A new SWS survey found that the overall hunger rate in the country did not have a noticeable change. Photos from Social Weather Stations.
MANILA, Philippines – The hunger situation in the Philippines “hardly moved” in months during President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.’s term, according to the latest Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey.
The national SWS survey released on October 29 was the first conducted under Marcos’ administration, and it found that “hunger hardly moves from 11.6% to 11.3%”.
In the previous national SWS survey conducted during the tail end of former President Rodrigo Duterte’s term in June, hunger was at 11.6% of Filipino families. Both hunger rates are estimated to be equal to 2.9 million families.
The latest SWS survey was conducted from September 29 to October 2 using face-to-face interviews with 1,500 adult Filipinos.
For Metro Manila, Visayas, and Mindanao, each area has 300 respondents while Balance Luzon (Luzon areas outside of Metro Manila) had 600 respondents.
Breakdown of the survey
The hunger rate increased in Metro Manila from 14.7% (501,000) of families to 16.3% (558,00) of families, said the SWS survey.
It also rose in Mindanao, with hunger going from 14% (816,000) of families to 15.3% (893,000).
Visayas’ hunger rate also increased by 1.3 points, going from 5.7% (272,000) of families to 7% (336,000), said the SWS.
However, Balance Luzon, which had the largest pool of respondents, decreased its hunger rate by 2.3 points, going from 11.9% (1.4 million) of families to 9.6% (1.1 million). This caused the overall hunger rate to narrow down to a 0.3 decline.
Regarding the level of hunger, 9.1% (2.3 million) of Filipino families experience “moderate hunger,” defined in the SWS survey as experiencing hunger only once or a few times.
Meanwhile, 2.2% (573,000) of families experience “severe hunger,” which is those who experience hunger often or always.
INQUIRER.net has reached out to Malacañang for comment, but it has yet to respond as of posting time.
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