PHILIPPINE POVERTY

Poverty and inequality have been recurrent challenges in the Philippines and have again come to the
fore in the wake of the current global financial crisis and rising food, fuel, and commodity prices
experienced in 2008. The proportion of households living below the official poverty line has declined
very slowly and unevenly in the past four decades, and poverty reduction has been much slower than
in neighboring countries such as the People’s Republic of China (PRC), Indonesia, Thailand, and Viet
Nam. The growth of the economy has been characterized by boom and bust cycles and current
episodes of moderate economic expansion have had limited impact on poverty reduction. Other
reasons for the relatively moderate poverty decline include the high rate of inequality across income
brackets, regions, and sectors; and unmanage population growth.

Poverty is about not having enough money to meet basic needs including food, clothing and
shelter. However, poverty is more, much more than just not having enough money.
The World Bank Organization describes poverty in this way:
“Poverty is hunger. Poverty is lack of shelter. Poverty is being sick and not being able to see a doctor.
Poverty is not having access to school and not knowing how to read. Poverty is not having a job, is
fear for the future, living one day at a time.
Poverty has many faces, changing from place to place and across time, and has been described in
many ways. Most often, poverty is a situation people want to escape. So poverty is a call to action --
for the poor and the wealthy alike -- a call to change the world so that many more may have enough
to eat, adequate shelter, access to education and health, protection from violence, and a voice in
what happens in their communities.”

In addition to a lack of money, poverty is about not being able to participate in recreational activities;
not being able to send children on a day trip with their schoolmates or to a birthday party; not being
able to pay for medications for an illness. These are all costs of being poor. Those people who are
barely able to pay for food and shelter simply can’t consider these other expenses. When people are
excluded within a society, when they are not well educated and when they have a higher incidence of
illness, there are negative consequences for society. We all pay the price for poverty. The increased
cost on the health system, the justice system and other systems that provide supports to those living
in poverty has an impact on our economy. After years of recognizing poverty as a key development
problem and devising various strategies and programs for its reduction, the government is still
confronting high levels of poverty and hunger among its citizens. Long and persistent periods of high
poverty may harm a country’s development path as poverty itself becomes a drag to economic
growth. Poverty incidence among households increased from 24.4% in 2003 to 26.9% in 2006 and
the number of poor families increased from 4.0 million in 2003 to 4.7 million in 2006. The headcount
index increased from 30.0% in 2003 to 32.9% in 2006 and the number of poor people increased
from 23.8 million in 2003 to 27.6 million in 2006. It should also be noted that poverty incidence and
magnitude do not necessarily coincide. According to the 2006 poverty data, Mindanao has the
highest poverty incidence at 38.8% but Luzon has the highest number of poor families, with almost 2
million families (42.4% of the total). Self-rated poverty1 has ranged from 50% to 52% for most of
2008, peaking at 59% (an estimated 10.6 million people) in the second quarter. Inequality has also
been persistent over the years. Although the Gini coefficient2 improved to 0.4580 in 2006 from
0.4605 in 2003 and 0.4872 in 2000, the level of inequality remains high compared with other
countries in Asia and has hardly changed for more than 20 years. High inequality has limited the
impact of economic growth on poverty reduction. The main causes of poverty in the country are low
to moderate economic growth for the past 40 years; low growth elasticity of poverty reduction;
weakness in employment generation and the quality of jobs generated; failure to fully develop the
agriculture sector; high inflation during crisis periods; high levels of population growth; high and
persistent levels of inequality (incomes and assets), which dampen the positive impacts of economic
expansion; and recurrent shocks and exposure to risks such as economic crisis, conflicts, natural
disasters, and “environmental poverty.”
Hunger is one of the extreme effects of poverty in the Philippines. With little money to buy food,
Filipinos are having to survive on very limited food; even when food supplies are stable, they are
most accessible in other areas where people have enough income to purchase the food. And with
such an unequal distribution of income, there is a low demand for food supplies in less developed
areas that are home to low-income residents. The quality of food is also decreasing — rice used to be
the main source of food for Filipinos, but now it has largely been replaced with instant noodles, which
is cheaper but less nutritious. As a result, malnutrition has become a lot more common. With poverty
taking a toll on Filipinos, parents often can’t make enough money to support their families; children
then have to be taken out of school to work in harsh conditions. Statistics show that around 3.6
million children, from ages 5-17, are child laborers in the Philippines. This is 15.9 percent of the
entire population. With conditions so troublesome, people often resort to crime and thievery to
survive. Research found that one of the overwhelming reasons to steal is due to difficulties caused by
poverty. Without proper employment, people turn to stealing, especially since family sizes are rather
large, and there are a lot of people to provide for.There are too many people and not enough
resources. And with such conditions, people become desperate and practice drastic measures to
provide for themselves and their families.

Despite the many definitions, one thing is certain; poverty is a complex societal issue. No matter how
poverty is defined, it can be agreed that it is an issue that requires everyone’s attention. It is
important that all members of our society work together to provide the opportunities for all our
members to reach their full potential. It helps all of us to help one another . Poverty can be stop, but
to be able to stop people of this country even the government must support each other, don’t help
because you feel pressure, do it because your heart telling you to do it

References:
https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/publication/27529/poverty-philippines-causes-constraints-
opportunities.pdf
https://borgenproject.org/effects-of-poverty-in-the-philippines/
https://www2.gnb.ca/content/gnb/en/departments/esic/overview/content/what_is_poverty.html
https://povertyseniorprojectwebsite.wordpress.com