88.5-M Filipinos and still growing…
May 8, 2008
Written by News Team, in Articles/Stories
President Gloria Arroyo released the official population number on April 16.
“The result of the 2007 Census of Population shows an annual growth rate
of 2.04 percent from 2000 to 2007,” Augusto Santos, acting director
general of the National Economic and Development Authority, told reporters.
He said the annual population increase for the past seven years was
slightly higher than the government’s target of 1.95 percent up to 2010.
“In a sense, it was close to the target and lower than the previous
decades,” Santos added.
The National Statistics Office conducted the census from August to
September 2007, with August 1 as the reference period.
Santos said the Philippines’ population expanded from 1960 to 1970 at an
annual rate of 3.01 percent. This slowed to 2.75 percent for the decade
from 1970 to 1980, and further to 2.34 percent from 1990 to 2000.
Despite the increasing number of Filipinos, Santos said the government
has no plans of changing its population policy.
President Arroyo has resisted use of contraceptives and other forms of
family planning other than natural methods, a move applauded by the Roman
Catholic Church but criticized by those who blame overpopulation for
rampant poverty in the Philippines and recently for the food shortage.
The Philippines is predominantly Catholic.
The Philippine population growth rate was much higher compared to
Malaysia with an average 2.1-percent growth rate from 2001 to 2006;
Vietnam, 1.4 percent from 2001 to 2006; Indonesia, 1.3 percent; and
Thailand, 0.8 percent.
Former health secretary Alberto Romualdez chided the government April 19 for cheering the “low” population growth rate, saying the Philippine population would still grow to 100 million in five years, unless curbed.
“The population growth rate of 2.04 percent is not good news. That means
that we’re going at 2 million persons a year. That is part of double
whammy with respect to food,” Romualdez said at the Sulo Hotel forum.
“We have more mouths to feed, and food is costing more,” he added.
At the current rate, the 88.57 million population in 2007 would balloon
to 100 million in five years, the former secretary said.
The National Statistics Office put the country’s 2007 population at
88.57 million with a record-low population growth rate of 2.04 percent.
Romualdez, who handled the top post of the health department during the
short-lived Estrada administration, said the ideal growth rate would be
1 or 1.5 percent a year.
“If we are able to achieve that, then government can honestly claim that
it has done something to address the problem for the good of our
country,” he said.
He believed that the 2.04 percent growth rate was “natural,” and not an
offshoot of the government’s family planning program.
The former secretary, now vice president of the Forum for Family
Planning and Development, said the “worst part” of the population
growth was that poor women were bearing more children than the rich.
“If you look at the figures of fertility rate, the women in the top 20
percent are bearing two children in their reproductive lifetime. That
means, they are at zero growth rate,” he said.
In contrast, women in the bottom 20 percent, have been bearing and
growing six to seven children, he added, saying “These are the people
who can’t pay for the increasing costs.”
“Increase in food costs results in hunger, less healthy children,
uneducated children,” he added.
To arrest this situation, Romualdez proposed that the government put up
a “strong, balanced family program” that would increase the
“contraceptive prevalence rate” to 70 percent, among others.
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