Labor and Employment Secretary Rosalinda Baldoz yesterday ordered the DOLE’s Financial Management Service to release an additional P7 million for the DOLE office in Region 10, a press release from the agency said.

This is to speed up the recovery of workers who suffered from the floods in the cities of Cagayan de Oro and Iligan brought by Typhoon Sendong last month, the press release said.

The amount is in addition to the P10 million in emergency employment assistance funds already released to the regional office for those affected by the flash floods.

The P7 million is out of the regional office's program funds of P31.007 million for 2012, and is coming from the Workers' Income Augmentation Program of the Department, Baldoz said.

Based on an update report by DOLE Region 10 Director Allan Macaraya, 51 more workers in three micro-enterprises have been severely affected by the floods.

These include the Darling Food Products, which has 38 workers; 2N Handicrafts, with five workers; and Pine Ham, which employs eight workers, the press release said.

Macaraya had reported  earlier that 327 workers were affected by the floods who are now being assisted by the regional office.

Baldoz said workers who will be displaced from the closures of firms and establishments in the region will qualify for an assistance package.

"Our focus will be on helping the workers setup livelihood enterprises to enable them to recover lost income," Baldoz said, the press release.

Meanwhile, DOLE regional directors and heads of the department’s  attached agencies, bureaus, and services have been tasked to implement systems improvement that will make their work efficient for their clients.

"This means improving and making efficient all services delivery mechanisms, reducing process cycle times, minimizing wide areas of discretion, and eliminating all forms of red tape and graft and corruption that would make it easier and faster for our clients to transact official business with the department," Baldoz said.

Baldoz, said that she expects all officials and employees of the DOLE and its attached agencies, bureaus, and services, to exercise greater accountability and transparency in all their dealings with the public.

She also instructed all heads of DOLE attached agencies, bureaus, and services to communicate more openly with all DOLE clients through the media.*

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