ECONOMIC, POLITICAL AND CULTURAL IMPACT UNDER RURAL TO URBAN

MIGRATION

INTRODUCTION

This faster growing economy lead by globalization creates a widespread of information engaging

countries all over the world to create an industrialized society. It is a kind of society supporting a

large population with a great economic development, which is one of the factors for us to be able

to keep up in in this globalized world. This idea is very much similar about rural and urban

aspects of population creating distinction within the developmental patterns of a specified areas.

The relationship between urban and rural areas is changing the country in many aspects, it is no

longer mutually exclusive but rather exist on a continuum of community types that are

increasingly interconnected. The territorial organization of the Philippines (McMillan 1952) is

divided in to four categories, the largest one is the “Province” which is administered by the

government that is composed by “Municipalities” and large “Cities” that is both governed by

mayors and lastly, the “Barangay” which is the smallest division of territory in the country that is

led by local captain. These are just some of the similarities of both urban and rural areas in terms

of territorial aspects. Every divisions of the country have its own legislative body that

administered and governed the community inside it. In this world run by globalization, for us to

be engage and get along with the idea, there must be an existence of the process of

industrialization or urbanization presiding in the country to keep up with globalized economy.

That is why at some part of the country, we can see the development in numbers of places that
shows industrialization which is mostly found in urban areas. Urbanized area are regions,

province, cities, town etc. that is highly developed enough to inhabit density of people, having

lot of structures such as houses, commercial buildings etc. as well as having a high capacity for

division of labor that supports economic development. On the other hand, rural areas are very

much opposite with urban areas, it has low population density and large amounts of undeveloped

land. It is the land overtaken by the agricultural sector where lives of the people in rural areas is

mostly depending on it. Both have differences in terms of the quality of life that the people may

experience, but economic problems most likely to occur in any situation that might cause

changes to the inhabitants. In an economical aspect, People used to live because of money, for us

to survive and for us to have what our needs we need to compensate everything. People are

willing to risk their future just to sustain the needs of their family, their own needs, to fill up

things that lack into them as well us to survive economic crisis. Due to unwavering effect of

globalization, urbanization has come and progressively corporate in many areas of the country.

Creating lots of opportunities, many benefits in terms of economic scale, great services and many

other things to discover. That is why an influx of classic rural to urban migration was led and

become the solution of many people in rural areas to survive economic crisis.

ANALYSIS

According to Philippine Statistic Authority (2019) In the year 2015, the level of urbanization rate

of population residing in urban areas in the Philippines was recorded at 51.2 percent and
continuously rising time to time. Highly industrialized area in the country is mostly found at

many parts of Metro Manila which is rank from one of the largest urban areas in the world with

dense population (Leyco 2015). As opposed to the idea of urbanization, some areas in the

country are likely lacking of many things that will sustain inhabitant’s needs. This is one of the

common reason why people tends to migrate, for them to find the absence of needs that they

cannot find in their areas. But what are these common needs that the people are trying to

acquire? What are the reasons behind of a sudden relocation? Does migration will really help

them to resolve their problems? or it will become progressively worse?

Discontentment in government services, insufficiency of resources, lacking of opportunities,

social influences, and environmental risk, these are just some of the factors why people preferred

to migrate is some areas where they can sustain their needs. People who live in rural areas are

mostly the one that experienced all of these situations. People insist to moved rather than

impelled themselves to a place where the existence of industrialization is deliberately to come.

An extensive scale of development in the industries mostly found in urban areas, wherein

proliferation of services and economic development of the area is said to be more guaranteed

compared to rural areas. Manila as the capital and chief city of the Philippines, centered in

economic and industrialize development shows the typical urbanization process which is very

similar to Latin America’s situation. It is based on high rates of natural increase in urban

population as well as rural to urban migration. But that doesn't mean every area in manila is

occupied by urban places, some are still under the process of development as an urbanized area.

Every year there is progress resulting for an expanding number of migration rates of urban
migration here in the country. Most of the people believed that the idea of urban migration will

solve their problem financially. More specifically, when they go to Manila, they can grab

opportunities much faster than their current locality. But does this idea really happen?

ECONOMIC IMPACT

When we talk about economy one thing that is essential about it is the money. Money literally

runs the world, without it you can’t freely get what you need. That is why people are striving to

work for them to sustain their life’s indispensable necessities. But not everyone can successfully

grab that, economic crisis is one of the possible reason behind a failure in terms of financial

needs which caused an increase of poverty rates in the country. The availability of job

opportunities from rural locality is very limited compared to a highly industrialized areas in the

country. That is why people have no choice but to work with agricultural sectors for them to

lived. In terms of resources, Rural is more likely the one that gives life in market economy. Rural

areas as an open swath of land that has few homes or other buildings, and not that populated.

