CPD: Lower fertility can also mean better workforce

MANILA, Philippines — The Commission on Population and Development (CPD) on Thursday said the country’s declining fertility rate could help make the population “more manageable” and presents an “opportunity” for the government to create a better quality workforce.

Speaking on the sidelines of a forum in Mandaluyong City, CPD Deputy Executive Director Lolito Tacardon said the declining fertility rate would affect the country’s labor force because of a decrease in human resources.

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However, he noted that the issue does not necessarily present a problem since it could be an “opportunity” for the government to improve the quality of the country’s workforce.

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‘Window of opportunity’

“The opportunity that we’re looking at is if the population is more manageable, the government can invest more on education, invest more on health, invest more on skills development so you would have a more quality human resource,” Tacardon told reporters in an ambush interview.

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“So, if you are able to make those quality human resource find work, they would have a higher productivity as compared to if you have a lot of human resource but they are not employed, because they don’t have the quality health, education and skills,” he added.

Citing the results of the latest National Demographic and Health Survey, the CPD noted in an earlier statement that the fertility rate in the country has gone down to 1.7 children per woman in 2025 from 1.9 in 2022, and has been continuously declining since 1993.

It pointed out that 57 percent of Filipino women no longer wish to have children, with the use of contraceptives among married women also rising to 58.6 percent in 2025 from 42 percent in 2022. /cb

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