OVCRD
19 February 2003
2:00 p.m.

Abstract

Food as an imperative for survival is a reality in the lives of people. Access to food, however, is not something everyone enjoys without a struggle. Amidst threats to food security, households in the Philippines are surviving through the coping strategies that they employ. This study is about how low income households in Barangay Ambulong, Tanauan City are responding to threats to their ability to be food secure. Many lessons can be learned from their experiences.

This study aimed to describe the coping strategies employed by low-income households in an urban community. Specifically, it aimed to (a) describe how low-income households in an urban community perceive their current state of food security or insecurity, (b) identify local indicators of food security or insecurity, and, (c) identify strategies employed by households with employed and unemployed wives to sustain food security and describe gender relations therein. The study is relevant and timely, especially at the present when the country is reeling from economic downturns. This study will contribute to the development of timely and socially relevant intervention programs. However, because of the limited number of respondent-households covered, caution is advised in the wider application of the conclusions and recommendations.

Norge W. Jerome, Gretel H. Pelto and Randy F. Kandell's Ecological Model on Nutritional Anthropology was used in the study. At the core of the model are the biological needs such as eating which is satisfied through the diet. The diet or the act of eating itself is determined by a host of factors in the environment external to the individual which include the physical environment, social environment, social organization, culture idea systems and technology. The factors in the external environment provide the range of options available to an individual to satisfy his biological needs such as eating. Inherent in the model is the notion of adaptation to stress.

The analytical framework of the study was adapted from Jerome et al.'s ecological model. The analytical framework looked at the microenvironment of the household and the macro environment external to the household. The independent variables included the external environment of the household as well as aspects of the internal environment of the household that included household characteristics and perceptions of whether they were food secure or food insecure. All these were seen to affect the dependent variables that included the coping strategies, food intake and nutritional status of preschoolers. If perceived to be food insecure, the household will employ coping strategies that may be economic, social and nutritional in nature. Ultimately, household food security was measured in terms of food intake and nutritional status of vulnerable groups, particularly in this study, the 0 - 5-year-old children. Food intake and nutritional status in turn influence the household's perception of its state of food security and its decision to resort or not to resort to coping strategies.

Data were collected for a one-year period to cover the annual food cycle. Respondent-households were visited throughout the one-year data collection period. Two rounds of interviews were done, once during the abundant food season (December to May) and another during the lean food season (June to November). Initially, 56 purposively sampled households participated in the study. Twenty-eight had employed wives and another twenty-eight households had unemployed wives. During the second round of data collection, however, only fifty-three of the original fifty-six households remained. Data collected included household socio-demographic profile, income and expenditures, coping strategies, perceptions of current state of food security or insecurity, morbidity, twenty-four hour diet recall, and, height, weight and mid-upper arm circumference of 0 - 5 year old children.

Methods of data collection used were the semi-structured interview with the wife and/or the husband as the interviewee, forced scale, anthropometry of 0 - 5 year old children, life history, focus group discussion among barangay health workers, twenty-four hour diet recall, observations, and, lastly, secondary data from the city and barangay profiles and development plan reports. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics like means and percentages. Diet diversity scores were computed for all households during the lean and abundant seasons. The Chi-Square was computed to determine correlation between some variables, particularly, employment status of the wife and anthropometric measurements of the children.

Tanauan City is located on the northwestern part of Batangas province covering 10,716 hectares of land mostly devoted to agriculture. Part of Taal Lake could be found in the city. The latest national census done in the year 2000 showed that the population of Tanauan City was 117,539 and the average household size is 5.36. A large percentage of the people of Tanauan City were able to finish only the elementary level of education.

Barangay Ambulong is located 11 kilometers northeast of the city proper of Tanauan. It has a total land area of 211 hectares and a population of 7,807 as of 1999. Like the city in general, Ambulong is also mostly agricultural. Residents of Barangay Ambulong were fishers, farmers or daily wage earners. Some were professionals and others were unemployed.

The sample households that participated in the study had husbands and wives in the 21-30 age range. The average household size was 4.6. Nuclear residences were normally formed after marriage. Nevertheless, these independent households were formed just next to relatives and kin. Thus, though households were residentially nuclear, in effect, these were functionally extended. The highest level of education reached by majority of the husbands and wives in the study were only the secondary level.

Majority of the employed husbands and wives covered by the study were engaged in unskilled labor. Only the wives were engaged in some saydlayn. Average annual per capita income of all households was PhP 15,525.74. Average monthly expenditures on food were greater than expenditure on non-food items.

Anthropometric survey among the 0-5 year old children showed that although the nutritional status of the majority of the children was normal, it is still alarming to know that a third of the children and that more boys than girls had below normal nutritional status. There was no significant correlation between maternal employment and nutritional status. The diet diversity scores showed that there was only a slight difference between food consumption during the abundant and the lean seasons. However, the diet of households with employed wives was more varied compared with the diet of the households with unemployed wives.

The sample households acknowledged the marked differences between the lean and the abundant seasons. The lean season coincided with the rainy months that started in June, peaked in August, and ended in November. The peak of the lean month was locally referred to with the term inaagosto. The abundant month started and peaked in December and ended in May. This coincided with the dry months. The lean season brought about difficulties in the people's efforts to earn a living; hence, living was more difficult during these months. The study named economic, nutritional and health local indicators of food security.

Coping strategies named by the respondents were economic strategies, namely, (a) seeking employment, (b) proper budgeting and economizing, (c) saving, (d) having a saydlayn, and, (e) job diversification. Social strategies were (a) securing loans, (b) children asking food from relatives, and, (c) sending children to live temporarily with relatives. Nutritional strategies included (a) consumption of famine foods, (b) adjustments in intra-household food distribution, (c) buying cheaper food alternatives, (d) eating leftover food, (e) skipping meals, and, (f) cooking only one viand each meal. Coping was seen to be gendered with the women being chiefly concerned with the coping strategies to make ends meet. Some of the coping strategies were referred to in the study as "functional deviations" because these did not conform with the community's ideal behavior but nonetheless, helped households in their struggle for survival. The sense of family obligations also proved to be a strong safety net in the community during the lean months.

Gender relations within the context of the coping strategies were discussed in terms of the relationship of the househusband with his wife and the relationship of the employed wife and her employed husband. Case studies of two househusbands and two employed wives were presented. It was observed that while the multiple burden phenomenon was present in the households wherein both the couple were employed this was not experienced in the households of the employed wives with househusbands. Some resistance to the role reversal was noted among the househusbands.

The study presented recommendations for policy formulation and development work. Recommendations pertaining to the economic strategies included the enhancement of human capital, provision of micro-credit facilities, enhancing the social value of manual labor, freedom from child labor, social support for the househusbands, and relieving the multiple burden of the women. Recommendations with implications on the social strategies focused on the development of social capital. Finally, those with reference to the nutritional strategies were priority feeding of the nutritionally vulnerable groups, enhancing the cultural acceptability of famine foods, provision of more gender sensitive nutrition education classes and access to timely nutrition, health and economic programs.