SENATOR Sherwin Gatchalian confirmed that the Senate Committee on Finance has approved his proposal to increase funding for textbooks and other learning materials by allocating an additional P300 million.

Under the Senate Committee Report on the proposed 2025 national budget, P300 million was added to the P12.4 billion originally allocated for textbooks and other learning materials, specifically for Grade 3 textbooks and teachers’ manuals.

The Senate recently approved its final version of the proposed 2025 national budget.

“I thank the Senate Committee on Finance for approving the additional P300 million for the procurement of textbooks and other instructional materials,” Gatchalian said.

Gatchalian emphasized, however, that beyond increasing the budget for textbooks and other learning materials, there is a pressing need to streamline the procurement process to ensure that all learners receive complete sets of textbooks.

The Year One report of the Second Congressional Commission on Education found that since 2012 up to last year, only 27 out of 90 textbook titles were procured for Grades 1 to 10.

The Commission’s report also found that only learners from Grades 5 and 6 have complete sets of textbooks for all subjects.

The report further flagged the low budget utilization for textbooks and other instructional materials.

Out of more than P12.6 billion allotted from 2018 to 2022, only about P4.47 billion was obligated and P951.9 million was disbursed.

Other issues on textbook procurement include insufficient development time, high participation costs, prolonged review processes, and pricing challenges.

While the textbook procurement process should only take 180 days, current inefficiencies have stretched the timeline to an average of three years.

“Mahalagang dagdagan natin ang pondo para sa mga textbooks at magamit ito nang maayos upang matiyak na magkakaroon ng aklat ang bawat mag-aaral. Patuloy nating isusulong ang mga reporma tungo sa dekalidad na edukasyon,” Gatchalian added.