By Nickky Faustine P. de Guzman, Reporter
It’s part of our culture to tidy things up when a visitor is expected. When foreign leaders and delegates came to the country last November for the Asia- Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), the government put its best foot forward and tried to hide our blemishes from the world: walls covered the squatter areas that surround the airports and reports said some 20,000 homeless people were removed from the streets and hidden from sight. But it’s time to finally look at our own backyard because there are issues that high walls cannot conceal: hunger and poverty and the resulting malnutrition are hurting our economy.
While the World Bank calls us Asia’s tiger economy, the Philippines may not be reaching its fullest potential because a recent study says our economy is losing at least P328 billion a year because of the impact of malnutrition on our education and work force.
The report, called “Cost of Hunger: Philippines” spearheaded by Save the Children, suggests that the loss, which amounts to 2.84% of our gross domestic product, is made up of the following: P166.5 billion worth of lost income as a result of the low level of education of the working class who belong to the malnourished; P160-billion productivity lost due to premature deaths; and P1.23 billion in additional education costs because of grade level repetitions.
“If stunting rates continue to rise, it would be difficult for families to break free from poverty. It is the poor and neglected sectors of society that carry the burden of stunting,” said Ned Olney, Save the Children Philippines country director, at a press conference on Aug. 30.
Save the Children, which has been in the country since 1981, aims to promote the importance of reproductive health education and breastfeeding while training health and nutrition workers on caring for newborns and mothers.
The report has found alarming and “unprecedented” data: After more than 25 years of steady improvement, the prevalence of stunting among kids below five has increased to 33.4% in 2015 from 30.3% in 2013.
Despite our economic growth, Mr. Olney said that “the easiest answer is the increase of poverty rates” on why we experienced this sudden shift in 2013-2015 from the steady development of the past two decades.
“While others say it’s typhoon Haiyan (local name: Yolanda), but I don’t think there’s a single answer. The growth [in the stunting rate] is a combination of all factors. There is no single bullet to point [to],” he said.
According to studies, once a stunted child reaches the age of five, she would fail to develop her cognitive capacity and this cannot be recuperated.
The report found also found out that the Philippines is lagging behind other countries when it comes to investing in nutrition programs, with only .52% compared with the global average at 2.1%.
“Malnutrition is everybody’s business,” said Mr. Olney.
THE FACE OF FAMINE
According to the World Health Organization, 16,000 children under the age of five (or 5.9 million children in a year) die because of malnutrition. In the Philippines, reports said 2.7 million Filipino children are hungry because of poverty and 1.5 million go to bed without eating for the whole day.
Small, thin, and sickly, Chanel is one of these hungry children. At four years old, her flaky skin sports rashes and scabs which are manifestations of malnutrition. Chanel is one of Save the Children Philippines’ case studies. She has four other siblings, and her mother, Desiree, is the family’s sole provider. Her husband has been forced to stay at home because of asthma and its health complications. His medications add burden to the family.
They live in a small house in Navotas where the cement floor is wet and the hollow blocks that make up the walls of the place they call home are bare and crumbly. As a canteen food server, Desiree earns P700 in a week.
“Pinagkakasya ko ang P100 sa isang araw (I make P100 fit for each day),” she said in a video which is part of Save the Children’s campaign.
“Minsan hindi priority ang pagkain. Minsan, wala talaga, wala naman kaming magagawa (Sometimes food is not the priority. Sometimes, there really is nothing, and there is nothing we can do about it),” she said. If she has extra money, she buys noodles or crackers. Though she knows they are not healthy, she buys them anyway just so they can fill the family’s empty stomachs.
Chanel’s younger sibling at three years old is still unable to stand or walk by herself. She hardly talks, unless when she is crying.
According to Dr. Cecilia Acuin of the Food and Nutrition Research Institute (FNRI), 80% of the barangays in the country have at least one malnourished child. When compared to the barangays which are supposed to be infested with drug problems — about 27% — she said malnutrition should be given equal, if not more, attention.
Then there is the increasing number of teenage pregnancy, which also triggers the problem on malnutrition “because parents are not yet ready [to start a family] and they are often without a job,” added Dr. Ella Cecilia Naliponguit of the Department of Education (DepEd).
According to the United Nations Population Fund, the Philippines is the only country in Asia-Pacific region where the number of cases of teenage pregnancy has been increasing over the last 20 years. This coupled with the slow decline of our fertility rate may deprive our economy of our expected economic growth.
INVESTING AT FIRST 1,000 DAYS
There is the need to invest in a child’s first 1,000 days — from pregnancy until the child’s second birthday — in order to combat stunting.
Save the Children, DepEd, FNRI, and the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) are all calling for the support of the “First 1,000 Days” bill, which is being pushed for the 17th Congress.
Save the Children’s Mr. Olney said Filipinos are not inherently short, but their seeming shortness is caused by “generational poverty and stunting.” The rate of stunting (33.4%) in the country is due to inequality in access to nutritious food, hunger, and lack of nutrition in the first 1,000 days.
While the DepEd and DSWD have feeding programs, “they only cure short term hunger,” said the DepEd’s Ms. Naliponguit.
“If they are already stunted at five years old, it doesn’t matter if DepEd hires good teachers or builds better classrooms,” she said.
She added that the DepEd budget is mainly focused on infrastructure, but not on school feeding programs.
The DSWD, meanwhile, has continued its Pantawid Pamilya Pilipino program and has supplemental feeding program where hot meals are provided at day care centers. Again, the bill emphasizes that these are not enough if children go hungry in their first 1,000 days — by the time they have access to the feeding programs, it might be too late.
