MANILA, Dec 18 (NNN-PNA) – The poverty incidence among the Philippine population increased to 23.7 percent during the first half of 2021, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) said yesterday.
“This translates to 26.14 million Filipinos, who live below the poverty threshold, estimated at 12,082 pesos (241.72 U.S. dollars), on average, for a family of five per month, in the first semester of 2021,” PSA head, Dennis Mapa, said, in an online briefing.
On the other hand, he said, subsistence incidence among Filipinos, or the proportion of Filipinos whose income is not enough to meet even the basic food needs, was registered at 9.9 percent or about 10.94 million Filipinos in the first six months.
On average, Mapa said, the monthly food threshold for a family of five for the same period was estimated at 8,393 pesos (167.92 U.S. dollars).
Socioeconomic Planning Secretary, Karl Kendrick Chua said, regions with stricter COVID-19 quarantines tended to see more significant poverty increases than regions under less stringent quarantines.
Chua said, the poverty incidence in Metro Manila, home to more than 13 million people, increased by around 1.2 percentage points. The government imposed hard lockdowns in the capital region, the epicentre of the COVID-19 outbreak in the country.
“With stronger growth in the second half of 2021, as we further relax restrictions and increase the vaccination rate, we can expect poverty incidence to decrease,” Chua said.
“Our policy to reopen the economy has accelerated our recovery and moderated the impact of the pandemic on the poor,” he said.
Chua said, the start of the vaccination programme enabled the safer reopening of the economy, allowing some 1.3 million workers to regain their employment, compared to the pre-pandemic level.– NNN-PNA
