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By Darwin G. Amojelar Reporter
The population will be increasing at the rate of
200 babies for every hour this year, making the Philippines the most
populated in Southeast Asia, the National Statistical Coordination
Board said Monday.
At present, Filipinos number around 84 million.
Romulo Virola, the board’s secretary-general, said
the population growth rate of the Philippines is above the Association
of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) average of 1.5 percent and is
higher than that of Thailand, Indonesia and Vietnam. The Philippines
is lower than that of the six other Asean countries, including
Singapore, which is promoting childbirth among couples. Brunei,
Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia and Myanmar are the other members of the
regional association.
Virola cited at least three reasons for the
country’s rising population: the poor’s lack of access to modern
family-planning methods, their need for more children to do household
chores or help in economic activities of the family, and their
reliance on guidance from the Catholic Church on such methods, which
the Vatican forbids.
In the latest 2000 population survey, the
population growth was 193 persons for every hour or three persons a
minute.
Available data from the 1990, 1995 and 2000
censuses show that the Philippine population grew annually by 2.32
percent between 1990 and 1995, 2.36 percent between 1995 and 2000, and
2.34 percent between 1990 and 2000.
Based on the 2000 census, population projections
put the country’s growth rate at 1.97 percent between 2006 and 2007,
and at 1.95 percent between 2007 and 2008. The midyear 2008 population
growth is projected at 90.45 million, or equivalent to a population
density of 266 per square kilometer and an average population size of
2,154 for every barangay or village.
On the average, Virola said, poor families are
larger than nonpoor families by more than one member. Specifically, he
added, 21 out of every 100 poor families had at least seven members in
2003, compared to only six among the nonpoor.
“Members of large families are less likely to
reach college. Indeed, this should be cause for concern for government
and civil society—less access to education among larger and poorer
families gives them very little options and makes it viciously
difficult for them to escape from poverty ever,” Virola said.
He said per capita expenditures on education,
medical needs and even recreation generally go down with increases in
family size. |
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