Over 15 million Filipinos have completed the Step 1 registration for the Philippine Identification System (PhilSys) since its registration expansion across the country this year, Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported on Tuesday, March 23.

Step 1 involves a house-to-house collection of demographics information of low-income household heads and appointment setting for Step 2.

Since January 18 to date, PSA recorded a total of 15,083,353 registrants across 81 provinces and all cities and municipalities in the National Capital Region (NCR).

The total number of registrants is based on manual counts from PSA field offices, bringing the total Step 1 registrations to 25.7 million Filipinos since its rollout in October 2020.

“We are optimistic that we will achieve our 2021 target given our pace in reaching the 15 million mark for Step 1 registration this quarter. We will ramp-up our operations and continue to adjust our strategy in light of the pandemic to ensure the safety of our registrants and registration staff,” PSA Undersecretary and National Statistician Dennis Mapa said in a statement.

Assistant Secretary Rosalinda Bautista, deputy national statistician of the PhilSys Registry Office (PRO), said the PSA is set to make the Step 1 registration more accessible by launching an online portal next month. This will enable registrants to complete this step in the safety of their homes.

“We thank the public for embracing the PhilSys program and we hope that this enthusiasm continues as we open the PhilSys online portal soon. The demand for this online registration is critical in realizing the goals of PhilSys so Filipinos can enjoy its uses and benefits,” she said.

PhilSys Step 1 registrations previously recorded 10.6 million registrants in 32 provinces from October 12 to the end of December 2020, surpassing PSA’s initial goal of nine million registrants. 

Acting Socioeconomic Planning Secretary and National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) chief Karl Kendrick Chua earlier announced that PhilSys’ target registrations for this year were set to at least 50 million.

Chua also reassured that registration operations will continue to strictly implement health and safety protocols for both registrants and the staff.

The Step 2 registration, which involves the validation of supporting documents and capture of biometric information, such as fingerprints, iris scans, and front-facing photographs at registration centers as per the registrants’ appointments, is currently taking place in 32 priority provinces. 

PSA intends to ramp up operations for the Step 2 PhilSys registration on a gradual, small-scale basis. 

As of February 23, all priority provinces have at least one registration center in operation.

(Source: Philippine News Agency)

Also Read: PSA to rollout Step 2 sign up for PhilSys early January