MALAYBALAY CITY (MindaNews / 02 May) – Eight of the 10 provinces in the Philippines with the highest rates of functional illiteracy are in Mindanao, according to the initial results of the Functional Literacy, Education, and Mass Media Survey (FLEMMS) conducted by the Philippine Statistics Authority in the second half of 2024.

PSA revealed the FLEMMS survey results during the Senate committee of basic education hearing Tuesday led by committee chair Senator Sherwin Gatchalian.

Tawi-Tawi has the highest rate of functional illiteracy with 67 percent of its population or 218,000 residents there.

Also landing on the top 10 provinces with the highest functional illiteracy rates are Davao Occidental with 53 percent or 130,000 (2^nd), Zamboanga del Sur with 49 percent or 399,000 (3^rd), Basilan with 48 percent of 150,000 (5^th), Sarangani with 48 percent or 209,000 (6^th), Agusan del Norte with 44 percent or 135,000 (8^th), Sultan Kudarat with 44 percent or 293,000 (9^th), and Lanao del Norte with 44 percent or 240,000 (10^th).

Northern Samar was ranked 4^th with 48 percent or 236,000 functional illiterates, and Western Samar 7^th with 46 percent or 283,000.

South Cotabato recorded a functional illiteracy rate of 23 percent, landing 9^th on the top 10 provinces in the country with the highest functional literacy rate. Occupying the top three spots in terms of functional literacy are Benguet, Apayao and Rizal provinces, all in Luzon.

At the regional level, Region 9 (Zamboanga Peninsula) recorded the highest functional illiteracy rate with 41 percent or over 1.2 million of its population, according to the survey.

The PSA conducts the FLEMMS survey to gather information on the basic and functional literacy rates, and the educational skills qualifications of the population.

The committee also found out during the hearing that close to 19 million Filipinos who are graduates of the country’s basic education system could be functionally illiterate.

“There are approximately 5.8 million people who are not basically literate…If you look at functionally illiterate, there are 24.8 million who have problems comprehending…This is the gravity of our situation right now, and I support the new definition [of literacy] because now we have a good picture of where we are,” Gatchalian said during the hearing.

The PSA changed the definition of “functional literacy” to include higher-level comprehension skills, going beyond basic reading, writing, and numeracy. The 2019 definition automatically categorizes high school graduates or junior high school completers as functionally literate, while the 2024 definition does not.

“In the old definition… we have 79 million constituents who are considered functional literate. But in the current definition, which you removed high school and junior high school, the number of functional literacy or literate went down to 60 million constituents. So, that’s a difference of about 18.9 million,” Gatchalian said.

“There are high school and junior high school graduates who…did not pass the new definition of functional literacy…In other words, 18 million graduates from the system are not functionally literate,” the senator said.

Adrian Cerezo, PSA Assistant National Statistician, agreed with Gatchalian’s observation, noting that 21 percent of senior high school graduates are not functionally literate based on FLEMMS data.

‘Staggering’

For basic literacy, the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) recorded a basic illiteracy rate of 16 percent or around 582,000 of its population, a number that Gatchalian described as “staggering”.

Like in functional literacy, Tawi-Tawi, which belongs to BARMM, also has the highest number of basic illiterates with 36 percent of its population or 117,000.

Completing the list, which includes seven Mindanao provinces, are Davao Occidental with 23 percent or 55,000, Basilan with 23 percent or 71,000, Northern Samar with 20 percent or 98,000, Sarangani with 18 percent or 77,000, Lanao del Sur with 17 percent or 155,000, Zamboanga del Sur with 16 percent or 128,000, Western Samar with 16 percent or 97,000, Sultan Kudarat with 14 percent or 97,000, and Maguindano del Sur with 13 percent or 64,000.

Like Tawi-Tawi, Basilan and Maguindanao del Sur belong to the BARMM. (H. Marcos C. Mordeno/MindaNews)