Zamboanga City (Darwin Wee) Nearly half of the city's 600,000 residents live below the poverty threshold, a research study by a coalition of nongovernmental organizations showed on Wednesday during the launch of the project, Poverty scanning and mapping in Zamboanga City.
The Zamboanga City Partnership and Access Center, composed of Manila-based Peace and Equity Foundation, the Western Mindanao State University, and the Zamboanga Coalition of Development Nongovernmental Organizations, said 50.6% of the city population suffers from lack of basic needs, unemployment and inadequate income.
Carmen T. Ramos, Western Mindanao State University's director for the comprehensive outreach programs for barangays and research team leader, said the high poverty rate was attributed to the absence or lack of employment opportunities, inequality in the distribution of wealth and access to resources, peace and order situation, failure to gain access to credit, technological and market information and other services.
She said the poverty map will generate quantitative and qualitative data to "identify priority areas for poverty reduction interventions, sector-based programs and projects, and develop local-level multi-stakeholders partnership scheme to support delivery of sustainable program on poverty reduction in this city."
"Formulating a strategy to fight poverty requires understanding the problem, identifying its major causes and manifestations, and choosing the instruments and the targets of public interventions.
"Through this mapping we can easily identify what intervention we can assist and spot the priority areas in this city."
The poverty map indicated that in the past eight to 10 years, poorer families had less access to basic education, preventive health care, family planning services, and safe drinking water.
Among the city's 98 barangays, at least 33 were considered priority areas with inadequate sanitary toilet facilities, high malnutrition and infant death rate, and no access to safe drinking water and electricity.
Those without access to safe water get their supply from nearby rivers and streams, rain collectors and peddlers. Conditions in urban areas are better in this regard where households can be connected to a piped water system at less costn than it would to dispersed households in small rural communities.
With respect to dwellings, at least 14% of the total barangays lived in a housing unit made of light materials. In education, the participation rate of student in attending schools is 88% in the elementary level and 87% for the secondary level, indicating good performance.
However, the survival rate for elementary students is only 58% in the secondary level.
Arsenio Gonzalez, Regional Development Council board member, who served as reactor to the study, said the low survival rate of the students and most common reason for dropping out of school, was loss of interest and the high cost of education.
"Majority of girls in poor families who dropped out of school had to stay home for housekeeping. A large proportion of boys in both income groups were employed or looking for work. I wonder what kind of leaders we will have when their time comes, with this figures alone."
Mr. Gonzalez said policy makers may need to look at how new public investments can be channelled to interventions that will more effectively raise the participation rates of the poor, especially at the high school level.
"Formulating a strategy to fight poverty requires understanding the problem, identifying its major causes and manifestations, and choosing the instruments and the targets of public interventions.
"Through this mapping we can easily identify what intervention we can assist and spot the priority areas in this city."
Conditions in urban areas are better in this regard where households can be connected to a piped water system at less cost than it would to dispersed households in small rural communities.
With respect to dwellings, at least 14% of the total barangays lived in a housing unit made of light materials.
In education, the participation rate of student in attending schools is 88% in the elementary level and 87% for the secondary level, indicating good performance. However, the survival rate for elementary students is only 58% in the secondary level.
Since the most common reasons for dropping out of school are poverty-related, getting the children to stay in school involves much more than what the school system can provide.
The support of the community may be necessary to focus resources on families and areas where the probability of dropping out is highest. He also called for social development and good governance.
Mayor Celso Lobregat urged the different sectors, especially business, to be transparent in paying their taxes to augment revenues. "If we don't have enough revenues and funds, it will very difficult for us to finance and sustain poverty reduction projects."
Aside from data on health status and education, the poverty maps provided detailed information on the economicn indicators of family, awareness and use of family planning methods, housing, water and sanitation conditions of the families, availability of credit to finance the family business or enterprise, and other demographic and economic characteristics.
This was in recognition of the fact that the different dimensions of poverty may not be adequately captured by family income and expenditures data.
"In effect, policy makers and program implementers have better information to evaluate, sharpen the focus, and enhance the impact of antipoverty programs," Ms. Ramos said.
"Best of all, the new indicators of poverty and welfare can be used to mobilize action at different levels of governance, especially at the community level where appropriate and timely response can make the most impact on the living conditions of the poor," she added.
Ms. Ramos said while the primary responsibility for reducing poverty with the local government, civil society can be a strong ally in\n efforts to alleviate poverty.
"The present poverty assessment, therefore, comes at a very opportune time. The government is in the process of formulating its medium-term development plan with poverty reduction and improved income distribution as the main thrust.
"The strategy for poverty reduction in Zamboanga is consistent with the development objectives and priorities of the Philippine government as spelled out in its medium-term plan," she said.
Angel Calvo, president of the Zamboanga Coalition of Development Nongovernmental Organizations, said the poverty map was fully financed by the Peace and Equity Foundation.
This year, the foundation has allocated P10 million to provide funds for grants to fill basic needs in health, water and food as well as loans for livelihood projects. It will also fund capability-building activities for the institutional-strengthening of local civil society groups.
The foundation has been assisting over 30 priorities barangays in the city. Mr. Calvo said barangays can avail loans or grants for as much as P500,000, depending on the project proposal.
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