combined organic and inorganic rice
production.
 For the research and development or R&D component, two research projects were implemented by the
University of the Philippines at Los Banos or UPLB Foundation as part of PRRM’s contract with the
Department of Agriculture. These include a comparison of the agro-economic and yield responses of the
system of rice intensification or SRI, balanced fertilization, and farmers’ practices in two sites in the
Philippines, and a quantification of the contribution to rice productivity of the component technologies of
the SRI. Outputs have included the setting up and maintenance of R&D sites in Alaminos City,
Pangasinan and Baao, Camarines Sur, with the research project established in the two sites, and the
formation of local R&D teams.
 As part of the information, education and communication or IEC component which is being implemented
by the La Liga Policy Institute, a regular radio program was broadcast every Sunday at 8:30 AM over
Radyo ng Bayan. A regular television show was also aired every Saturday at 10:00 AM on the Nation
Broadcasting Network or NBN Channel 4. Another accomplishment was the launching of the Go
Organic! Philippines website
Training Projects
 Training Program for Community Organizers of the CIDDS Program, Department of Social
Work and Community Development (DSWD), 1998-99
 Participatory Rapid Appraisal Training Course for DENR Region III (Provinces of Zambales
and Nueva Ecija)- funded by JICA, 2005
 Social Preparation/Social Marketing Training Module of the CBRED-Renewable Energy
Training Program- a UNDP-funded project of the Department of Energy (DOE), 2007
 Integrating Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate Change Adaptation into Coastal
Development Planning in San Miguel Island- funded by the ProVention Consortium and the
Tabaco City Government, 2009
Major Health, Infrastructure, Energy and Climate Change Projects
 Community-Based Family Planning and Reproductive Health Project: community-managed
health systems models in six provinces, supported by the United Nations Fund for Population
Activities (UNFPA) for four years.
 Community-Based Social Marketing for Women's Health and Safe Motherhood: social
marketing component of the Women's Health and Safe Motherhood Program of the
Department of Health; implemented in 25 pilot sites in 18 provinces; funded by the ADB
through Strategic Advantage, Inc.
 Community Based Health Project (CBHP): upgrading capacities of people’s organizations
and community health workers in addressing primary health care needs through training and
direct support (provision of medical kits, establishment of health data boards); implemented
in five provinces; supported by NOVIB.
 Health and Family Planning Advocacy Project (HAP): aims to mobilize interest,
commitment, and resources to ensure better family planning and health impact; a three-year
project in eight partner areas supported by the David and Lucille Packard Foundation.
 Translating Interest and Commitment into Mobilized Resources for Reproductive Health
(TRICOM-RH): a three-year follow-through project to the HAP implemented in ten partner
areas.
 Community-Managed Expanded Potable Water and Infrastructure Project in two provinces:
supported by German Agro Action for 2½ years.
 Micro-hydro power projects: 15 units in 12 villages of an upland province, benefiting around
150 households; supported by the local government units and the Department of Science and
Technology.
 El Nido Solar Energy Pilot Project: benefiting 300 households in an island province,
supported by the Spanish NGO IPADE.
 Green/Renewable Independent Power Project (in cooperation with International Institute for
Energy Conservation, Greenpeace Southeast Asia, and Solar Electric Philippines), 2000-01
 Participatory Community-Based Biomass Resource Development Project (in partnership with
Preferred Energy Inc. and the Development Academy of the Philippines), 1999- 2000
 Mapping of Climate Change Initiatives and Enhancing Capacities of Civil Society in
Addressing Climate Change in the Philippines, in partnership with the Philippine Network on
Climate Change (PNCC),- funded by Oxfam-Hongkong and Oxfam-Great Britain, 2007-08.
5.
REMARKS
Europe Aid ID number:1
1
PH-2008-DRX-1311761460
This number is allocated to an organisation when it registers its data in PADOR. For more information and to register, please visit
http://ec.europa.eu/europeaid/onlineservices/pador/index_en.htm
Legal Entity File number / ongoing contract number (if relevant):2
2
EIDHR/2009/205-304
If the applicant has already signed a contract with the European Commission / has been informed of the relevant Legal Entity File
number.