Getting RP out of poverty: Note to Aquino

MANILA, Philippines – The burden of solving the country’s poverty problem will soon rest on the shoulders of President-elect Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III and members of his Cabinet.

Experts say the job may depend on stemming corruption.

Speaking on ANC’s “The Rundown” on Thursday night, Dr. Arsenio Balisacan of the UP School of Economics says billions of pesos are estimated to be lost to corruption, and addressing this could help push the government’s anti-poverty programs.

“Research shows, there’s a lot of leakage in government programs, even those targeted for the poor. So, if we can cut that leakage substantially, we can generate money, we can support community cash-transfer programs, support a more intensive intervention in health and education,” he explains.

Balisacan says billions lost in food subsidies could easily be re-allocated to community cash transfer (CCT) and family planning programs, which would have a bigger impact on easing poverty.

Incoming Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Secretary Dinky Soliman says the incoming Aquino administration will have to seriously consider a review of the Food for School program, and the rice subsidies being distributed through the National Food Authority (NFA).

Plug the leaks

Aside from plugging losses from corruption, Soliman says poverty reduction also depends on improving the delivery of social services and addressing the immediate needs of poor Filipinos.

She says the next administration can continue effective programs of the previous administration, but should also plug the leaks.

“There could be some leakages especially in the identification of beneficiaries, and that’s the first level of examination and analysis we’ll be doing,” Soliman says. “The second thing that will be immediate in the first 100 days is addressing the most vulnerable of the poor, the street families and street children in the highly urbanized centers.”

She cites an existing CCT under the “Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program” or 4Ps, which gives an incentive to poor families identified by the DSWD, whose kids have ideal school attendance. She says tapping this, along with community-driven development, can help meet the country’s poverty reduction goals.

Convergence of DSWD programs

“In my orientation with the DSWD yesterday, we were talking about the convergence of three programs in the department: community development program under Kalahi seeds, conditional cash transfer under the 4Ps, and the self-employment assistance program. So we need to develop the technology of complementation with sustainable livelihoods as the intervention of permanently moving them out of poverty,” she says.

Soliman adds the population issue has as much of a role in pointing the way out of the country’s poverty situation.

“The main tenet of the program is responsible parenthood. Under CCT family meetings, beneficiaries talk about problems of the household. Given a situation of poverty and development, it’s important that responsible parenthood is emphasized,” Soliman says, citing how space and the density of a population have remained a challenge in highly urbanized cities.

Fund infusion

Soliman reveals informal discussions are underway with multilateral institutions for a fresh infusion of funds to help government’s anti-poverty programs.

“We’re on informal discussions with some of multilaterals by way of increasing the support they’re giving, and we’re talking with agencies like the Millennium Challenge Corp. (MCC). Because in the pipeline, we’re in the last stages of negotiations for grants. The MCC will be giving grants under certain conditions, particularly the fulfillment of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), democracy index, and the human rights index. And right now, they’re looking at it again, and it looks like we’re going to be able to get fresh grants from MCC. And one of the grants that we’ll be given as soon as negotiations are over will be for community-driven development or Kalahi seeds, $120 million as grant within the next 3 months,” she says.

Balisacan agrees the CCT program is promising as a subsidy program for the poor, but he believes it is only transitory.

Aside from improving access to social services, he believes job generation and improving productivity are keys to reversing the country’s poverty situation. He notes an almost jobless growth has been a basic feature of economic growth over the last 10 years.

Job generation, raising revenues

“Economic growth has not created employment opportunities especially for the low-income groups as much as we expected. What we have to do is to ensure the growth will be accompanied by employment creation, and that means we need to improve access of the poor to infrastructure, technology, credit because that’s what’s going to create jobs,” Balicasan says. “We’ve got to get the economy moving and generate jobs because at the end of the day, what really causes poverty is the absence of income-generation opportunities.”

“The challenge for the government, at least in the medium term, in the next say 2, 3 or 5 years, is to ensure that the investment climate in the country improves substantially so jobs are created and employment opportunities for the poor expand rapidly. Meantime, apart from the CCT, we have to do substantial reform in health, education,” Balicasan says, citing how the social sector has deteriorated in recent years, as manifested by higher dropout rates in basic education and poor maternal health.

“Complementing the CCT and social services programs, we really have to address the population issue,” he adds.

While such measures can immediately be done without raising revenue, Balicasan says, raising taxes should not entirely be ruled out.

“We need to raise revenue, and while it’s not a politically attractive idea to raise taxes, I don’t think we can move forward in a massive way to solve poverty without raising taxes,” he says. –Caroline J. Howard, ANC