Nearly a third of rural WV families earn too little

By Joseph Bernard A. Marzan

About three in 10 rural households in Western Visayas earn less than half of the national median annual per capita income — more than double the national rate — according to the first wave of a 20-year study that researchers say exposes deep and persistent economic vulnerability in the countryside.

The Philippine Socioeconomic Panel Survey (PSPS) found that 30.1 percent of rural households in the region fell below half the national median, compared with 13.1 percent nationally.

The threshold — half the national median per capita income — is a relative measure of low income, distinct from the Philippines’ official poverty line, which is based on the cost of basic food and non-food needs.

Researchers reported the findings during the survey’s Wave 1 data launch on June 2 at the University of the Philippines Visayas in Iloilo City.

The survey tracks more than 15,000 rural households across nearly 500 barangays in Aklan, Antique, Capiz, Iloilo, and Negros Occidental, and is designed to revisit the same households every four years over two decades.

Fieldwork ran from December 2023 to January 2025, and more than 99 percent of the households approached agreed to take part — a response rate the researchers attributed to repeated visits and sustained efforts to reach remote communities.

Researchers said the panel design sets the PSPS apart from one-time household surveys, which capture only a single snapshot.

By returning to the same families, the study aims to show how livelihoods change, how households absorb economic and environmental shocks, and how government programs affect well-being over time.

It is also built to host future randomized program evaluations at far lower cost, because the baseline data already exist.

The survey is a collaboration among Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) Philippines, which led data collection and project management; the Global Poverty Research Lab at Northwestern University, the academic lead and principal funder; the University of the Philippines School of Economics; and the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS).

National agencies, including the departments of education, social welfare, health, and labor, were consulted during the survey’s design.

Agriculture remains central to rural livelihoods, with more than 80 percent of households operating at least one agricultural enterprise.

Animal raising was the most common, practiced by 35 percent of households on its own and by another 30 percent in combination with farming, while less than 10 percent engaged in fishing or forestry.

On health, about 80 percent of eligible women reported experience with modern contraceptive methods.

Women from households enrolled in the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps), the government’s conditional cash transfer program for low-income families, were more likely than nonbeneficiaries to report modern contraceptive use in every province, with the widest gap — more than 10 percentage points — in rural Antique.

Access to safe drinking water and sanitation remained uneven.

While flush toilets were used by 87.4 percent of rural households and purchased water was the most common drinking source at 38 percent, about one in four households still drew drinking water from untreated surface sources.

That share was highest in Negros Occidental at 60.7 percent and in Antique at 33.7 percent.

Education indicators showed strong participation at the elementary level that thinned as students advanced.

Elementary enrollment reached 93 percent but slipped to 88 percent in junior high school and 74 percent in senior high school, the survey reported, with girls enrolling at higher rates than boys, particularly in kindergarten.

The survey also measured exposure to disasters.

One in 10 households reported a recent natural disaster, with typhoons the most common and Antique the hardest hit.

Flooding ranked second and struck rural Capiz especially hard.

A majority of affected households were in barangays that received some government disaster assistance, although coverage varied by province and disaster type.

The study was developed to generate publicly available data for evidence-based policymaking, researchers said.

“It enables us to understand how livelihoods evolve, how people respond to shocks, and how interventions influence outcomes over time,” said Rene Marlon Panti, IPA Philippines senior research manager.

In a message read by Alice Joan Ferrer, UP Visayas vice chancellor for academic affairs, Chancellor Clement Camposano said the dataset would sharpen policymaking across sectors.

“The insights generated from this rich data set will strengthen our understanding of key issues in education, agriculture, health, climate, migration, employment, and household well-being, enabling us to craft more responsive and effective policies,” he said.

Dean Karlan, a Northwestern University economics and finance professor and the founder of IPA, stressed the value of evidence in choosing which programs to scale.

“We don’t want to just take the thing that we want to work the most; we want to take the thing that actually works the most and roll that out,” Karlan said.

IPA Philippines Country Director Aftab Opel thanked institutional partners and the thousands of participating households.

“This work exists because of your trust and generosity,” Opel said, expressing hope that the dataset would become “a living resource for better decision-making over time.”

At a panel discussion, provincial officials from Aklan, Antique, and Capiz said the lack of reliable, localized data has long hampered development planning, describing how flooding, health gaps, and poverty-reduction efforts are difficult to evaluate without long-term evidence.

PIDS President Philip Arnold Tuaño framed the survey as a sustained investment rather than a finished product.

“Today’s launch should not be viewed as the culmination of a project, but rather the beginning of a long-term collaborative effort to better understand the realities faced by Filipino households and communities,” Tuaño said.

With follow-up rounds scheduled every four years over the next two decades, researchers said the PSPS is expected to become a key source of evidence on how Filipino households move into and out of poverty, and which interventions most improve long-term well-being.

The deidentified dataset is available through Innovations for Poverty Action after a short registration survey, and a recording of the June 2 launch may be viewed online.