THE University of the Philippines Resilience Institute – Noah (Nationwide Operational Assessment of Hazards) Center said that it would utilize the P1 billion funding it received from the national government for research in disaster risk reduction, environmental protection, and climate resilience.
The funding was included in the 2026 General Appropriations Act.
"At UP, we do not conduct research simply to add another paper to an academic journal, or another dataset to a repository, or another technology to a laboratory. We do research because knowledge matters. And knowledge matters most when it can help us make better decisions, solve real problems, and improve the lives of our people," UP President Angelo Jimenez said in a press briefing at the UP Executive House in Quezon City on Thursday.
"The reality is: we cannot prevent a typhoon from forming. We cannot stop the rain from falling. But we can make better decisions before the rain comes. We can know where water is likely to go. We can identify which communities and infrastructure are most exposed. We can understand how a proposed intervention will perform before billions of pesos are spent building it," he added.
Jimenez said the funds would give UPRI and the Noah center the opportunity to strengthen and expand systems that have already demonstrated their value, including high-resolution mapping of major river basins that would produce high-resolution hazard maps.
He said UP would collaborate with the Department of Public Works and Highways, the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority, local government units and the private sector in identifying structural and nonstructural solutions.
He noted that the funding would benefit research on surface and subsurface flow of water to assess storage capacity of detention basins. Part of the money would also be used in the procurement of Lidar, or light detection and ranging technology, drones for topographic surveys.
"You cannot find a solution if you do not understand the problem. Once you understand the problem with better science and better technologies, you can find the appropriate solutions," UP Resilience Institute Executive Director Alfredo Lagmay said.
"We are using AI as a tool; we are feeding AI the appropriate data. We look at it very carefully, making sure that whatever we put in is what comes out correctly. There is a concept of 'garbage in, garbage out,' and when we use AI — especially with the potential for hallucinations — in the disaster arena, you are only good as your last performance," Lagmay said.
