Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Secretary Rex Gatchalian reported on Thursday, May 25, the preparedness measures being undertaken by the Department to mitigate the effects of Tropical Cyclone Mawar.

Secretary Gatchalian cited the directive of President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. to preposition relief items in the entire country as part of the augmentation support to local government units (LGUs) that will be affected by the super typhoon.

During the inter-agency meeting of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) in Camp Aguinaldo, Quezon City, Secretary Gatchalian said the DSWD and its Field Offices (FOs) have already prepositioned food and non-food items (FNFIs) in strategic locations and warehouses in the different regions.

More than 1 million family food packs (FFPs) and a total of 307,664 non-food items (NFIs) were already prepositioned in all regions as well as in the DSWD National Resource Operations Center (NROC) and Visayas Disaster Resource Center (VDRC).

The Secretary expressed his gratitude to Department of National Defense (DND) officials for their assistance in transporting FFPs to Batanes that has been forecasted to be one of the areas that will be affected by the tropical cyclone, according to the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA).

The state weather bureau PAGASA is an attached agency of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST).

“Thank you to DND, PAGASA, and DOST for providing us with necessary tools. Everybody, thank you kasi we all know that relief operations require all this data and the logistics to it. So maraming salamat on behalf of the DSWD bureaucracy,” the DSWD chief said.

The Department, through its FOs, is also continuously coordinating with concerned LGUs, as the first responders in the occurrence of natural and man-made calamities, to ensure that sufficient relief items are ready for distribution to families whose areas are expected to be hit by Tropical Cyclone Mawar. #