• GILBERT P. BAYORAN
The Department of Budget and Management (DBM) has released P1 billion to the University of the Philippines (UP) System for Project NOAH, providing funding for disaster risk reduction and climate resilience efforts, including flood modeling, LiDAR mapping and real-time hazard assessment.
Negros Occidental Third District Rep. Javier Miguel Benitez welcomed the release of the budget, saying the funding would help strengthen the country’s capacity to provide early warnings and hazard information to communities.
The funding was included in the 2026 national budget after the House of Representatives pushed for its allocation during the bicameral conference on the national budget last December.
Benitez said Project NOAH’s importance is particularly evident in the Third District, where Silay, Talisay, Victorias and E.B. Magalona have experienced flooding more than once in the past five years.
“I have been that mayor,” Benitez said, recalling his experience in local government. “Most of the time, the difference between a hazard and a disaster is how early the warning arrives.”
Benitez has filed House Bill No. 2577, which seeks to transform the UP Resilience Institute, which operates Project NOAH, into the UP National Climate Resilience Institute.
The proposed measure would provide the institute with a dedicated line item in the General Appropriations Act, permanent research positions and a Resilience Knowledge Platform that local governments could use to access hazard data for their barangays.
Benitez said the measure would establish a permanent institution instead of relying on year-to-year funding.
The lawmaker also cited the demand for Project NOAH’s services, noting that its website has recorded about 35 million searches, with usage reaching as high as 2.5 million searches a day during the height of a typhoon.
He also pointed out that the country’s hazard maps had not been comprehensively updated since 2012.
Benitez said the technology behind Project NOAH translates directly into practical decisions for local governments and residents such as determining which barangays should be evacuated first and when families should leave their homes.
He said families who evacuated early during previous flooding incidents were generally safer than those who waited.
“Preparing for a flood costs far less than responding to one, in lives and in pesos,” Benitez stressed. | GPB
