The Covid 19 pandemic is hitting the country’s urban poor the hardest. Now that the necessary measure of enhanced community quarantine is in place, it is extremely difficult for many Filipino daily wage earners and micro entrepreneurs to make ends meet.
Fortunately, the country’s big businesses are stepping up in plugging the gaps brought about by this health crisis. They did not only heed the government’s call to provide financial support and alternate work arrangements for their employees, but also offered interventions to mitigate the plight of the country’s poorest.
The Philippine Business for Environmental Stewardship fully supports Project Ugnayan, an initiative spearheaded by the country’s top conglomerates in cooperation with the Philippine Disaster Resilience Foundation. The collaboration of Aboitiz Group, ABS-CBN/Lopez Group, Alliance Global/Megaworld, AY Foundation and RCBC, Ayala Corporation, Bench/Suyen Corp., Cebuana Lhuiller, Century Pacific, Concepcion Industrial Corp, DMCI, Gokongwei Group of Companies/Robinsons Retail Holdings, ICTSI, Jollibee, Leonio Group, Mercury Drug, Metrobank/GT Capital, Nutri-Asia, Oishi/Liwayway Marketing Corp., PLDT/Metro Pacific Investments Corporation, Puregold, San Miguel Corporation, SM/BDO, Sunlife of Canada, and Unilab, targets to raise P1.5 billion pesos to fund the distribution of P1,000 gift certificates to over one million households in the underprivileged communities of the greater Manila area.
PBEST has always advocated the adoption of an inclusive and holistic approach in solving environmental challenges. The same applies now in this health crisis – we call on every sector of society to take part in mitigating the looming economic displacement of our most vulnerable kababayans.