2007/08/19

Philippines 'off track' on MDGs

The Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ)

Ahead of the release late this month of the official report to the United Nations on how the country is faring in its implementation of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) midway to the 2015 deadline, civil-society organizations are already saying that the government is “off target” particularly in achieving the most crucial goals.

NGO leaders who gathered last week for a national consultation on the midterm review of the MDGs, say the government is off track in five of the eight goals: poverty and hunger reduction, achieving universal primary education, reducing child mortality, improving maternal health, and ensuring environmental sustainability.

The Millennium Declaration was signed in 2000 by 190 countries which committed themselves to reaching eight goals and 18 targets by 2015. The goals are: (1) eradicate extreme poverty and hunger, (2) achieve universal primary education, (3) promote gender equality, (4) reduce child mortality, (5) improve maternal health, (6) combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, (7) ensure environmental sustainability, and (8) develop a global partnership for development.

Despite the government’s assurance of progress toward meeting the MDGs, they say the prospects for reaching many of the goals are not good, pointing to the country’s performance for the past seven years. They also cite a study that shows the Philippines “falling further behind” compared to countries in Asia and the Pacific.

Social Watch Philippines even ranks the country as “very low” — at 77th among 161 countries — in its own Basic Capabilities Index, a way of looking at the poverty situation not based on income. The BCI uses three indicators — percentage of children reaching grade 5, under 5 mortality, and attended birth — to depict what Social Watch calls as a “more reliable” picture of the social security of the population, particularly with regard to health status and basic educational performance.

“Missing on these three BCI indicators renders government’s claims of MDG achievements insignificant,” says Isagani Serrano, Social Watch co-convenor.

Social Watch identifies education and health-related goals as the most threatened. In education, it notes that all key indicators — from the participation rate to cohort survival rate for both elementary and secondary education– are all going down. The country’s out-of-school rates are also now among the highest in Asia. Even the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) acknowledges the erratic trend in the cohort survival rate and the increase in the dropout rate.

Access to primary education is in fact far from universal, having declined from 96.8 percent in 2000 to 84.4 percent in 2006.

“The main reason why progress on the MDGs remains unsatisfactory is because the government is not fully committed to it,” says Professor Leonor Briones, Social Watch convenor, citing the financing gaps that has been an “intractable problem since the start of the MDGs.”

It was only last year that the Department of Budget and Management provided specific allocations to the MDGs in the national budget, adds Briones.

Social Watch’s assessment of where the Philippines really stands in terms of the MDGs directly challenges the government’s “excessive claims about growth and the resulting improvement in the quality of life of Filipinos.”

NEDA reports that the country is on track in reducing child mortality, as there has been a decline in the under-5 mortality rate (per 1,000 children) from 80 in 1990 to 32 in 2006, and from an infant mortality rate of 57 down to 24 during the same period. Social Watch however points out that infant mortality rates “remain inordinately high, compared with other countries in Asia.”

And while the government is on track in achieving Goal 6 (combating HIV and AIDS, malaria, and other diseases), NEDA reports that halting and reversing the incidence of HIV and AIDS is not quite evident.

Both NEDA and Social Watch agree that the country is lagging behind in improving maternal health (Goal 6). The maternal mortality ratio was 162 in 2006 and is not decreasing nearly fast enough to reach the 2015 target of 52. The slow decline in reducing maternal mortality ratio may be traced to inadequate access to reproductive health services, says NEDA. Only 50.6 percent of women had access to reproductive health care in 2006, a long way off from the 100-percent target in 2015.

But on Goal 7, Social Watch says environmental sustainability remains the least funded at less than one percent of the total budget. But despite this, the government seems to be faring well, as NEDA reports it is on track on providing better access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation facilities.

Addressing poverty and inequality

Doubts have also been cast on NEDA’s figures on Goal 1 where the government reports a high probability of attaining the targets on eradicating extreme poverty and hunger by 2015. But Social Watch says “poverty statistics are doubtful because of the underestimated poverty thresholds; lack of comparability and inconsistency of estimates because of changes in (survey) methodologies…and exclusion of families without official and permanent residence – the poor who live under bridges, road islands, and along the streets.”

Of government’s supposed “pro-poor” growth agenda, Dr. Maria Racelis of the Institute for Philippine Culture says, “(It) trusts that economic growth will trickle down to help the poor even though government policies in pursuit of growth have continued to marginalize them, particularly through forced displacements.”

Citing government’s current actions in threatening 390,000 families along the Pasig River and other waterways with ejection without relocation assistance, Racelis points out how these exemplify the insensitivity of the current system to the needs and rights of the poor.

Briones says the lack of leadership in achieving the MDGs has been shown clearly in the past state of the nation addresses, where the President has been harping on the “super” regions.

“The super-regions are already super,” bemoans Briones, “but there are many more regions that aren’t super. Since the poor are mostly in these ‘un-super’ regions, especially Mindanao, these regions need to be prioritized in order to address inequality.”

Briones explains that the NEDA statistics are blind to inequality: Makati, Quezon City and some other cities pull up the national averages a lot so that these figures fail to capture the reality of poverty in rural provinces.

The way forward, counsels Racelis, is through political reform and an end to traditional politics. “Good governance characterized by citizen participation, transparency and accountability will go a long way in achieving MDG goals.”

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