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5 NEW CORELLA, DAVAO DEL NORTE
Participatory Governance at Work
Sustainable Integrated Area Development (SIAD):
The New Corella Experience
NEW Corella is a third-class municipality in Davao del Norte. As in any
other place in the Philippines, the local government unit and the
community were besieged by problems like poverty, environmental
degradation, peace and order. But to successfully combat these
problems, the local government unit and the people in the community
had to get their act together.
Focus on Process
One could say that in this instance the focus is not on the myriad problems
attendant to poverty but on how various players in development will
overcome resistance to change, resolve conflicts of interest or differences
in opinion, minimize overlapping functions, distribute responsibilities,
harmonize different thrusts, and bridge gaps in knowledge or
relationships. In short, to agree to a process that would make all
concerned more effectively work together.
The Sustainable Integrated Area Development (SIAD) is a framework
on the development process that has been used successfully in New
Corella by the Institute of Primary Health Care-Davao Medical School
Foundation (IPHC-DMSF) in its rural development work from the early
1980s. In 1999 New Corella formally adopted the SIAD process as its
primary development framework in drafting a 5-year Memorandum of
Agreement that was set to end in 2004. The main signatories to the
MOA, or stakeholders of the program, included the municipal
government, the twenty barangay governments, and the IPHC-DMSF.
The primary goals of the program are: (a) people’s participation and
empowerment; (b) transparency and good governance; (c) better quality
of life; and (d) sustainable development.
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