THE BASE OF THE PYRAMID

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By Ike Señeres 10/26/2010


THE BASE OF THE PYRAMID

So much has been written about the “base of the pyramid”; an economic theory that advocates the approach of providing priority assistance to the sector that is also known as the “poorest among the poor”. This is probably the same sector that Secretary Jose Eliseo Rocamora of the National Anti-Poverty Commission (NAPC) refers to as the “extremely poor”. What exactly is the opposite of this term? Is it “moderately poor”?

In their penchant for fancy words, the government has declared the “urban poor” as a sector, but did not bother however to clarify whether there is also a “rural poor” sector or not. Perhaps still in search of fancy words, the government has come up with the term “informal settlers”, apparently suggesting that the rich people are the “formal settlers”, whatever that means.

What is the difference between “extremely poor” and “moderately poor”? Is there really a difference between the “urban poor” and the “rural poor”? Words could really be confusing sometimes, especially if the definitions are coming from those who apparently do not have the real feel of what the problem really is.

In my own search for the meaning of words, I found out that the people who are now known as the “urban poor”, and are now considered as “informal settlers” are actually migrant workers from the provinces, being formerly farm workers where they come from.

The statement of Secretary Rocamora that the incidence of “extreme poverty” is not likely to rise anymore is reassuring, but it would have sounded better if he took the trouble to differentiate between “extremely poor” and “moderately poor”, so that we will be able to monitor any changes in the data, if ever.

The pyramid of poverty tells us that there are more people at the base who are “extremely poor”, compared to the lesser number of people at the top who are “moderately poor”. As he told us that the incidence of “extreme poverty” will no longer rise, Sec. Rocamora did not tell us whether the incidence of “moderate poverty” will rise or fall. This is important for us to know, because any rise or fall in the “moderate poverty” data will also affect the “extreme poverty” data.

Data is just data in the sense that words are just words. How I wish however that the government would be more honest and accurate in reporting the data about the true economic condition of the people, especially when it comes to their wellbeing.

I would agree too that the government should pay more attention to those who are “extremely poor”, but that should not be used as an excuse to pay lesser attention to those who are “moderately poor” either. Poor is poor in any language, but simply changing the language to refer to the poor does not do anything for them, if they still remain poor. Poor as they are, it does not help them to get poor treatment from the government either.

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FAILURE TO MEET POVERTY REDUCTION TARGET

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By Ike Señeres 10/19/2010


FAILURE TO MEET POVERTY REDUCTION TARGET

Secretary Jose Eliseo Rocamora of the National Anti-Poverty Commission (NAPC) recently admitted to the press that the Philippines is unlikely to reduce the incidence of extreme poverty by half before 2015 as targeted by the government, adding however that it is not likely to increase either. The frankness and honesty of Secretary Rocamora is commendable, but it does not excuse the government from being accountable, not even with the lame assurance that it is not likely to increase, a segue that sounds like a “consuelo de bobo”.

Mind you, Sec. Rocamora was not even talking about plain and simple poverty per se, but about extreme poverty. The distinction between plain and extreme poverty appears to be an invention of the United Nations that the Philippine government has not really defined for purposes of local usage, as a statistical measure that is.

As far as I know, the Philippine government measures only the statistic of household members who fall below the poverty line based on the number of households that could not afford to buy the imaginary basket of goods, an artificial measure that is used for statistical purposes. So far, the government does not isolate the data that would define how many percent of those who are below the poverty line are in the category of “extreme”.

Based on the usual and customary practice of statistical data gathering, all the data inputs must originate from local sources, getting these from below first, before these are elevated to the national level, for integration purposes. Again as far as I know, there is no data that is coming from below, leading me to speculate that the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA) is simply fabricating (meaning inventing) the data that it is submitting to the United Nations (UN).

As a charter member of the UN, and even as a regular member, the Philippines has the moral obligation to submit only the data that are accurate and truthful, but apparently, the government has broken this rule, an action that could practically be considered as a national crime.
As a responsible member of the UN (presumably we are), we should have made it our objective to meet the poverty reduction targets as we pledged, given the fact that we had fifteen long years to make good on it. Out of our own choice, we have been spending a huge portion of our national budget to make good on our foreign debts presumably to preserve our national honor, but as it turned out, that honor is tainted now, because of this double failure of not being able to make good on our pledge on one hand, and not submitting honest data on the other hand.

In fairness to the new government, it is not directly their fault that this sad situation has come to be. Be that as it may however, we are faced with the reality that the rest of the free world does not care who is in power and who is not, all they care is that a pledge is a promise that has to be met by our nation as a whole. As far as us local citizens are concerned, we are double victims, as we are put to shame by a national crime, and as we are short changed by a government that is supposed to be working for us.

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HERE COMES THE INDIES!

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By Ike Señeres 10/14/2010


HERE COMES THE INDIES!

Indie is a genre of rock music that emerged in the 1980’s. Nowadays, Indie is better known as a genre of cinematic films that are independently produced, as distinguished from those that are commercially produced by the big studios. The term has since evolved to refer to fashion items that are independently designed, as distinguished from those that are produced by the big designer names. If the trend will continue, the term Indie could eventually apply to any product that is independently produced.

