JICA Provides Assistance to DPWH for Safer Roads

JICA Philippines office chief representative Takema Sakamoto and Department of Public Works and Highways (DPW) Secretary Roger Mercado agreed to a three-year technical cooperation project for road disaster prevention and other countermeasures. This project hopes to help deter road mishaps in the Philippines. Running until 2025, the cooperation is geared to boost the DPWH’s ability to handle damage caused by landslides, debris flow, and rock collapse, among others.

According to Sakamoto, the Philippines’ geographical location makes it especially vulnerable to disasters. The country’s annual experience with strong typhoons and earthquakes severely damages roads and renders them inaccessible. The project also aims to enhance the Philippines’ capability to implement permanent countermeasure works for slope disaster, emergency response, hazard maps development, and road disaster information management based on the road disaster information system.

Japan will share its expertise in disaster-proof, high-quality infrastructure with the DPWH through capacity development activities on road disaster response and management. “JICA continues to support the Philippines in enhancing quality infrastructure with the concept of sustainability, inclusion, and resilience in order to save lives, economic growth, poverty alleviation, and improved quality of life for all,” Sakamoto noted.

He also added that “this project could help preserve the asset lives of public works investments, thereby saving on financing requirements of the country as well.” The project will be implemented in Central Visayas, the Davao Region, and the Cordilleras first. Since 2007, through a series of projects, JICA has supported DPWH engineers with road slope protection technology for small-scale collapse or damage. It has been helping the Philippines promote mobility and better connectivity across the country through cooperation in roads and bridges.

Source: PhilStar