Perhaps as a response from getting flak from both domestic and international communities, the government of the Philippines would be launching a website designed to track foreign aid it had received for the victims of Typhoon Haiyan, or known locally in the country as Yolanda. The website called Foreign Aid Transparency Hub (FAiTH), would supposedly grant anyone to have access to information regarding the foreign assistance the country had received online. Although the website had been put up, the launch will be done officially tomorrow, November 18.

The Philippine government under President Benigno Aquino III had been criticized lately for its slow response to the natural disaster that had hit several cities and towns in the major part of Visayas.

Undersecretary and Chief Information Officer Richard Moya of the Philippines's Department of Budget and Management said, "There's an urgent call now for us to monitor the movement of foreign aid funds for Yolanda so they will go exactly where they're supposed to: to the survivors of the typhoon for whom recovery will be a long and arduous process, and to the communities that need to be rehabilitated as quickly and efficiently as possible."

Moya explained that FAiTH would serve as an online information portal for visitors and interested parties to be educated about the receipt of donations and cash via multiple donors and sources. Moya also noted that the aid received would have already been coursed first through government agencies like the state's Office of Civil Defense, Department of National Defense and the Department of Social Welfare and Development.

"Counter to what most people think, foreign aid isn't given to the Philippine government in hard cash. Instead, these arrive in the form of pledges, which are released to aid groups or their corresponding organizations in the Philippines, such as USAID and Red Cross. In cases like this, FAiTH doesn't monitor these funds; instead, it tracks foreign aid that is coursed through Philippine government agencies," Moya said.

The monitoring team involved on the latest online project included the Office of the President. The country's Department of Foreign Affairs would be the team's main source of information for the website.

FAiTH went up on November 14, and reflected that around PHP9.1 billion in foreign aid had been received.