Philippines | World Food Programme

The Philippines is an archipelago of over 7,600  islands. For three consecutive years, it has had the  highest disaster risk worldwide , due to its exposure and vulnerability to natural hazards compounded by low coping capacities.

Through sustained post-pandemic recovery efforts, the Philippines is on track towards achieving upper-middle-income status, remaining as one of the fastest-growing economies in Southeast Asia and the Pacific. Amid challenges in achieving Zero Hunger (Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2) and Partnerships for the Goals (SDG 17), the country has made moderate progress in 12 of the 17 SDGs.

The Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) saw notable improvements, underscored by a drop in the region’s poverty rate from 60 percent in 2018 to 32 percent in 2023. Within the country, the BARMM remains one of the regions with high poverty and malnutrition rates, due to recurrent natural hazards and conflict-related risks. Cultural norms add further constraints, particularly on women’s livelihood opportunities, with restricted access to basic social services.

The World Food Programme (WFP) has supported the Government in delivering emergency response to natural hazards and armed conflicts, while gradually shifting to capacity strengthening through technical support and augmentation of the disaster risk management capacities of government authorities.

Today, WFP supports the Government in achieving food and nutrition security, by strengthening disaster risk management, social protection, and food systems and capacities to enhance institutional and community resilience.

What the World Food Programme is doing in the Philippines

Disaster risk management: WFP supports the Government of the Philippines in preparing for and responding to shocks through technical assistance and capacity strengthening, innovative technology, and enhancing humanitarian supply chain management. WFP’s support involves designing and pre-positioning critical response assets and infrastructure, contributing to strengthening the capacity of disaster management professionals at national and local levels, and supporting policy and legislative development. In the event of a sudden-onset emergency, WFP maintains a capacity to provide food or cash assistance to communities as well as emergency logistics and telecommunications support to government responders.
Disaster Risk Financing and Anticipatory Action: WFP has been a leader in supporting the Government’s integration of anticipatory action (AA) into disaster management and social protection systems. This includes the formulation of a global first-of-its-kind “Declaration of State of Imminent Disaster Act,” which will allow the Government to harness domestic resources for AA. WFP is also advancing additional disaster risk financing mechanisms, building on AA initiatives and its partnership with the Government to respond to Typhoon Haiyan (2013) and a series of successive typhoons in 2024. We do this by quickly providing cash to vulnerable populations through social protection programmes. These efforts support a more predictable, shock-responsive social protection system and enhance the resilience of smallholder farmers.
Nutrition and cross-cutting priorities: WFP provides technical support to the Government in formulating or enhancing strategies to address malnutrition, such as active involvement in the Scaling Up Nutrition Movement and Government-led technical working groups. WFP supports the strengthening of national and local systems to design and more effectively implement social and behaviour change, by incorporating nutritional messages among other topics, and has been a lead partner in advocating for and scaling up the fortification of rice. All WFP actions are anchored on the principle of “leaving no one behind”.
Social protection: As the Government’s partner of choice in strengthening national systems, WFP contributes to enhancing social protection programmes to become more nutrition-sensitive and shock-responsive. In support of the Government’s commitments to the School Meals Coalition to deliver nutritious meals to all schoolchildren by 2030, WFP sources food locally from smallholder farmers and fortifies rice with iron to alleviate vitamin and mineral deficiencies. To address hunger and malnutrition, WFP assists the Government in piloting and expanding nationally the Walang Gutom (No Hunger) 2027 programme, to provide families facing severe food insecurity with electronic food vouchers coupled with social and behavioural change communications.
Climate change adaptation, social cohesion and integrated resilience: WFP works with the national and BARMM governments to strengthen the resilience of communities and food systems against shocks. This involves increasing agricultural productivity through sustainable, community-led livelihood projects, coupled with social and behaviour change strategies promoting healthy nutrition. Through technical support, WFP strengthens government capacities for disaster risk management and climate change adaptation, and contributes to effective policy formulation for resilience programmes. WFP links smallholder farmers to institutional markets (schools, hospitals and penitentiaries) to improve their income and people’s access to fresh, nutritious commodities. Nationally, WFP helped the Government to model and scale up a national flagship programme focused on ensuring access to water to support rural livelihoods. In BARMM, WFP has been supporting efforts to ensure peace dividends and social cohesion.

Publications

In focus

Indigenous Peoples' Day: local knowledge and young people are driving change

Story | 9 August 2023

Philippines: How farm-to-school meals are bringing children back to class post COVID-19

Story | 2 February 2023

Road to COP27: Lessons from Rai - the Philippines one year on

Story | 17 October 2022

Typhoon Rai: WFP steps up efforts to support families affected by Typhoon Rai

Story | 21 January 2021

Philippines: WFP joins collective response to Typhoon Goni

Story | 4 November 2020

Partners and donors

Achieving Zero Hunger is the work of many. Our work in the Philippines is made possible by the support and collaboration of our partners and donors, including:

Asian Development Bank OPEC Fund USAID-BHA Australia-DFAT Japan

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Operations in Philippines

Philippines country strategic plan (2024–2028)

PH03 - Country Strategic Plan (CSP)

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Contacts

Office

11/F South Tower Rockwell Business Center Sheridan Corner Sheridan and United Streets, Mandaluyong City, Philippines
1554
Philippines

Phone

+63 2 8833 6229

Fax

+63 2 8823 1485

Email

wfp.philippines@wfp.org

For media inquiries

philippines.communications@wfp.org

Walang Gutom (No Hunger)

Project Lawa

What the World Food Programme is doing in the Philippines

Disaster risk management

Disaster Risk Financing and Anticipatory Action

Nutrition and cross-cutting priorities

Social protection

Climate change adaptation, social cohesion and integrated resilience

Publications

Annual Country Reports - Philippines

Fill the Nutrient Gap - Asia and the Pacific

2024 Typhoon Season: WFP Philippines Response Report

WFP in Asia and the Pacific: 2024 Year in Review

Strengthening the linkages between social registries and climate risk data in Asia and the Pacific

2024 - WFP’s Support to Strengthening Social Protection Systems Around the Globe