A lawmaker on Sunday called on the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) and the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) to set performance targets for government agencies to address poverty in the country.
According to Deputy Majority Leader Michael Romero of 1-Pacman party-list, the country’s “poverty line” is still at P10,969 per month, which means 2 of 10 Filipinos are “ultra-poor.”
“I recommend to DILG Secretary Eduardo Año and DBM Secretary Benjamin Diokno the setting of performance targets on jobs creation, underemployment reduction, high-school graduation/completion, and fewer deaths of pregnant mothers, and improved child nutrition,” Romero said.
“Tie these targets to the Local Government Support Fund. That should be a good incentive for the governors, mayors and barangay chairmen to truly improve the lives of their constituents,” he added.
Poverty line, Romero said, is the minimum threshold government computed for a family of five to meet the very basic needs of food, shelter, housing, transportation, health and education.
In the Philippines he said the poverty- line threshold computed by the Philippine Statistics Authority is now at P10,969 per month ($200 per month).
Romero added that the computed national food threshold for a family of five is at P7,638 per month. This P7,638 per month is the minimum requirement for a family to be able to have three regular meals in a day.
To cross that poverty line, the lawmaker said the national government should create more jobs and bring down underemployment to below 10 percent, keep more young Filipinos in school and have more of them graduate from high school and from college.
“We must also focus on maternal health and child care. Emphasis and clear results on these three key areas alone would have transformational impact,” he said.
Romero said there are now more middle-class Filipinos because they were able to cross over the poverty line. “That line is the subject of much debate and furor. That line even has different names: poverty threshold, living wage, minimum wage, survival income and so on.”