That is why agricultural sector become most of the living here of every people here. They’re the

ones who maintained the stability of the resources that circulates in the country. But working
with agricultural sector alone won’t make that much progress from the farmers that is why they

choose to moved instead of enduring an indigent life. But moving to urban doesn’t mean you can

grab an opportunity that easily compared to rural. As years goes by, an increase of population in

Manila or some other urbanized area was become the critical point of unemployment rate of the

country due to proliferation of migrants coming from rural places. Overpopulation of an area

may lead workers having a hard time finding jobs, most probably jobs that really meets their

professions that is why some are might possibly fall under those who are underemployed

workers. Urbanized areas really do have lots of opportunities compared to rural, but when the

time that population growth of the cities is faster than the creation of jobs, this will result for a

levels of urban poverty.

However, urban migration does not just focus on job opportunities itself. Educational attainment

of an individual is really a big thing in the industry that is why some are willing to move from a

highly industrialized places just to satisfied their education needs. There is this discrimination

binding the hierarchy in the industry of the student having their bachelor’s degree into a well-

known school compared to those unfamiliar ones. The existence of the idea that you are more

likely suited for a work if you graduated from UP, La salle, Ateneo, etc, really happened in most

of the companies here in the country. This is also one of the reason behind of a sudden growth of

unemployment and underemployment. That is why people especially from rural are trying their

best to engaged themselves in some schools here in Manila even though there is a lot of

adjustments to work on. Behind the great opportunities coming from urbanized area as well as a

for being dominant among the poorest regions This simply shows the discrimination varies

among different regions in the country in terms of economic shares facilitated by the
government. In terms of average per capita GDP, Metro Manila’s residents are more than ten

times richer than the other regions and despite of its many slums, National Capital Region has

much lesser poverty than the other parts of the country.

POLITICAL IMPACT

Philippines is known of being one of the great rice exporter from before, but unfortunately the

situation turns out to be the opposite of what the country is used to be from the past. At the

recent crisis, Philippine was suffering from the availability of rice due to continuously decreasing

of export statistics from agricultural sectors. The National Food Authority stated that the law

would allow private traders or companies to import rice without being subject to regulation to

stabilize prices, leading to uncontrolled increases in the price of rice, this is Rice tariffication

law. Rice tariffication law according from the government should be implemented for the local

farmers to be more competitive compared to foreign farmers. It was recently signed by the

president but instead of having prosperity, it gives too much threat from the farmers. Under this

current pricing scheme, no farmer will continue planting rice below production cost. Aside from

that when industrialization began to process from places to places, these may lead for a lack of
an effective land reform program in the country. Government excluding farmers by these land

reform acts which leads them to lost their land as well as their livelihood and choose to move to

the city in order to support their families. In terms of market economy, perception of immigrants

as competitors for resources, especially in areas of economic hardship that is governed by

political advocate also become a threat for those who have lower income within their businesses.

Capitalism as a freedom from market economy allows everyone as well as foreign businesses to

rule the market economy of the country. What really sadden is that foreign products are

becoming more dominant than the local ones. That is why people whom failed to save their

businesses especially those who lived in rural areas more likely to migrate in areas with lots of

opportunities to find different jobs to help them survive poverty crisis.

CULTURAL IMPACT

Migration means moving from places to another, in connection with urban migration, having

new locality means you also have a new set of cultures, norms, values, beliefs, etc. to be instill in

yourself as a respect for your new home. This adaption of new cultures turns out to be the

cultural changes that naturally happened in every migrant. But what are the cultural impacts in

the process of rural to urban migration?

