Study on the Housing Resettlement for Disaster-Affected Communities of Tacloban and Cebu,Philippines

Abstract

It is normal for different types of calamities and disasters to occur in the Philippines. It is located along the path where most typhoons that build up from the Pacific Ocean would traverse. There is an estimate of twenty or more typhoons that pass through the Philippines every year. It is also located along the ring of fire; thus, the danger of earthquake is imminent. Other than the natural disasters, the Philippines also experience a lot of man-made disasters especially fire. The Philippine government is trying to address the issue of disaster risk management and mitigation. Together with other nations around the world, they defined the laws and the guidelines that should be followed not only to respond to disaster, but also to prevent or lessen its effects. A part of this comprehensive program of addressing disaster issues is the aspect of rehabilitation and recovery, where housing is one of the main concerns. The Local Shelter Planning (LSP) manual serves as the main reference in the planning and design of housing settlements. LSP likewise refers solely to the Economic and Socialize Housing Act, or BP220, for provisions on the built environment. This study looks into the various ways that housing settlement is addressed in four case studies with the intention of evaluating whether the existing guidelines is sufficient to attain the goal of “providing access to affordable disaster resilient housing located in safe zones and in areas where social services and public facilities are available for financing assistance to build their houses” (NEDA, 2020). Two types of resettlement projects were tackled in the study: temporary resettlement sites in Tacloban City, and four case studies of permanent settlements, one in Tacloban City and the others in Cebu City. Each site was evaluated according to their compliance with BP220, then each type of housing resettlement was evaluated according to the standards of UNHCR (for temporary resettlement sites) of the SPHERE standards (for permanent resettlement sites). The results show how inadequate BP220 when applied to temporary resettlements and permanent settlements which are water-based, or privately owned, or a community of cultural minorities. Furthermore, resettlement housing do not fully comply with UNHCR standards while permanent housing do not comply the SPHERE standards when the project is handled by the government.