Findings of AltDev study featured in UNESCO Inclusive Policy Lab thinkpiece

Eduardo C. Tadem, Convenor of the Program on Alternative Development (AltDev) of the University of the Philippines Center for Integrative and Development Studies (UP CIDS), wrote a thinkpiece on the findings of the Program’s research project on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic to marginalized communities, which is featured in the Inclusive Policy Lab of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
Dr. Tadem opined that “[w]hile COVID-19’s adverse impacts cut across all sectors of society, poor and marginalized communities have borne the brunt of the crisis.” However, as the AltDev-UNESCO research project shows, “some grassroots organizations have been able to provide relief for their communities, especially in areas where government support was lacking.”
The rest of the thinkpiece provides brief overviews of the five grassroots organizations and communities covered by the project and their respective responses to the effects of the pandemic. These include the Alyansa ng mga Samahan sa Sitio Mendez, Baesa Homeowners Association (ASAMBA); the Bantay Kalusugang Pangkomunidad (BKP); the Maigting na Samahan ng mga Panlipunang Negosyante ng Towerville Inc. (Igting); the Ayta Mag-indi community in Pampanga; and the Lumad community schools for indigenous children in Mindanao.
These communities and organizations, Dr. Tadem writes, are “imbued with the principles of solidarity, social cohesion, organizational fitness, and sharing,” which made them able to “undertake the minimum alleviating measures.” The thinkpiece ends with policy recommendations that aim to provide new and supplementary measures to address the impacts of the pandemic to marginalized communities in the Philippines.
The UNESCO Inclusive Policy Lab is a platform that explores and supports “emerging issues of knowledge co-production and its translation into inclusive and equity-weighted policies.”
Read the full thinkpiece here.