THE transfer of the Development Academy of the Philippines (DAP) to the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) is expected to sharpen the economic planning agency’s focus on raising government productivity, the NEDA Secretary said.
“Our development plan for socioeconomic transformation emphasizes the need to enhance productivity frameworks across government sectors and transform them into cohesive capacity development programs and incentive structures. Thus, DAP’s productivity capability development programs greatly contribute to this strategy,” Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan said in a statement.
NEDA sees the transfer as “enabling critical institutional synergies and strengthening the links between human resource development for the public sector and the implementation of the Philippine Development Plan (PDP).”
Last week, President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. signed Executive Order No. 45, which transfers the DAP to NEDA. It was previously overseen by the Office of the President.
The DAP was created to “promote and support the country’s development efforts through government human resource programs.”
Other NEDA agencies include the Philippine Statistics Authority, the Philippine Statistical Research and Training Institute, the Philippine Institute for Development Studies, the Public-Private Partnership Center, the Tariff Commission, the Philippine National Volunteer Services Coordinating Agency, and the Commission on Population and Development.
Separately, NEDA said it signed a grant agreement agent contract with the Japan International Cooperation Agency on Oct. 27 for the Human Resource Development Scholarship project.
“The grant aims to support the development of the Philippine government’s human resources through scholarships for master’s degrees in Japanese universities. Twenty slots are allocated annually for the Philippines under the program,” NEDA said in a social media post.
As of October, the program had 439 fellows. — Luisa Maria Jacinta C. Jocson
