Residents of Bgy. 105 in Tondo, Manila redeem food items from the Kadiwa Market set up by the Department of Agriculture in line with the Walang Gutom 2027: Food Stamp Program on May 28, 2024. The Department of Social Welfare and Development, supported by the World Food Program and the Asian Development Bank, distributed food stamps worth P3,000 to each family, which were then used to buy different items in the market. The government aims to reach around 1 million of the poorest Filipinos in the hunger alleviation program. Jonathan Cellona, ABS-CBN News

MANILA -- More Filipino families experienced involuntary hunger at least once in the third quarter of 2024, a recent national survey by the Social Weather Stations showed.

In its national Social Weather Survey, conducted from September 14 to 23, the research firm found that 22.9 percent of Filipino families experienced involuntary hunger, or being hungry and not having anything to eat, at least once in the past three months.

The September 2024 hunger figure was 5.3 points above the 17.6 percent in June 2024 and is the highest since the record-high 30.7 percent in September 2020, during the COVID-19 lockdowns.

The survey also showed the experience of hunger was highest in Mindanao at 30.7 percent of families, followed by 26 percent in Visayas. Hunger in Metro Manila was at 21.7 percent, and 18.1 percent in balance Luzon.

Compared to June 2024, the experience of hunger in Mindanao almost doubled from 15.7 percent to 30.7 percent. There was also a sharp increase in Visayas, from 13.7 percent in June 2024 to 26 percent in September.

According to SWS, the 22.9 percent hunger rate is the sum of the 16.8 percent who experienced "moderate hunger", and 6.1 percent who experienced "severe hunger".

Moderate hunger refers to those who experienced hunger "only once" or "a few times" in the last three months, while severe hunger refers to those who experienced it "often" or "always" within the same time frame.

The September 2024 survey likewise found 59 percent of Filipino families rating themselves as "mahirap" or poor.

More Filipinos see themselves as poor: SWS survey

On self-rated food poverty, based on the type of food eaten by their families, 46 percent of Filipinos rated their families as food-poor in September 2024. 

The rate of total hunger, or the sum of moderate and severe hunger, also rose sharply among the self-rated poor from 21.3 percent in June 2024 to 29.3 percent in September 2024.

The Third Quarter 2024 Social Weather Survey was conducted using face-to-face interviews of 1,500 adults nationwide, with 600 from Balance Luzon, and 300 each from Metro Manila, Visayas and Mindanao.

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