Philippines Crisis Response Plan 2021

Last updated: February 05 2021
$23,900,000
Funding required
215,000
People Targeted

IOM Vision

IOM Philippines believes that safe and orderly migration, driven by a migrant's genuine will and choice rather than by necessity, benefits both migrants themselves and the wider society. In line with this vision, IOM will assist the government to achieve the following: assist and protect the most vulnerable populations (including internally displaced persons and mobile populations) affected by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic; advocating for and implementing urgent actions to combat the climate crisis, focusing on people and communities whose vulnerabilities are further exacerbated by the intensified effect of the climate change; emergency response that addresses the immediate needs of people affected by natural hazards and human-made disasters; improved capacity of governments and communities to effectively anticipate, respond to, and recover from mobility consequences of crisis; and strengthened partnerships to integrate mobility in resilience-building efforts. 

Objective 1 - Saving lives and protecting people on the move
Objective
Saving lives and protecting people on the move

$10,100,000
Funding required
160,000
People Targeted
2
Entities Targeted
Internally displaced person, Local population / community
Primary target groups
Description of People and Entities Targeted

(1) IDPs that remain in situations of displacement (due to natural hazards, effects of climate crises, and human-made disasters), including IDPs blocked from returning or unwilling to return, IDPs at high risk of protracted displacement;

(2) Vulnerable host communities in areas characterized by large levels of displacement and communities of return where services are inadequate or overstretched;

(3) IDPs who have returned, but are in need of humanitarian assistance.

Camp coordination and camp management

IOM will provide camp management support to the local governments in emergency response to the population affected by natural disasters and impacts of climate crises, and man-made disasters. IOM will support the improved camp management and prevention of COVID-19 in displacement sites and host communities in North Cotabato, Davao del Sur, Bicol and Cagayan through:

  • Preventing local transmission at displacement sites through CCCM COVID-19 preventive measures such as the provision of personal protective equipment (PPE), modular tents and sanitising/disinfectant materials, along with information dissemination and communication sessions on COVID-19;
  • Improving living conditions in camps through maintenance and critical upgrades;
  • Implementing site risk reduction interventions, with a focus on safeguarding the protection of camps' populations;
  • Building capacities of government actors, IDPs and local community leaders;
  • Supporting prevention and mitigation of GBV in camps through capacity building and awareness-raising, taking into account local gender dynamics;
  • Mainstreaming community participation through regular and frequent consultation forums and feedback mechanisms, to ensure accountability to affected populations in the camps;
  • Coordinating closely with other humanitarian actors and partners in the field to ensure efficient delivery of services to the affected populations.
Funding required
$800,000
Plan types

Mental health and psychosocial support in humanitarian response

IOM will provide mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) with a focus on services which ensure protection for the most vulnerable groups. All MHPSS activities will be in line with the IOM Manual on Community-Based Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Emergencies and Displacement. IOM intends to include MHPSS activities in all emergency response projects in any location, to the extent possible. IOM's interventions will include:

  • Setting up free and widely available MHPSS hotline stations in displacement sites (accessible for all in the sites including those who do not have personal phones) and at-risk host communities;
  • Building capacity of local government authorities, IDPs and local community leaders in providing MHPSS through trainings on peer support techniques;
  • Conducting MHPSS activities (e.g. socio-recreational and cultural activities) involving vulnerable adults and children of the affected communities and providing related materials such as stationery, games and sporting goods;
  • Providing government officials and frontline responders with psychological first aid (PFA), as well as building their capacity in PFA;
  • Building capacity of IOM staff, especially on protection-related issues such as GBV and sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA);
  • Building capacity of IOM field staff, as the MHPSS services, including hotlines, may be an entry point for people to disclose a protection incident and seek support, including an incident of GBV (including SEA). The staff will be equipped to safely and ethically respond to a disclosure of GBV and make necessary referrals as requested. 
Funding required
$1,300,000
Plan types

Provision of water, sanitation and hygiene in emergencies

Assisting families in vulnerable situations, particularly at risk of COVID-19 infection, IOM will provide access to essential services and commodities such as hygiene kits and construction of WASH facilities. These activities are also aimed to improve overall infection prevention and control (not only related to COVID-19), and risk communication and community engagement. IOM's initiatives will include:

