PH ‘well-placed’ to reduce poverty incidence — WB

The Philippines is well-placed to speed up poverty reduction owing to its solid macroeconomic fundamentals, the World Bank (WB) said yesterday.

While providing more economic opportunities remain the challenge to the government’s poverty reduction efforts, the Washington-based multilateral institution noted that its poverty rate has fallen since 2006.

Based on its “Making Growth Work for the Poor: A Poverty Assessment for the Philippines” report, the World Bank said that poverty rate in the Philippines declined by five percentage points to 21.6 percent between 2006 and 2015.

The World Bank said the reduction was attributable to the expansion of jobs outside agriculture, government cash transfers, in particular to qualified poor Filipinos through the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program, and remittances.

“This experience gives us hope that the Philippines can overcome poverty,” Mara K. Warwick, World Bank country director said in a statement.

“With a strong economy, the country is well-placed to end the vicious cycles of unequal opportunity that trap people in poverty, set in place measures to improve service delivery, and boost job opportunities,” she added.

In 2015, some 22 million Filipinos — more than one-fifth of the population — still live below the national poverty line.

Constraints to achieving faster poverty reduction, according to the report, include the less pro-poor pattern of growth; high inequality of income and opportunities; and the adverse impacts of natural disasters and conflict.

Most poor Filipinos have low levels of education and live in large households headed by individuals who are self-employed or work in agriculture as laborers or smallholder producers.

The poorest households, World Bank said are those dependent on agriculture as their main source of income and most of them live in the countryside, in areas prone to disasters or in the conflictaffected areas of Mindanao.

“Making a difference in Mindanao makes a big difference to the Philippines,” Xubei Luo, World Bank’s Poverty and Equity Global Practice senior economist said.

“Increasing public investment in Mindanao to boost development there would expand opportunities for conflictaffected communities, broaden access to services and create more and better jobs,” the economist added.

Inequitable investment in human capital and insufficient well-paying job opportunities trap the poor in poverty across generations, the report explained.

The government has prepared strategic plans focused on reducing poverty, specifically AmBisyon 2040, a long-term vision to bring down poverty and improve the lives of the poorest segments of the population, and the Philippine Development Plan 2017–2022.

The plan targets reducing poverty to 13 percent to 15 percent by 2022.

To help achieve these targets, the Poverty Assessment recommended creation of more and better jobs; improvement in productivity in all sectors, especially agriculture; equip Filipinos with skills needed for the 21st century economy; and invest in health and nutrition.

The World Bank also suggested that the government should focus poverty reduction efforts on Mindanao; and manage disaster risks and protect the vulnerable.