Photo Release

Funding for SDGs: Sen. Pia Cayetano during the continuation of the marathon hybrid plenary session tackling the proposed P4.506 trillion budget for 2021, Monday, November 16, 2020, stresses the need for sufficient budget to monitor the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). The chairperson of the Committee on Sustainable Development Goals, Innovation and Futures Thinking, said typhoon Ulysses has shown again the country’s gaps and vulnerabilities and proposed to consider the SDGs as guide in preventing or minimizing damages caused by typhoons and other natural calamities. “It is not acceptable that we do not have the baselines, that we do not have recommendations coming from the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) on what we need to do to achieve these goals. We cannot suddenly pull our resources in this flooding. There will be other calamities, there will be other needs. Kids have been out of school for almost a year. So we have to focus on all the goals of SDGs. I need NEDA onboard, I need the Department of Budget and Management to be able to finance the needs of NEDA so that they can come up with their research and directions for the agencies to follow,” Cayetano said. (Screen grab/ Senate PRIB)