Filipino family’s spending depends on their lifestyle: Palace

FILE: Grandparents and their Grandchildren share an afternoon outside their family run business sharing information on their social media devices (Photo: Wayne S. Grazio/Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

MANILA — Whether or not PHP10,481 was enough for a family of five to purchase their food and non-food necessities would really depend on their lifestyle, Malacañang said on Thursday.

This, after the Philippine Statistics Authority’s (PSA) estimate that for the first semester of 2018, a monthly amount of PHP10,481 was enough for a family of five to meet the basic needs was met with criticism.

“Depende siguro eh. Depende sa lifestyle nung kumakain (It depends. It depends on the lifestyle of those eating),” Panelo said in a Palace briefing.

“Kasi kapag tanungin mo iyon mahirap, sabihin niya, asin lang. Magdidildil kami ng asin, nakakakain na kami (Because if you ask the poor, they’ll say, they just have salt. As long as they have salt, we can eat),” he added.

Panelo, however, acknowledged that this should not be the case.

“Hindi nga, hindi okay siyempre iyon (That’s not okay, of course),” Panelo said.

Panelo pointed out that the PSA estimate was the result of studies.

“I’m sure pinag-aralan nila iyon, ‘di ba. I’m sure tinanong nila iyong mga respondents sa survey, tapos nakuha nila iyong average. (I’m sure they studied it. I’m sure they asked respondents in a survey and got the average),” Panelo said.

Panelo, meanwhile, refrained from saying whether he felt the PSA estimate was realistic.

“I will leave it to them kasi sila ang nag-conduct ng survey; sila ang nag-aral (they conducted the survey; they studied it),” Panelo said.

“Mahirap mag-guess, mag-speculate (It’s difficult to guess, to speculate),” he added.

Early this month, President Rodrigo R. Duterte has approved a proposal to draft an executive order (EO) creating a task force that seeks to eradicate hunger in the country by 2030.

The proposed task force will formulate a national food policy to fast-track the government’s campaign to fight hunger, consistent with the 2017-2022 Philippine Development Plan.