Poverty Poverty and inequality have been recurrent challenges in the Philippines and have again come to the fore in the wake of the current global financial crisis and rising food, fuel , and commodity prices experienced since 2008 . The proportion of households living below the official poverty line has declined very slowly and unevenly in the past four decades, and poverty reduction has been much slower than in neighboring countries such as the People's Republic of China (PRC), Indonesia, Thailand, and Viet Nam. The growth of the economy has been characterized by boom and bust cycles and current episodes of moderate economic expansion have had limited impact on poverty reduction. Other reasons for the relatively moderate poverty decline include the high rate of inequality across income brackets, regions, and sectors: and unmanaged and high population growth rates; and perennial occurrences ofdisasters and longstanding conflicts in variousregions . especially in Mindanao The difficulties of the Philippines to transition to a higher and sustained level of growth have been explained to be due to a sustained decline in domestic investments, weaknesses in institutions and social infrastructure, institutional uncertainty, and a history and culture that have impeded growth. However, it is also possible that poverty itself is constraining economic expansion. The channels through which poverty may impact on economic growth include investment capacity constraints specifically lack of access to credit aggravated by the underdevelopment of the financial markets; human capital constraints specifically lack of education , health care , and nutrition ;regular doses of risks and shocks, causing poverty traps: and conflicts and disorder resulting from inequality, which hamper investments and destroy social capital. After years of recognizing poverty as a key development problem and devising various strategies and programs for its reduction, the government is still confronting high levels of poverty and hunger among its citizens. Long and persistent periods of high poverty