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Reference: Abueva, Jose et al. (1998). The Book on the Future: The Philippines Into the
21st Century. Quezon City, Philippines: University of the Philippines Press.
COMMENTS: According to CIA World Factbook 2010, the estimated urbanization rating
of the Philippines for the year 2005 to 2010 is about 65 in a scale of 100. This rating
ranked 33th, tied with that of New Caledonia and Algeria. The country also scored a
rating of 3.0, which placed us in the 24th slot with Sao Tome and Principe, Pakistan,
Malaysia and Mauritania. This rating is only for the year 2008.
According to CIA World Factbook, the estimate of the US Bureau of Census on
the Philippines' population by the year 2010 is almost 100,000,000. For the past 8
years, the country fared 12th on the world ranking. From the year 2004 to year 2010,
the mean percent change in population from last year is 2.41%. However, a decrease in
this rate can be seen starting from the year 2008.
The presence of female headship in the Philippines is more of an urban
phenomenon (Morada, H. et al.). Morada presented several findings regarding the
major differences between households headed by males or females (which can be
accessed through http://www.bles.dole.gov.ph).
COMMENTS: By the 1990s, Philippine nationalism had not fully penetrated two regions
of the country inhabited by national minorities: the Muslim parts of Mindanao and the
tribal highlands of northern Luzon (accessed from http://www.photius.com/countries/
philippines/government/philippines_government_regional_autonomy.html). Presently,
regions have been assigned to these places as Cordillera Administrative Region and
Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.
The problems surrounding indigenous peoples and access to land in the
Philippines ultimately derive from the following historical circumstance; since the early
Spanish colonial period, all forest lands have legally belonged to the state, and most
indigenous peoples have long inhabited the forest (accessed from Cultural Survival,
Inc.). Accordingly, the current emphasis on ancestral domains rather than ancestral
lands reminds us that more is at stake than simply the need of indigenous people to
make a current agricultural living. This was seen in the proposals of some Muslim
leaders on the so-called Bangsamoro State. The emphasis on ancestral domains
reflects recognition of and concern about the effects of armed conflict in the Philippines
on indigenous peoples, two of which are the New Peoples Army (NPA) and Moro-
Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
In spite of being the national language, only about 55 percent of Filipinos speak
the language (accessed from http://www.asianinfo.org). From the same source, the
Philippines is the third largest group of English speaking people in the world, after the
United States and the United Kingdom.
COMMENTS: Sustained, progressive development will likely result from (1) laws like
the “Science and Technology Act”, (2) creation of the Commission on Higher Education
(CHED), and (3) provision of funding for IT infrastructure in schools and colleges, plus
S&T faculty development (Abueva et al.).
Decelerating and stagnating development will happen under the following
conditions (according to The Book on the Future: The Philippines Into the 21st Century),
(1) investments, fund allocations and incentives are not improved, and (2) no policy
changes has been made regarding S&T.
According to Abueva et al. (1998) deterioration and decay is likely to happen if
(1) DOST is abolished, and (2) UP stops to offer undergraduate degrees, and focusing
on graduate programs. All these proposals have not been enacted up to this date.
COMMENTS: A proposal has been made for 25 years, starting from the year 1995 to
year 2020. This is the “National Plan for Health”, which has its own negative
expectations:
According to Abueva et al. (1998), in the first decade, deterioration in health
conditions will be felt by the country through high morbidity and mortality rates, and
other factors. Likewise, in the second decade, more newer health problems will be
added to the old ones. This was seen in the emergence of the SARS and A(H1N1)
virus. However, they said that in the third decade, rise in use of more modern medical
care technology will cause the influx of ethical, moral and legal health issues and
concerns. Also, this will escalate costs of health care, which in turn threatens the
accessibility and availability of health care to more people.
COMMENTS: In August 2001, Republic Act 9155, otherwise called the Governance of
Basic Education Act, was passed transforming the name of the Department of
Education, Culture and Sports (DECS) to the Department of Education (DepEd). The
goal of basic education is to provide the school age population and young adults with
skills, knowledge, and values to become caring, self-reliant, productive and patriotic
citizens (accessed from http://www.deped.gov.ph). This trifocalization of the educational
system in the Philippines, together with TESDA and CHED, helps in meeting the
demands for education of each sector. This also enhances competency as the control
over schools are decentralized; thus, allowing greater control over a smaller number of
institutions.
Abueva et al. (1998) saw that in the first decade, loss of human resources due to
export of labor will cause decelerating and stagnating development while increases in
quality education and accessibility will cause sustained, progressive development. In
the second decade, deceleration and stagnation will continue if education will be limited
to the elites and deterioration and decay is more likely to happen if educational services
will be continually privatized. In the third decade, trends will still be the same and
human resources will be staying at home.
COMMENTS: In the concluding words of Abueva et al. (1998) in the fourth chapter of
their book, these projections must be correlated with the economical and political
development of the nation as these three are interrelated concepts.
The line above is a strong projection about the trend that will happen in any
aspect of social, cultural, economical and political development of the Philippines. The
last line of this chapter read, “... Filipinos are resilient and things will eventually get
better.” I firmly believe in this statement as Filipinos has been hit by many crises, but
here they are, strong and firm to face the world's next challenges on their great race!