Catholic Church to hold poverty summit June 4-5

Catholic Church officials will hold a national poverty summit next week to find more effective ways of helping the poor. Father Edu Gariguez, executive secretary of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) National Secretariat for Social Action, Justice and Peace (NASSA), said the summit aims to determine the real causes of poverty. "If we look at the Philippine Development Plan, for example, it’s like only a few are going to benefit from it again ... All in all, it seems like there’s nothing new really," Gariguez said in an article posted on the CBCP news site. Gariguez said they expect some 300 participants from marginalized sectors to attend the summit along with Catholic bishops, priests and the religious. The summit will have representatives from the agriculture, agrarian reform, health, labor, education, and social welfare sectors, and non-government organizations. Gariguez said the gathering will also look into the country’s progress in the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) especially in education and poverty reduction. He said recommendations will be made on how to address such pressing issues to food insecurity, vulnerability to climate change and the impact of the global change. He said he hopes the event would gather the broadest inputs on the government’s programs and policy directions and the way by which poverty will be eradicated. “Let’s discontinue the lapses of the past administration. Current economic policies which do not really benefit the people should be improved," he said. - VVP, GMA News