Tabuk, Kalinga (14 February) -- In line with the Handog ng Pangulo Program para sa Kabataan of the Arroyo Administration to provide basic services to children ages six and below, the Early Childhood Care and Development (ECCD) program of Kalinga is on track to meeting the program phase out this June 2009.

This was gathered from ECCD Kalinga Coordinator and Provincial Social Welfare and Development Officer Digna Dalutag in her 2008 accomplishment report.

In her presentation, Dalutag mentioned that of the 11 targeted Barangay Health Centres, 10 were 100% accomplished and one is still on-going. Medicines and equipments were also provided for said BHCs. For the targeted 16 day Care Centres, five had been completed with the rest on-going.

Under its social services, Dental Care were provided to all the 24 target barangays. Three municipalities had also reported a 100% accomplishment for their Maternal and Child care services and that Mother and Child Book for monitoring had been delivered to 40 barangays in the province.

Supplemental Feeding with Mother craft session was likewise conducted in the municipalities of Balbalan benefiting 32 families; Lubuagan 32 families; Rizal 39 families and another 32 families in Tinglayan. During the duration hot meal were provided to the underweight children for 120 days coupled with sessions on Nutrition Education.

For the ECCD livelihood program to help parents of recipients in sustaining the education and health care of their children, ECCD had allotted P350,000.00 for the year where four municipalities had already received their fund assistance.

To strengthen the ECCD systems capability building activities were likewise conducted such as the livelihood training scheduled for the 30 parent-members in Rizal, DCWs Evaluation and Assessment for Tabuk; training of the DCC workers and training on basic therapy.

Local Council for the Protection of Children (LCPC) roles and functions orientation was likewise conducted in 69 barangays in the province while a continuous advocacy for the rights of children was plugged over the radio, posted through signages.

In support to the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) the President in previous statements has stressed the importance of enforcing hunger mitigation programs such as the ECCD which is giving focus to the nutrition and health needs of young children from birth to age six.