MANILA, Philippines -- The National Food Authority (NFA) is expected to distribute family access cards in Marikina City on May 16, the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) said on Tuesday.

In a phone interview, Undersecretary for Operations Celia Yangco said that Marikina is the first city to complete the requirements for the distribution of family access cards, which is intended to allow low-income families access to cheap government-subsidized rice while at the same time prevent hoarding.

“We can now recommend the NFA to distribute rice to these areas [in Marikina],” Yangco said.

Yangco said the access card is made from thick cardboard the size of a letter-sized bond paper. The first half of the card contains the general information sheet, which includes the name of the recipient and other basic information. The other half of the card would be used to record how many kilos of rice have been purchased by the family.

“Initially kulay green dapat yung card, pero ang city may color preference so hindi na kami nag-impose [Initially the card should be colored green, but the city has a color preference so we did not impose our choice],” she said.

Yangco also corrected the misconception that the NFA access card would be like an ATM card.

“There is confusion. The ATM card-type is for another program of DSWD. The access card is a card that has information [about the family] to whom the card has been issued,” she said. “This is because subsidized rice should be for the poor.”

Yangco said that a family of five could only buy up to two kilos of NFA rice per day, while a family of more than five could buy up to four kilos.

She gave assurances that the access cards are safe from counterfeiting because they would come with barcodes. Each family would be issued a unique number, with the number unique to a city, village, and family, Yangco said.

“Pag hindi lumabas sa computer yung number nila, hindi sila entitled sa rice. At tsaka hindi sila pwedeng palipat-lipat, kunwari taga San Juan sila tapos bibili sila sa Makati [If their number does not appear on the computer, they will not be entitled to rice. And they cannot transfer, for example, from San Juan and then buy rice from Makati],” she added.

Yangco said before the cards are distributed, the local governments are required to conduct an education campaign with the rice distributors and target families to properly explain how the access card works.

The DSWD has also set up a grievance mechanism in local governments units’ (LGUs) social welfare units for families to air their complaints about anomalies and problems in the NFA’s rice distribution, she added.

She said other cities expected to receive access cards soon were Pateros, Pasay, Pasig, and Parañaque. The department is just waiting for the LGUs’ master list of urban poor families in their jurisdictions, she added.

Yangco said the process of drawing up the master lists was a tedious one since the LGUs are required to submit a complete list of the families, including the names of each member of the household.

Once submitted, the DSWD then double-checks the list to ensure that the families are, indeed, qualified for the program.

While the DSWD has set no deadline for the LGUs to submit their master lists, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has set it for May 15, Yangco said.

She added that 70% of the LGUs in the National Capital Region (NCR) have submitted their master lists.