There are many products that are coming from independent sources. Many of these sources are socially oriented, for instance the small and medium enterprises, the producer cooperatives and the livelihood associations, among others. Generally speaking, they do not have a problem with production, but almost always, their problem is in marketing, meaning that they always have a difficulty in selling what they produce.

Housing and livelihood are two public policy concerns that are seemingly not related to each other, but are actually directly connected in more ways than one. When I was with the Ministry of Human Settlements (MHS), I learned the lesson that housing beneficiaries need livelihood in order to earn the money to pay for their mortgage. I also learned that they needed marketing support, so that they could sustain their livelihood projects.

As far as I know, the government has not yet officially defined the meaning of “homelessness” in the parlance of governance. As it is generally used in other countries, “homeless” persons are those who do not have a place to stay, and that is the reason why they practically “live” in the streets. Here in the Philippines, we have come to recognize the existence of “street children”, but for some reason, we seemingly do not realize that these children have parents and other relatives who live in the streets too, thus making them “homeless” in effect.

The informal settlers who live in makeshift huts and other forms of shanties all over the country may have a “place to stay” so to speak, but their quarters could hardly be called “houses”, much less homes. A house is not necessarily a home as the saying goes, but more so if it is hardly a house, it would be very difficult to turn it into a home. Since their dwellings do not meet the standards of what a decent house should be, it would be more realistic for us to accept and recognize the fact that these settlers are in effect “homeless” in the proper context of the word.

Call me sentimental, but I consider as my “unfinished business” the objective of providing marketing support to the products coming from independent and socially oriented sources. I used to do this back when I was still with MHS, and I believe that I am in a better position now to pick up from where I left. Here comes the Indies!

I do not believe that I am directly in a position to do something about the problem of homelessness, but I know for a fact that with good marketing support, people could sustain their livelihood and would eventually be able to rent or buy a house once they have enough money.

Watch KA IKING LIVE! Saturdays 8 pm to 9 pm in Global News Network (GNN), Channel 21 in Destiny Cable. Email iseneres@yahoo.com or text +639293605140 for local cable listings. Visit www.senseneres.blogspot.com

ZERO POVERTY ZONES

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By Ike Señeres 10/06/2010


ZERO POVERTY ZONES

More than one hundred years after the birth of our Republic, we are still at the stage of trying to eradicate corruption. The new administration says that if there is no corruption, there is no poverty. This could be a chicken and egg situation, because it could also be said that if there is no poverty, there is no corruption. Both problems taken into consideration, a developing country like ours should go beyond the goal of merely eradicating corruption and poverty. Ambitious as it may sound, our more objective goal should be to achieve economic supremacy and national prosperity, both being mutually reinforcing.

In my previous column I discussed the concept of eradicating poverty at the micro level, in specific self-contained communities where targeted poverty eradication programs could be manageable, compared to bigger macro levels that are more difficult to achieve. At the core of the concept is the idea that if all of the households in a given community could have easier access to the imaginary basket of goods, it could be statistically documented and proven that poverty has indeed been effectively eradicated.

The communists have adopted the strategy of surrounding the cities from the countryside. An alternative to that approach is to eradicate poverty in small areas, until the poverty free zones will spread and eventually engulf the entire countryside and the cities too. Readers who are attuned to political theories will recognize this as an application of the principle of subsidiarity, and that is precisely what it is.

Following the criterion of being self-contained, it appears that ancestral domains and remote municipalities would be the best locations for piloting the subsidiarity principle. The reason for this is very simple. These places are more self-contained than the others, and presumably would be less prone to the influence of corruption coming from the outside.

In a meeting of the Corinthian Coffee Clutch (C3), my proposal to deploy volunteer consultants to selected local communities was already approved. Based on my experience in the Transfer of Knowledge thru Expatriate Nationals (TOKTEN) program, this deployment should follow the rule of deploying only to clients that are determined to be willing, able and ready (WAR). This is just an acronym, but indeed we are waging a war against corruption on one hand and against poverty on the other hand.

In my search for new technologies that could be used in remote locations, I came across the policy of the United States to enable more households to gain access to broadband connectivity. Over 200 million households already have broadband at home in the US, and they would like to add 100 million more households.

No data is available about broadband access at the household level in the Philippines, but it would probably be less than 50,000 households, the number recorded for the countries at the bottom of the list. Broadband access at home will eventually become an issue here in the Philippines, because of its potential in increasing household incomes, among other benefits.

Broadband connectivity is needed at the community level in order to deliver remote education and remote medicine, among other services. The good news is, it is within the reach of small communities to build their own broadband infrastructure, possibly as a service provided by their own local cooperatives.

Watch KA IKING LIVE! Saturdays 8 pm to 9 pm in Global News Network (GNN), Channel 21 in Destiny Cable. Email iseneres@yahoo.com or text +639293605140 for local cable listings. Visit www.senseneres.blogspot.com