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Project
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Webpage design and development
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In
studying economic development, I have always been aware of the gap that exists between theory and practice. Way back in my
grad student days, Big Theory was the rule (see Reflections on Globalization for an example of the syndrome). Indeed, I suppose I was somewhat unusual in that I made the transition
from the theoretical disciplines of political science and economics to the practical level of hands-on development work. (I
also never managed to finish my dissertation and never quite made it to the big Ivory Tower in the sky, but that's another
story best filed away in the lost dreams folder).
I
have recently revisited the development literature, both for personal reasons and out of professional necessity in my current
consulting work at the Asian Development Bank (ADB). And I must say that I am impressed by the breadth and logic of current development philosophies.
Let's
take a quick look at some widely accepted principles in the mainstream development community, at the three descending levels
of the world as a whole, Asia as a region, and the Philippines specifically. All three share in common placing poverty reduction
at the core of development work.
Global Level: In September, 2000 the
UN General Assembly ended the Millennium Summit by adopting a set of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). In addition
to the first MDG of eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, the others include achieving universal primary education, promoting
gender equality, reducing child mortality, improving women's reproductive health, combating HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases,
ensuring environment sustainability, and "developing a global partnership for development."
With
specific reference to poverty, the MDGs specify three targets:
- Target 1: Halve the proportion of people living in
extreme poverty between 1990-2115
- Target 2: Halve the proportion of population below
minimum level of dietary energy consumption and halve the proportion of underweight children (under five years)
- Target 3: Halve the proportion of people without access
to safe drinking water or those who cannot afford it by 2115.
Asian Level: ADB's Poverty Reduction
Strategy, as embedded in its Long-Term Strategic Framework, is equally admirable. ADB identifies three fundamental pillars
of poverty reduction:
- Social
Development (human capital development, population policy, social capital development, gender equality, social protection);
- Good
Governance (government accountability, public participation, predictable legal framework, transparency, anticorruption initiatives);
and
- Pro-poor
Growth (labor-intensive employment and income creation, public/private sector provision of basic services, poor area public
investment. regional and subregional cooperation, environmental sustainability)
Philippines Level: The Arroyo administration's official development agenda focuses
specifically on issues of poverty and unemployment. The key document here is the Medium-Term Philippine Development Plan
(MTPDP), 2001-2004, which stresses poverty reduction through equitable growth, rural development, and social sector investment.
The four primary strategies are:
- Macroeconomic
stability and equitable growth, using sound fiscal and monetary policies to keep inflation low and avoid surges in unemployment;
modernize all sectors through HR development and technology;
- Comprehensive
HR development, basic education, health, shelter, water, electricity; safety nets for most vulnerable sectors; encouraging
poor to participate in governance;
- Modernization
of agricultural sector with social equity; agrarian reform, improving rural infrastructure, implementing land reform;
- Effective
governance through transparency, reducing graft and corruption, strengthening partnerships with civil society and the private
sector.
Poverty
is conceptualized broadly, taking into account not only income but its impact in terms of human deprivation, development,
and quality of life.
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Rural poverty in the Philippines
About half the population of the Philippines is rural, and agriculture is the primary
and often only source of income for rural poor people. Poverty is most severe and most widespread in rural areas, where almost
80 per cent of the country’s poor people live. Most of them depend for a livelihood on subsistence
farming and fishing. In general, illiteracy, unemployment and the incidence of poverty are higher among indigenous peoples
and people in the upland areas of the Philippines . Overall, more than one out of three people in the Philippines lives in
poverty.
Who are the rural poor
in the Philippines ?
The poorest of the poor are indigenous peoples, small-scale farmers who cultivate land
received through agrarian reform, landless workers, fishers, people in upland areas, and women in all categories.
Where are they?
Despite progress in reducing the overall level of poverty in the country, disparity among
regions is increasing and the poverty gap between urban and rural areas is widening. Since 1990, urban poverty has dropped
by 14 per cent while rural poverty has decreased by only 4 per cent. Among the regions that have seen
the largest increases in poverty are those in the southern island group, including the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao
and Region XII on Mindanao Island , and Bicol in the Visayas region. Rural people in Western Mindanao are among the poorest
in the country.
Why are rural people
poor in the Philippines ?
The causes of poverty in rural areas in the Philippines vary widely from island to island.
They include a decline in overall national growth, political instability and fiscal restrictions that have led to declining
public services. Microentrepreneurs face a policy bias that favours large firms and capital-intensive industries, and a lack
of relevant laws and administrative procedures. They lack access to investment and credit, to complete market information,
and to opportunities to develop skills. In Northern Mindanao , for example, most rural poor people have limited assets. Most
are landless, and some depend for their livelihood on work as tenant farmers or paid agricultural workers. For people living
in rural areas, the lack of social infrastructure and services makes the effects of poverty even more acute.
Much agriculture in the Philippines is carried out at subsistence level. Because of the
highly seasonal nature of agriculture, its vulnerability to price fluctuations and the generally low prices offered for raw
products, agriculture cannot by itself make a substantial difference in levels of unemployment, underemployment and poverty.
