Manila: As rural Filipinos become increasingly impoverished, a lawmaker has called for more equitable development so that people in far-flung areas would benefit from improvements in the economy.

“Government spending has been largely focused in urban areas despite the fact that extreme poverty occurs in less developed provinces. Government should spend more to develop our rural areas to unlock their potential in contributing to the national economy,” Senator Sonny Angara said Wednesday.

Angara, chair of the Senate ways and means committee pointed to a recent study by the government think-tank, the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS), which showed that “poverty in the country is largely a rural phenomenon” with three out of four children from poor families living in rural areas.

The PIDs study, entitled Child Poverty in the Philippines, said there were already about 13.4 million Filipino children living in poverty in 2009.

Dr Celia Reyes, PIDS senior research fellow and lead author of the study, said the number “represents 36 per cent or more than one-third of all Filipino children aged below 18.”

Being poor, they suffer from deprivation of food, shelter, health, and education,” she said.

According to the study, the disparity would not have been so severe had the government been more aware of the specific needs of provinces.

Angara for his part said rural areas needed to catch up with urban areas. “We should boost their tourism drive by providing infrastructure and job generation projects. If we help our poor provinces rise from poverty, it would definitely result in a growing and lasting impact on the economic growth of the entire country,” the senator said.

Increasing poverty

The PIDS, utilising data collected from national surveys and administrative records of various government agencies, also said both the number and severity of poverty among Filipino children have been increasing through the years.

“Around 10 million of these children face at least two overlapping types of severe deprivation in basic amenities while an estimated .75 million (750,000) face at least five kinds of deprivation simultaneously,” the study said.

It added that around four million Filipino children who did not have access to sanitary toilet facilities while four million did not have access to safe water. Another 260,000 kids did not have decent shelter.

“There were 1.4 million children living in informal colonies, 6.5 million did not have access to electricity in their homes, and 3.4 million did not have means to access information,” according to Reyess.

The study also identified the Zamboanga Peninsula, Eastern Visayas, and the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) as the regions where the condition of children is dismal in many aspects and therefore should be prioritised for interventions.