MANILA, Philippines–Who are “near-poor” Filipino families?
The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) will define “near-poor” families to be able to come up with social protection programs to prevent them from becoming poor altogether.
The DSWD is scheduled to present on Tuesday the results of a study by Vicente Paqueo, an economist and public policy expert of the Philippine Institute for Development Studies.
His study, “Analysis of the Near-Poor Challenge and Strategy Development Ideas,” will be the highlight of the agency’s forum dubbed “People at the Edge: Defining the Near-Poor of the Philippines.”
One of the salient points of his study is the proposed definition and threshold of being “near-poor.” Near-poor are “nonpoor” families who have little or no buffer against economic shocks and can easily become poor in case of crisis.
There are now a little more than 100 million Filipinos, a quarter of whom are considered poor.
The study on the national policy on near-poor families will be presented in a forum at Sulo Riviera Hotel in Quezon City and was initiated by the DSWD with support from the Asian Development Bank.
Social Welfare Secretary Corazon Soliman said the DSWD would initiate and implement social protection programs to keep near-poor families from becoming poor altogether.
“This policy will allow us to define and identify members of this sector in the ‘Listahanan’ second round of assessment and find ways to effectively address their concerns,” Soliman said.
Identifying poor, near-poor
Listahanan is the DSWD’s information management system that identifies poor families who will benefit from social protection programs. This project will be used to identify near-poor families as well.
In the first semester of 2013, a family of five needed at least P8,022 a month to meet basic food and nonfood needs, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).
For the same period in 2012, the poverty line averaged P7,821 a month for a family of five. It was at P7,040 for the first semester of 2009.
In April this year, the PSA reported that one in every four (24.9 percent) Filipinos was considered poor, based on their average income in the first semester of 2013.
This was down from 27.9 percent of Filipinos below the poverty line in the same period the year before.
The figure also showed a slight improvement from the poverty incidence of 28.6 percent in 2009 and 28.8 percent in 2006.
Extremely poor
For the first time in the country’s history, the number of people considered “extremely poor” also dropped to a single-digit rate of 7.7 percent from 10.7 percent.
Apart from the reduction in the number of poor people, the number of households below the poverty line also dipped to 19.1 percent from 22.3 percent.
The PSA report also marked the start of more frequent reports on the poverty level in the country.
The government, through the PSA, now uses the Annual Poverty Indicator Survey, which replaced the Family Income and Expenditure Survey conducted every three years.
The better monitoring of poverty data is expected to help the government tweak its policies to more effectively help the poor.
At the DSWD forum, the panel of reactors will include Mahar Mangahas of Social Weather Stations, Ana Maria Tabunda of Pulse Asia and Romeo Recide, interim deputy national statistician of the PSA.
The forum is part of the monthlong celebration of the 25th National Statistics Month with the theme “25 and Beyond: Solid and Responsive Philippine Statistical System in Support of Globalization and Regional Economic Integration.”–With Inquirer Research
Originally posted: 9:56 pm | Sunday, October 5th, 2014
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