Bothered By the Continued Incidence of Hunger in the Country

The Social Weather Station (SWSS) has just released a survey revealing that one out of five families in Metro Manila have experienced hunger in the past 12 months.  That's pretty disturbing considering that it happens in probably the richest place in the Philippines, its capital, Metro Manila.  The data revealed that about 3.4 million families in Metro Manila encountered hunger in the past 12 months.  Well, the cost of living in Metro Manila is usually much higher compared to most other urban, and especially rural ares in the country. That's why families whose income ranges from 200 pesos (US$4.56) to 400 pesos (US$9.11) per day are the most at risk of encountering hunger.  And we are not even counting those families whose breadwinners are unemployed!

I guess the government's plan to enforce the Conditional Cash Provision for the poorest of the poor families will be a good idea, even though it goes against the 'teach them to fish' idea.  It's really just a palliative but something has to be done for the moment.  A more long-term solution has to be drawn out to minimize this incidence of hunger.  More jobs, better public education, family planning, bringing development to rural area are just among the issues that can lower this incidence of hunger.  It will take a well-planned program of the government to implement this.  It will take a lot of goodwill also from private persons to help the government battle this problem - and many NGOs and foundations are helping in their own little way.