Poverty eases little from 2006 to 2012, becomes harder to escape – NSCB

MANILA – Poverty incidence in the Philippines has eased little over the last seven years, the National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) said on Tuesday, adding that the main difference between being poor last year and being poor in 2006 is that it’s become harder to escape poverty as of 2012.

NSCB Secretary-General Jose Ramon Albert on Tuesday told reporters that poverty incidence among Filipino families eased from 23.4 percent in the first half of 2006 to 22.9 percent in the same period of 2009 and 22.3 percent in 2012.

Still, on average, 28 in every 100 Filipinos were poor over the last six years.

Worse, a family of five needed P2,292 more last year than in 2006 to move itself out of poverty. The same family required only P1,681 in 2006 and P2,042 in 2009 to leave the ranks of the impoverished.

To meet basic food needs, a family of five needs P5,458 every month. To stay above the poverty threshold – that is, to meet basic food and non-food needs – it would require P7,821.

Albert said eradicating poverty required P79.7 billion last year, up from P63.1 billion in 2009. This was higher than the government’s conditional cash transfer (CCT) budget of P39.4 billion for last year.

Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Arsenio Balisacan said the poverty statistics were “not the dramatic results that we wanted.”

He expects poverty statistics in the second half of 2012 to improve, citing the CCT program of the government.

Balisacan said the government is still targeting to reduce poverty incidence to 16 percent by 2016. –Darwin G. Amojelar, InterAksyon.com