Rice price cap drives poverty drop

Food poverty in the country fell sharply in the fourth quarter of last year, with the Department of Agriculture (DA) pointing to the expanded P20-per-kilo rice program and higher farm infrastructure spending as key to sustaining the gains.

Agriculture Secretary Francisco P. Tiu Laurel Jr. said in a statement on Wednesday that the government plans to scale up the P20 rice program to reach 15 million households, or around 60 million Filipinos, this year, and to keep it in place through 2028.

“These results show that our programs are reaching Filipino families. We will continue to ensure consumers have access to affordable food with stable prices, while helping farmers, fisherfolk, and other food producers earn more,” Tiu Laurel said.

He added that Congress and Malacañang have approved a higher budget for farm and related infrastructure, including farm-to-market roads, cold storage facilities, food hubs, deepwater ports, rice dryers, warehouses, and greenhouses to boost production, cut post-harvest losses, lower food costs, and increase rural incomes.

The latest OCTA Research Tugon ng Masa Survey showed self-rated food poverty dropping by 19 percentage points, from 49 percent in the third quarter to 30 percent in the fourth quarter of 2025.

This translates to about five million families who no longer consider themselves food-poor, one of the fastest improvements in the survey series.

Self-rated overall poverty also fell sharply, dropping 17 percentage points from 54 percent to 37 percent quarter-on-quarter, or around 4.5 million families no longer identifying as poor—the largest single-quarter decline recorded.

Self-rated hunger rose from 11 percent to 16 percent, but OCTA noted that nearly 80 percent of affected households experienced hunger only once or a few times, suggesting short-term or episodic food stress rather than chronic hunger.