Short answer. Article 295 explains how two Labor Code bodies were bankrolled when the Code took effect: the Overseas Employment Development Board and the National Seamen's Board, both named in Articles 17 and 20, drew their initial funding from the unprogrammed fund of the Department of Labor and the National Manpower and Youth Council, rather than from a dedicated appropriation.
What the law says
the Overseas Employment Development Board and the National Seamen’s Board referred to in Articles 17 and 20, respectively, of this Code
Labor Code, Article 295 — Funding Of Two Boards. Read the full provision →
What the law says
shall initially be funded out of the unprogrammed fund of the Department of Labor and the National Manpower and Youth Council.
Labor Code, Article 295 — Funding Of Two Boards. Read the full provision →
A funding clause, not a creation clause
Article 295 does not create either of these two boards; it only answers a narrower, practical question, which is where their money came from at the very start. The boards themselves are established elsewhere, in Articles 17 and 20 of the Code, and this article simply fixes the funding arrangement that let them begin operating right away instead of sitting idle while a separate budget line worked its way through the usual appropriation process.
The two boards this article names
The two bodies named here are the Overseas Employment Development Board and the National Seamen's Board. The article treats them as a pair, funding both out of the same source rather than giving each its own separate arrangement, which reflects how closely their work on placing Filipino workers abroad was tied together when this part of the Code was drafted in the mid-1970s. Grouping them in one funding clause also meant a single decision could keep both boards running without Congress having to pass two separate measures.
What an unprogrammed fund means
An unprogrammed fund is money that has been set aside without being earmarked in advance for one specific, predetermined purpose. Drawing on it let these two boards start functioning immediately after the Code's effectivity, instead of waiting for Congress or the relevant department to pass a fresh, dedicated budget for two brand-new agencies that did not yet have a funding history of their own. Using an existing pool of funds this way is a common bridge measure for new government bodies that need to operate before the regular budgeting cycle can catch up to them.
Why this provision matters mostly for research today
This article sits in the Labor Code's transitory and final provisions, the part of the statute concerned with how the Code was rolled out administratively rather than with the ongoing rights of individual workers. Its practical value today is mostly historical and interpretive: it helps explain the administrative origins of Philippine overseas employment regulation for anyone researching how the earliest agencies handling Filipino workers abroad came to be organized and, in their first months, actually funded before a regular budget took over. It also illustrates a broader pattern in the Code's transitory provisions, where new institutions were frequently launched using existing pools of government money as a stopgap, with dedicated funding arrangements following only once the agency had proven it was operational.