One of the factors affected by cultural changes is the environment. There is a big difference

when we talk about the comparison between the type of environment from both rural and urban

places as well as their advantages and disadvantages. “Bahay kubo” or nipa hut is a type of stilt

house indigenous to the cultures of the Philippines. It is also known (Perez et al. 1989) as

“payag” or “kamalig” in other languages of the Philippines. It often serves as an icon of

Philippine culture. Its architectural principles give way too many of Filipino traditional houses

and buildings that rose after the pre-colonial era. This traditional Philippine houses is mostly

seen from the rural areas. As the world innovate along with the continues growth of

globalization, Filipinos are hereby changing their ways or traditions to build their own houses in

to a more productive and innovative way. Year 1571, the first stone houses was built in manila

by the help of Spaniards. The tradition seems to be gradually left behind however it is for the

benefit of disaster risk reduction from some places. At first they didn’t succeed, but in the latter

part they can now built a composite structure of “bahay na bato” that has an advantage over

earthquake conditions. As the years go by, the houses made up of stone become the foundation

of all the infrastructures that we are seeing nowadays that result a better shelter for every

population. Now that we have these great innovations that doesn’t me we already forgot the

traditions that becomes an icon for every Filipinos. Because until now there are a lot of people

trying to preserved “bahay kubo” as our very own traditional house in the Philippines. In

connection with urban migration, the traditional nipa hut still has its existence even in an

urbanized area. The less fortunate (Takashi 2009) who moved from the cities built their own

versions of “bahay kubo” they constructed it whatever the materials available in their places.

People are happy to showcase our past time traditions in a lot of ways, one of the best example of

these is using “bahay kubo” as their native theme for the place, for the people to feel the

presence of old culture. Some are also trying to modernized the way of construction of these

traditional nipa hut. However, the rapid reproduction of infrastructures creates a huge change in

terms of the environment that we are used to live with in urban areas. These result of thick air

pollution caused by some particles that come from many sources, including car exhaust,

factories, coal burning that is mostly found in the cities. This may affect the health of every
individual, since long-term exposure to air pollution has been associated with diseases of the

heart and lungs, cancers and other health problems. Lastly, the most affected by these cultural

changes is the way of life that every people have from rural to urban locality is the values, beliefs

and tradition instilled with different places of the country. Migrants should be prepared for this

kind of situation and have the willingness to adapt these changes as their cooperation for their

new locality. These cultural changes may possibly give them a hard time to adapt it, but in a

more positive perception, these acculturations will widen individual’s knowledge about the

economic, political and cultural way of living of different places.

CONCLUSION

Urban Migration is something that the rural dweller’s last resort for them keep up and survive the

crisis of poverty. People are willing to risk their future and engage themselves for another way of

life in the city. Migration might be a simple relocation for us, more specifically a movement

from a place to another. But if we talk about the possible impact of this kind of action, we will

perceive how migration affects people life economically, politically and culturally. In the

economic aspect of the Philippine context, migrations to a big city like Manila are for some of

the first step for having great careers and opportunities in the case of high-mobility, high-

aspirations students and young urban professionals, who tend to participate actively in urban life
When it comes to political services, the discrimination between rural and urban areas are the

reason behind a slow growth of the population as well as the economy. The Government often

allotting their time for the rich areas of the country rather than the poorest ones which made rural

areas hard to escape from poverty. Instead of the government supporting those who are capable

of producing what every countryman’s needs most probably the agricultural sectors, they act

oppositely and continuously implementing advocacies that hinders the development of our own

farmers. Sadly, it came to a point that they give an ineffective land reform program that excluded

most of the farmer’s job. In cultural aspect of migration, it is normal for a migrant to adapt a new

set of cultures depending on the locality they relocated especially if it is a rural to urban type of

migration. From an area with an open swath of land, less people and living with indigenous life

to an area with industrialized cities where proliferation of infrastructures is being denser. Aside

from that every values, norms, beliefs and tradition that is inherited is varies from different areas

of the country depending on the type of living they have. This kind of adjustments is essential for

us to get along with the type of culture that the townspeople have. But adapting new culture

doesn’t mean you will remove the culture that you grew up with before you entered to a new

community. We must learn to use all those learnings we get in every cultural differences and

give prosperity in every places we go. Rural to urban migration is really something to thought

well before it happens. Doing this case doesn’t mean you can live comfortably as you think

compare to rural places that you lived with. Yes, there are a lot of opportunities waiting for you

to go there but demographers, however, have found no exclusive evidence that the migration of

individuals to cities has led to higher levels of fertility. An extensive growth of population in

urban areas might cause competitions in the industry and leads to a lower chance of business

engagement for the people especially to those whose purpose of a sudden migration is work.
Everything has its own weaknesses, but a right political services for the economy might help us

to solve this kind of crisis. Most importantly, the discrimination from both rural and urban

should be stop and must give equality in terms of the quality services that is given by the

government for the betterment as a whole.

REFERENCES

PSA (Philippine Statistic Authority) (2019). Urban Population in the Philippines. Retrieved

from: http://www.psa.gov.ph/content/urban-population-philippines-results-2015-census-

population