  • Contributing to promoting good hygiene practices among the supported households and communities through awareness-raising campaigns and information, education and communications (IEC) materials (all hygiene promotion and awareness-raising activities will follow national guidelines on COVID-19 preventive measures, such as physical distancing);
  • Conducting consultations with the community, especially women and girls, on the location and design of the WASH facilities in the displacement sites, so as to ensure they can access these safely and would not be put at further risk of harm or face any barriers when accessing and using, and can use them in a dignified manner;
  • Installing WASH facilities (e.g. handwashing stations, soap refilling stations) in displacement sites within the crisis response;
  • Supporting vulnerable and at-risk families with hygiene kits and a consistent supply of hygiene items such as soap and sanitiser.
Funding required
$4,000,000
Plan types

Shelter and settlements

IOM will provide emergency assistance to displaced populations and those impacted by climate crises (locations depending on the specific crisis to which IOM is responding), to improve living conditions so they may live in safety, privacy and dignity. In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, shelter activities will mainstream health-related considerations (e.g. proper sanitation and social distancing practices during distributions and capacity building training sessions). IOM's initiatives will include: 

  • Supporting with access to shelter materials (e.g. emergency shelter kits and shelter repair kits, depending on the needs and context) and labour through cash-based interventions and in-kind support. In consideration of the crisis-affected populations who have neither the physical nor material capacity for self-recovery, IOM will provide additional assistance in the form of direct cash grant assistance for self-managed hiring of contractors. Cash grants will be provided to improve their purchasing capacity on additional household and shelter materials to improve living conditions;
  • Providing Building Back Safer (BBS) trainings. As part of the shelter recovery programme, IOM will provide trainings on disaster risk reduction (DRR) and safer shelter construction to crisis-affected communities. IOM engineering staff and supporting staff will supervise and provide technical assistance for the trainings.
Funding required
$4,000,000
Plan types
Super Typhoon Goni emergency response in Albay, Bicol Region
Super Typhoon Goni emergency response in Albay, Bicol Region

Objective 2 - Driving solutions to displacement
Objective
Driving solutions to displacement

$9,700,000
Funding required
46,000
People Targeted
82
Entities Targeted
Former combatant / fighter, Internal migrant, Internally displaced person, Local population / community
Primary target groups
Description of People and Entities Targeted

(1) IDPs still living in camps requiring a better assessment of their situation and support for safe and sustainable voluntary returns or other durable solutions;

(2) Returning Overseas Filipinos and communities in areas of return to access basic services, livelihoods, safety and security;

(3) Government authorities and community-based organizations, to contribute to capacity building and facilitate community stabilization;

(4) Former combatants (especially women combatants), youth, conflict-affected communities, Indigenous Peoples, traditional and religious groups.

Funding confirmed 1%
99% Funding gap

Address the socio-economic impacts of health crises

IOM will support vulnerable populations to build resilience and mitigate the socioeconomic impacts of crises, including the COVID pandemic. These activities are also aimed at addressing problems related to diminished livelihoods or food insecurity, and different forms of social exclusion such as limited access to health services and communications. Initiatives will include:

  • Supporting vulnerable households with multi-purpose cash grants to preserve food security and access to basic services and commodities, including hygiene products. The cash-based intervention will safeguard access to basic services for individuals not covered by existing social protection schemes. IOM will assess possible risks related to providing cash to households (particularly taking into account gender dynamics): for example, who within the household is the recipient and whether that could create any risks, in particular for women. To understand and incorporate gender dynamics in relation to access to and control over cash and access to markets, consultations with women on preferred modalities will be conducted with advice from GBV specialists;
  • Providing access to cash-for-work interventions especially directed towards construction and repair of WASH and other infection prevention and control (IPC) infrastructure in displacement sites and host-communities. The cash-for-work modality prioritising such lifesaving infrastructure will contribute to build resilience to the negative impacts of, and recover sustainably from, health crises like the COVID-19 pandemic;
  • Building capacity of local governments in safeguarding food security and early recovery. Enhancing local capacities on proper planning and provision of essential services will help mitigate the negative socio-economic impact of the crisis.
Funding required
$2,800,000
Plan types

Health system strengthening

IOM will continue to facilitate health systems strengthening efforts in the Philippines, through supporting and bolstering the local health care response, particularly as regards COVID-19 in 2021. To achieve this, IOM will procure and provide critical equipment, alongside overseeing robust capacity building efforts for healthcare workers and relevant personnel, particularly in relation to cold-chain management and logistics in response to COVID-19 and future vaccination efforts. IOM will support the government of the Philippines and its healthcare system by providing:

  • Capacity building trainings on topics related to to vaccinations and cold-chain management for the regional government’s Ministry of Health and frontline healthcare workers;
  • Supporting procurement of cold-chain vehicles and bio-refrigeration systems as necessary, to ensure proper vaccine roll-out and management to all relevant parts of the country;
  • Strengthening testing capacities, such as through the safe and efficient transport of specimens to support the country's disease surveillance efforts.
Funding required
$1,400,000
Plan types

