SAYS STATISTICS BOARD
Poverty threshold now P10,000 a month in Metro Manila
By Michelle Remo
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 18:24:00 05/31/2008
Filed Under: Poverty, Statistics
MANILA, Philippines -- A family of five needs an income of more than P10,000 a month to survive in the National Capital Region, a newly revised figure that explains why more Filipinos are feared to have fallen down below the poverty line.
This income threshold covers only basic needs like food, clothing, shelter, and transportation. It does not include spending for recreation. Families whose incomes fall short of the threshold are considered poor.
According to the National Statistics Coordination Board (NSCB), the rough estimate on the new poverty threshold took into account the latest increases in fuel prices.
NSCB’s latest estimate means that the minimum monthly income a family must earn so as not to be officially considered poor has gone up by 16.7 percent from P8,569 in 2006.
NSCB said, however, that the new estimate was preliminary, as the official figure will be determined in 2009. Surveys for poverty statistics are conducted once every three years, and the last one was in 2006.
“Consumer prices have increased by double-digit levels from 2006 to 2008. The cost of rice alone already rose by 50 percent,” NSCB director general Romulo Virola said in a phone interview.
Virola said that if average income of Filipino families did not increase commensurately with the rise in the income threshold, then the country’s poverty incidence would worsen.
The NSCB earlier reported that 26.9 percent of Filipino families were poor in 2006. The government set a target of reducing the figure to 17 percent by 2010, but the unfriendly economic environment nowadays has raised doubts about the attainability of the goal.
Augusto Santos, director general of the National Economic and Development Authority, earlier said the government might consider revising the target on poverty reduction because soaring prices of fuel and food and other commodities made the goal somewhat unrealistic.
But Santos said the government was looking for ways to help Filipinos cope with inflation, such as by spending more on social services.
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