Image Source: Philaid.org
Philippines’ greatest challenge up till now is to battle its burgeoning poverty rate. Though the country seems to be doing moderately well in the economic sector, its poverty rates are alarming and are a source of immediate concern. According to Rural Poverty Portal, indigenous people concentrated in areas of highly fragile and vulnerable ecosystems constitute the poorest of the poorest in the whole of the Philippines. These people depend on subsistence farming and fishing as a source of income. One of the reasons cited for them being a lot poorer than the poor in the urban areas is the employment of unsustainable practices, which have led to depleting fishing waters and deforestation. Source: Ruralpovertyportal.org
When the country’s people are not experiencing good living conditions, it is difficult for the government to allocate sufficient resources to other sectors of the country’s development as their first priority is usually to take care of the people’s wellbeing. As such, the Philippines government may be more focused on trying to alleviate poverty from the lives of the Filipinos and thus may not prioritize environmental conservation as much as they prioritize their people’s wellbeing. This could be a reason why insuffiicient resources are allocated to addressing the problem of the loss of biodiversity in the Philippines, as will elaborated more under the page ‘Scarce financial resources’ on this blog.