Mental health and psychosocial support in transition and recovery

IOM will support key actors in conflict-affected communities in Mindanao with MHPSS activities. These activities aim to not only address MHPSS needs of the affected population but also to promote dialogue and social cohesion towards recovery and crisis prevention. Initiatives will include:

  • Capacity building on MHPSS of government stakeholders, local community leaders, traditional leaders and IDPs in conflict-affected areas. It may include peer support training, in which IOM will train IDPs nominated from their communities for a peer support system. The team will conduct a training on the referral pathways, MHPSS and psychological first aid (PFA), and child protection, to enable the affected communities themselves to be aware of, identify, and properly refer the MHPSS reports to the appropriate service providers or organizations. The trainings will also include how to respond to a disclosure and safely refer to specialized services (e.g. how to safely and ethically refer persons to services, especially in the case of a GBV incident), and have updated information on the GBV referral pathways. The peer support will work as a supportive relationship between peers of the affected populations with similar experiences. The activity does not target survivors of GBV and thus community focal points (those trained on peer support) will be trained on how to refer such cases should they arise;
  • Improving PSS referral mechanisms - this may include the provision of MHPSS hotlines attended by dedicated social worker staff; working with the local authorities and service providers to streamline the existing referral pathways to make referral processes more efficient and accessible to all relevant actors; and disseminating information materials to the target communities to raise awareness of the available referral mechanisms and how to access them;
  • Creating or supporting the creation of safe spaces in the community for children, women, other vulnerable groups and families, for them to be protected and engaged in psychosocial structured activities. This could be held in community halls, a public gymnasium and other accessible premises.
Funding required
$1,000,000
Plan types

Peacebuilding and peace preservation

To mitigate further negative migration pressures resulting from violence and instability, IOM activities will support reconciliation efforts at regional, national and community levels. IOM will strengthen community capacity to promote the peaceful resolution of conflicts so that communities may enjoy the dividends of peace through:

  • Strengthening research and evidence generation in BARMM, including on risks and drivers of instability and vulnerabilities;
  • Strengthening local accountability mechanisms in conflict-affected areas, based on the past successful project model: as foundations of the community-based, accountable and sustainable development mechanism, IOM will establish Community Working Groups (CWG) in each of the target barangays. Each CWG will consist of members of various social segments such as barangay officials, women, youth, traditional and religious leaders. Each CWG will develop specific Terms of References (ToRs) with guidance from IOM and will be formally established through a Barangay Executive Order. The CWGs will be linked to their respective Municipal Technical Working Groups (M-TWGs) and Provincial Technical Working Groups (P-TWGs) to ensure accountability and coordination across various administrative levels. Based on the lessons learned from the PAMANA project, the M-TWGs will play a key role in assessing and identifying the overall needs, while the P-TWGs will provide overall guidance and ensure linkage of activities with other existing recovery and peacebuilding initiatives. They will also ensure community participation in the process, ownership and commitment to sustaining the initiatives. The past projects of IOM Philippines proved this approach can contribute to strengthen community accountability mechanisms and help relieve fragmentation of conflict-affected communities which diminish local capacities to work together;
  • Enhancing social cohesion and understanding through the conduct of socio-cultural events and economic opportunities that bring together diverse segments of society. These initiatives will be conceptualised by local actors (CWGs, M-TWGs, women associations, youth groups, etc.) to strengthen the social fabric (each initiative can include multiple communities). These activities can include cultural festivals, performance contests, awareness-raising campaigns, activities to promote respect for the environment and natural resources. As part of the social cohesion activities, IOM may also conduct conflict resolution and community dialogue sessions to better address potential conflicts.
Funding required
$3,000,000
Funding confirmed
$111,083
Last updated: 15 Jun 2022
Plan types
3%
Funding confirmed
97%
Funding gap

Community stabilization

IOM will serve to restore trust among community members, vulnerable populations and local authorities and lay the foundations for durable solutions, lasting peace and sustainable development. Initiatives will include:

  • Providing leadership and capacity building opportunities to women and youth, especially in promoting non-violent political processes;
  • Enhancing local community accountability mechanisms aiming at the promotion of social cohesion, capacity building of local governance, promoting non-violent and inclusive processes of governance. Based on the past successful project model, IOM will establish Community Working Groups (CWG) in each of the target barangays. Each CWG will consist of members of various social segments such as barangay officials, women, youth, traditional and religious leaders. This intervention will contribute to inclusive access to the provision of essential services and promotion of social cohesion;
  • Tailored livelihood assistance to the most vulnerable communities and individuals. This activity will support the promotion of inclusive economic recovery as the vulnerable sectors will be able to actively participate in the income-generating activities in a sustainable manner. 
Funding required
$1,500,000
Plan types