I
have been acutely aware of the relationship between poverty and hunger since my first trip here in 1982. As a statistical
programmer cum development economist on a USAID-funded project based at Cornell, I came to Manila to analyze data from a national
nutrition survey. The survey, conducted by the National Nutrition Council (NNC), provided the basis for targeting food
and nutrition services designed for mothers and children in the most impoverished parts of the archipelago.
Although
the work I did was both technologically primitive and abstract - tabulations painstakingly extracted from a Fujitsu computer
using an ancient Fortran compiler and hand-drawn maps with stick-pins and annotations showing malnutrition prevalence rates
- it was also a real eye-opener for me. While I had studied political and economic development at a theoretical level for
years, those endeavors had been intellectualized and idealistic. In the process of analyzing that real world nutrition data,
I came to appreciate the existential reality that underdevelopment and poverty are more than concepts in a book - they are
directly related to starvation, illness, and human degradation.
Thus,
I found it sad that when I returned here in 1998, the situation, while somewhat improved, was still not that good. When I
again analyzed data on a nutrition study, this time for UNICEF, the numbers were still appalling. Still just numbers spit
out by a computer, but still numbers reflecting real human suffering.
The
NNC, the same organization I worked with so long ago, recently developed a Philippine Nutrition Country Profile with
funding from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Findings showed that, just like 20 years
ago, the biggest problems are protein-energy malnutrition (PEM) and micronutrient deficiencies. Paralleling the general trend
in poverty statistics, there was a decline in the prevalence of malnutrition during mid-1990s, followed by gradual increases
beginning in 1998. There are now approximately 4 million (32%) preschool children who are underweight-for-age, 3 million (20%)
adolescents who are underweight-for-age, and 5 million (13.2%) adults who are chronically energy deficient. Vitamin A deficiency
is a serious problem, with 7% of pregnant women and 8% of infants under six months being severely deficient. Iron deficiency
anemia affects 57% of infants, 51% of pregnant women, and 46% of lactating women.
The
primary cause of malnutrition is the inequitable distribution of food, which is related of course to poverty. The typical
Filipino diet is grossly inadequate for energy and other nutrients, causing human bodies to compensate for inadequate energy
intake by utilizing protein as an energy source; the usual result is PEM. This situation is unlikely to improve as long as
an estimated 28 million Filipinos are unable to buy food to meet basic nutritional requirements.
Poverty
in the Philippines is most acute and widespread in rural areas. Although Manila certainly has its share of urban poor, the
National Capital Region has the lowest poverty incidence in the country. Nationwide, one can compare the 1997 poverty incidence
rates of 21.5% in urban areas to the 50.7% rate in rural areas. The rural poor tend to be self-employed, primarily in agriculture
or casual labor. They are almost all landless.
The
state of "landlessness" is, of course, nothing new. The Spanish bequeathed to the Americans a colony with an extreme concentration
of wealth and land, with the Spanish elites and religious orders controlling vast estates. The Americans themselves assumed
title to approximately two-thirds of all arable land in the Philippines .
The
American colonial administration saw land reform as crucial for political stability and economic development given the extreme
poverty and unequal land distribution. The Americans were not accustomed to the colonial role, and always had a difficult
time juggling their own democratic traditions with the realities of administering a colony halfway around the world. The dilemma
in this case was how to uphold property rights (meaning the commercial interests of large landholder) while creating a more
equitable system that would raise the standard of living of the large numbers of rural poor.
The
Americans, as they did in so many other areas, relied on their own idiosyncratic historical experience. They opted for public
land grants on the "homestead" model (i.e., the model used in settling Oklahoma and other areas of the American West), theoretically
empowering poor peasants to become independent small-scale farmers. This was institutionalized when the American Congress
passed the Public Land Act (1902), the Friar Lands Act (1903), and the Rice Share tenancy Act
(1933). Each of these laws provided for land entitlements and extended the possibility of landless tenants gaining title
to land.
However,
in practice, American colonial efforts at land reform strongly favored the landowners, the educated, and the wealthy. Procedures
such as land surveying, notice requirements, and excessive legal costs ensured that potential peasant benefactors did not
gain access to land. Indeed, landholders took advantage of bureaucratic and costly procedures to not only retain their holdings
but to significantly increase the size of their plantations.
Since
independence in 1946, the Philippines has had four land reform programs (under Presidents Magsaysay (1955), the first Macapagal
(1963), Marcos (1972), and Aquino (1987)). The latter, known as the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP), was
by far the most ambitious.
President
Aquino made CARP the centerpiece for her economic development policies, capitalizing on the fact that the EDSA Constitution
made owning land a constitutional right of Filipino farmers. However, implementation problems existed from the beginning,
exacerbated by corrupt and incompetent management. Among the problems with CARP have been:
- An
extended land valuation process
- Few
and excessively vague guidelines for landowner compensation
- Extended
landowner-tenant negotiations
- Lack
of bureaucratic coordination
- Inconsistent
implementation
Today,
CARP is still alive and kicking under the auspices of the Department of Agrarian Reform. Erap made a big deal out of
handing out land titles to peasants during photo ops, and President Arroyo is now doing the same. However, the bottom line
is that land reform has never been effectively implemented in the Philippines . In fact, a good case can be made that efforts
at land reform over the last 15 years have served only to perpetuate the cycle of rural unrest, poverty, and economic stagnation.
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MARK JOSEPH MEDINA AND MARIFEL MANALO
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