The Philippines has broken ground on a $214m project to rehabilitate the road that connects the Western Samar and Eastern Samar provinces in the country.

The project involves upgradation of the 222km four-lane road from Wright, Western Samar, to Guiuan, Eastern Samar, covering 134 villages in 15 towns of Samar and Eastern Samar.

The road network, which falls under the Secondary National Roads Development Project (SNRDP), is expected to be completed in May 2016, reported bworldonline.com.

Funded by the US Government under the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) fund, the new project is a part of MCC’s $434m programme with the Philippines Government to improve economic opportunities and alleviate poverty.

MCC is a bilateral US foreign aid agency established in 2004.

"MCC is a bilateral US foreign aid agency established in 2004."

The road project will be undertaken in four phases. The first phase will include rehabilitation of a 16.3km road from Buray Junction to Barangay Tinani in Paranas.

The second phase will rehabilitate over 64km-long stretch from Barangay Tinani to San Julian / Sulat municipal boundary, while phase 3 will restore the 64.6km road from San Julian / Sulat boundary to Balangkayan / Llorente.

Phase 4 will cover reconstruction of the 79.5km-long road from Balangkayan / Llorente Municipal to Guiuan.

The Millennium Challenge Corporation chief executive officer Daniel W Yohannes was quoted as saying that the new road project will uplift the lives of Filipinos by opening up new opportunities.

Other components of the programme include the revenue administration project and the community-driven development project called Kapit-Bisig Laban sa Kahirapan-Comprehensive and Integrated Delivery of Social Services (Kalahi-CIDSS).