Objective
Strengthen preparedness and reduce disaster risk

$2,000,000
Funding required
5,000
People Targeted
3
Entities Targeted
Local population / community
Primary target groups
Description of People and Entities Targeted

(1) Government of the Philippines, including national and local authorities;

(2) Community leaders, to better equip them to deal with disaster management to reduce vulnerabilities;

(3) Government and non-governmental actors, such as civil society organizations and community-based organizations, to support their efforts to include and mainstream preparedness, risk reduction, and climate change adaptation.

All groups, in particular persons with disabilities, women and elderly will be involved in preparedness activities to ensure the response also addresses their specific needs, concerns and risks that may be exacerbated in the case of a disaster. Those at higher risk of being excluded from accessing information (e.g. women, persons with disabilities) will be involved in these efforts to ensure appropriate means of reaching them with information.

Disaster prevention

IOM will support in developing the preparedness capacities of government and non-governmental partners in humanitarian response and assisting vulnerable populations, and provide support for populations who are likely to be severely affected by the impact of the climate crisis. Initiatives will include:

  • Supporting in the review and drafting of local disaster risk reduction and management policies;
  • Enhancing capacities of local responders through trainings and distribution of necessary equipment;
  • Conducting disaster risk reduction management simulation exercises.
Funding required
$1,000,000
Plan types

Water, sanitation and hygiene in preparedness and risk reduction

IOM will enhance preparedness through prepositioning key supplies, building local capacity especially on infection, prevention and control (IPC) measures. Initiatives will include:

  • Building capacity of local government officials and service providers on WASH, including operations and maintenance (O&M) of refurbished or newly installed WASH facilities, as well as on techniques of hygiene promotion and information campaigns on proper sanitation and hygiene practices;
  • Refurbishing and constructing WASH facilities such as handwashing stations and soap refilling stations in order to promote proper hygiene practices among the target communities;
  • Enhancing awareness of the most vulnerable and at-risk communities on proper hygiene and IPC measures.
Funding required
$1,000,000
Plan types

Objective
Contribute to an evidence-based and efficient crisis response system

$2,100,000
Funding required
4,000
People Targeted
7
Entities Targeted
Internal migrant, International migrant, Local population / community
Primary target groups
Description of People and Entities Targeted

(1) Government of the Philippines;

(2) Communities;

(3) Crisis response actors.

IOM will collect, analyse and disseminate critical multi-layered information on the mobility, vulnerability, and needs of displaced and mobile populations in the Philippines, using the Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM) and other customised tools and methodologies, as well as capacity building on data management and processing, response monitoring and accountability mechanisms.

Displacement tracking

IOM collects, analyses and disseminates critical multi-layered information on the mobility, vulnerability, and needs of displaced and mobile populations in the Philippines. The following activities will be considered for implementation in any relevant settings, and the geographical areas and demographic groups and components of the DTM will be determined depending on the context and needs, taking into consideration the existing available data at that point. Initiatives will include:

  • DTM during mass displacement (the exact scope of this activity, including target locations and population groups, will depend on the occasion, e.g. natural disasters, armed conflicts);
  • Returnee Intentions and Needs survey for Returning Overseas Filipinos affected by COVID-19 (rolled out at the Metro Manila points of entry in the second half of 2020; for 2021, it may expand to other points of entry across the country).
Funding required
$500,000
Plan types

Support services for response actors

IOM will work in close coordination with the national and local governments in response to various crises. This will include the provision of technical support in the coordination, stockpiling, storage and distribution of critical supplies for response activities, including for COVID-19.

Funding required
$1,200,000
Plan types

First line of defence

IOM partners with the UN Department of Operational Support (DOS) in order to provide critical health services to eligible UN personnel, dependents, and other persons in need of care referred by the UN, as part of the ‘First Line of Defence (FLOD)’ for the COVID-19 response in the Philippines. IOM’s Migration Health Assessment Clinics (MHACs) provide services in 19 (inclusive of the Philippines) locations. Currently, the IOM Philippines MHAC is authorized to provide testing for SARS-CoV-2. 

Funding required
$400,000
Plan types
Operational presence in

Philippines

41
International staff and affiliated work force
633
National staff and affiliated work force
2
IOM field office

The map used here is for illustration purposes only. Names and boundaries do not imply official endorsement or acceptance by IOM.

Figures are as of 31 December 2023. For more details of IOM's operational capacity in country, please see the IOM Capacity section.

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