By Mai Gevera

Davao City (8 November) -- The first province used as a model by the National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) for poverty mapping, Davao Oriental now finds planning for annual programs less of a burden.

The NSCB recently initiated the program of Poverty Mapping in the four provinces of the region to provide local government units a legend as to what programs of the government are much needed in every municipality.

NSCB XI head Estrella Turingan said that the province of Davao Oriental, which is the first to have been provided by a poverty map, is maximizing its full use in prioritizing projects as well as towns and barangays where programs will be implemented.

From the survey conducted by the LGU and the data gathered afterwards, the NSCB made it as the basis in plotting the poverty map of the province.

" The data are all coming from the LGU. Our sole job here was to gather those data and convert it to a map for easy comparison and identification of strong and weak areas in every municipality," she said.

Through the map, it was observed that Davao Oriental has significantly improved its poverty situation from 2000 to 2000 based on the indicators given.

It appeared that the concern of the municipality of Boston was the survival rate during the year 2000, however, two years after no more municipality exhibited the same concern in survival rate. The nutrition of kids in Boston also improved in 2002 as it exhibited a decrease in the number of malnourished kids. Basic education, though, may not be that alarming in most areas of the province, however, some towns exhibited a so-so level of basic education delivery that have targeted not much of its population. Peace and order, on the other hand, showed to have improved along with the poverty level.

The map, according to NSCB, has contributed to the proper distribution of programs that would best suit in every municipality.

"Now, they would know what and where to prioritize and they could also very well back up any funding projects that they are applying for," she said.

After teaching the provincial government in coming up with a poverty map, the NSCB is now urging cities and municipalities to come up on their own for barangay level purpose.