By Lailany P. Gomez Reporter

THE government, the Church and the private sector will meet on Monday to discuss the post-disaster needs assessment (PDNA) in line with the task of rebuilding from the damage caused by typhoons Ondoy and Pepeng.
“We will have [a] preliminary meeting among key members of the donor community, including traditional ones and [the] private sector. The post-disaster assessment report being completed, there will be preliminary report on it. There will be indications as to what kind of response [the] donor community will have,” Finance Secretary Margarito Teves said.

Foreign funding institutions along with the government plan to convene the Philippine Development Forum this month for a pledging session, which is expected to raise about $1-billion worth of official development assistance (ODA) loans.

ODA is defined as flows of official financing administered with the promotion of the economic development and welfare of developing countries as the main objective. Such loans are concessional in character with interest rates ranging from 0.72 percent to 2.2 percent a year.

The government, through the Public-Private Reconstruction Commission, has entered into a cooperation agreement with the private-run Philippine Disaster Recovery Foundation to study the causes, costs and actions to be taken in the wake of Ondoy, Pepeng and Frank.

President Gloria Arroyo created the Reconstruction commission with the secretary of Finance as head and the secretaries supervising the National Disaster Coordinating Council, Department of Social Welfare and Development and Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council as members.

Besides rehabilitation and rebuilding, the key tasks of the commission include tapping the resources of the private sector in formulating and implementing the government’s reconstruction strategy.
The commission will also serve as a clearing house for international assistance.

The commission is recommen-datory in nature, with its work divided into relief, early recovery and long-term reconstruction.

“We would like to participate in early recovery then the most expensive part will be the rehabilitation and reconstruction. Most likely this will come from major financial institutions,” the Finance chief said.
According to Teves the commission will have a clear picture of what “needs to be done, category of support and which country the support will come from” by the end of the month.

In a joint statement, the government, World Bank, Asian Development Bank (ADB), United Nations and other development partners earlier said the PDNA covers economic and social impacts of the disasters on production and infrastructure, the extent of damage among vulnerable groups as well as calamity preparedness and mitigation.

The ADB and the World Bank earlier said they were amenable to re-channeling existing loans to the Philippines’ post-typhoon rehabilitation effort. This would be on top of the issuance of reconstruction bonds.

The world’s biggest lenders have quoted an amount of $280 million, but said “they are fine-tuning which among these pre-approved loans could be re-channeled for the purpose.”

In addition, the government will seek about $300 million to $350 million in grants from the United States Agency for International Development, Australian government’s overseas aid program, Japan International Cooperation Agency, among others.