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Ensuring Project Sustainability



How can you ensure that the project will be sustainable?

This is the common question to local government units (LGUs) presenting their programs for evaluation in the search for Galing Pook programs. The common response: Institutionalization by means of policies and ordinances.

Indeed, institutionalization is one of the ways to sustain the programs and projects. In the Philippines, however, while policies and ordinances may set the tone and the environment for sustainability, they do not guarantee that the projects will continue after the administration that initiated them. This is because of the lack of strong political institutions and the highly personality-oriented system of politics and governance in the country. 

Cases in point are the city and municipal development plans which are literally shelved when a new officials are elected. At the national level, there is  also the Bottom-Up Budgeting Program (BUBP) initiated by the Aquino Administration (2010-2016). Despite good reviews and a number of awards and international citations on BUBP, it was still discontinued due the different thrust and priority programs of the succeeding administration. 

So, how can a project and program become sustainable? In addition, what are the possible lenses that project implementers should look into to ensure project sustainability?

Of course, institutionalization is one thing. Aside from institutional sustainability, implementers should also look into financial sustainability or the aspect of ensuring a steady flow of funds and generating revenue for maintaining and continuing the project.

Third is programmatic sustainability which refers to continuing the organizations projects and programme in the absence of donor support, and designing opportunities reflective of the environment. Setting up systems for accountability, human resource development, and knowledge management can also be included here. Projects should not stop when there is a new administration or when there is staff turnover. 

The last is the attitudinal or psychosocial sustainability. This refers to the behavioral and mental change on the part of the stakeholders particularly the beneficiaries for having the initiative to pay for those services even without demand or fear of penalty or to exercise the voice to exact accountability from the rest of the stakeholders.

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