Migrants in Cebu City: 1996

Introduction

In the Philippines, as in most countries permitting free movements of their citizens, hardly any effort is being made, systematic or otherwise, to monitor internal migration. In consequence, no complete data base for the analysis of internal migration in the Philippines exists. There has likewise never been any national migration survey.

The most comprehensive current information on internal migration is contained in the 1990 Census of Population and Housing, in which people were asked about their residence five years earlier. The information provided is that of in-migrants during the preceding five years that were still alive and around. There are no records of any sort of out-migrants. Not included among the in-migrants are those who either had left again before the census came around or who had died. In consequence, no data exist that permit to determine the actual number of migrants during any given period.

Existing information on intercensal migrants is, unfortunately, not available to the public in full. Published data in either print or computerized files tell the user only whether a person had lived in 1985 in the same municipality or city in which he/she was currently living, or in an other and, if the answer was 'other', whether it was in the same or a different province. From a ten-percent public use file of the 1990 Census, which has been made available, the barangay codes have been removed, making it impossible to trace movements within cities and municipalities. This means that, for example, intra-city movements in a city as large as Cebu City cannot be traced. In short, there are few data sources on migration, and those that do exist have been further limited in their usefulness.

To estimate the amount of net migration in the City of Cebu, Padilla, in his Cebu City paper produced for the second-round in-depth urban inquiry of AUICK, attempts to dissect the annual population growth into growth stemming from natural increase and from net migration. His figures imply that there was hardly any growth resulting from migration during the period 1981 through 1983, and then sudden migration surges occurred in 1985 and again in 1989.1 While such erratic migration behavior is not impossible, it is rather unlikely and probably caused by the population projection method applied as well as the registered birth and death figures used for the estimation of natural increase. The birth and death figures used represent most likely overestimates.2 There are no known events that occurred in Cebu City during the 1980s that prompted large groups of people to leave the City. Padilla's figures for the entire decade of the 1980s suggest that net migration was not an overwhelming factor with respect to the growth of Cebu City between 1980 and 1990, contributing just 15,000 persons to the overall population growth during the decade which amounted to some 120,000 persons. It is also difficult to reconcile Padilla's figures with other census information. According to the 1990 Census, ca. 37,000 residents of Cebu City five and older in 1990 had lived elsewhere in 1985, i.e., six percent of the total city population. These 37,000 represent the 1990 census count of migrants, i.e., persons who had come to Cebu between 1985 and 1990 and were still there in 1990. Padilla's estimate for the same period, which includes children under five, is 13,549.

1 Perfecto L. Padilla, "Study of the Population Dynamics and Urban Conditions, Problems and Services in Cebu City, Philippines." Population Dynamics and Urban Infrastructure: Second Round In-depth Urban Inquiry. Asian Urban Information Center of Kobe (not dated), p. VII-12, Table 6.
2 To obtain single-year estimates of the Cebu City population for the period 1981 through 1989, Padilla used straight-line interpolation between the census counts of 1980 and 1990. This method overestimates the population around 1980, and underestimates it for the second half of the decade, thereby obscuring the number of migrants for the early 1980s, and magnifying it for the late 80s.

I. IS CEBU CITY AN IN-MIGRATION CENTER?

The demographic development of Cebu City has to be viewed within the context of Metro Cebu. Cebu City is part and center piece of a larger unit of ten contiguous cities and municipalities known as Metro Cebu (see Appendix Figure A1 ). Population-wise, Metro Cebu contains about one half of the population of Cebu Province which, in 1990, was ca. 1.3 million; Cebu City contains approximately one half of the population of Metro Cebu, some 600,000 in 1990 (see Appendix Figure A2). Metro Cebu has not (yet) been declared an official administrative unit, but it has developed an economic life of its own quite distinct from that of the rest of Cebu Province.

During the past couple of decades, Cebu City was either one of the administrative units of Metro Cebu with relatively small population growth rates (1970s), or it was the unit with the smallest population growth rate (1980s), as Fig. 1 demonstrates.

Flg.1. INTERCENSAL POPULATION GROWTH 1970-80
AND 1980-90: ADMINISTRATIVE UNITS OF METRO CEBU

The main reason for the relatively slow and declining population growth in Cebu City is the fact that Cebu City is among the worst endowed of the ten administrative units of the Metro area as far as land suitable for continued urban sprawl is concerned. Table 1 classifies the land area included in the City boundaries according to elevation and slope. The City area covers one of the most mountainous parts of Cebu Island. Less than 30 percent of the total Gity area is relatively flat, and just one half of that flat area is situated along the shore line. The other half of somewhat flat land is 200 and more meters up in the mountains of Cebu Island. More than 70 percent of the City area is covered by slopes of 18 percent (ca. 10 degrees) or more. In the flat area along the shore line, more than one half of the City's population is crowded with an average population density of more than 20,000 persons per km2. In some City barangays (neighborhoods, the smallest administrative unit in the Philippines), density is getting close to 100,000/km2.3

Table 1. SURFACE AREA OF CEBU CITY, BY ELEVATION AND SLOPE (in km2)4

An examination of census data for Metro Cebu reveals that most Metro Cebu in-migrants did not settle in Cebu City but in the other cities and municipalities of Metro Cebu. In 1990, Metro Cebu contained more than 95,000 persons five and older who had not resided in Metro Cebu in 1985, close to 9 percent of all persons over age 5 in the Metro area. Of these, the 37,000 Cebu City migrants represent less than 40 percent. The figures make clear that it is Metro Cebu that attracts internal migrants, not necessarily Cebu City.

Of all 1985-90 internal migrants to Metro Cebu covered by the 1990 Census, some 55 percent were females; almost exactly one half of all migrants had come from other parts of Cebu Province, and the other half from other provinces.

Metro Cebu is the second-largest metro area in the Philippines. This position of Metro Cebu has implications for the migration of highly skilled or professional workers. Highly trained people with origins outside of Cebu, who underwent training in Cebu City or Metro Cebu, usually search for employment first in the Cebu area. But for many of these, the ultimate aim is to either 'move on' to Metro Manila, where salaries tend to be higher and the job prestige greater, or to migrate abroad. While the Philippines is known as a supplier of trained manpower and professionals to other countries, the skilled manpower of a 'second' city like Cebu is drained by two competitors: Metro Manila and foreign countries.

The information on migrants to Cebu City presented on the following pages has to be placed into the just outlined context. To have some similarity with migrants covered by the census data, the migrants or migrant households included in the AUICK pilot survey are limited to those who had come to Cebu City since 1990, i.e., within the past five years.

3 A more detailed description of the physiography of Cebu City is contained in a background paper prepared for the 1996 meeting of the International Advisory Committee of AUICK entitled "Cebu City in 1990."
4 Surface area includes the area of all slopes of mountains and ravines. It is distinct from the base area on which elevated land structures are situated. The surface area is always larger than the base area. The base area of Cebu City is 28Okm2.

II. MIGRANTS IN CEBU CITY: CHARACTERISTICS

The AUICK-commissioned survey of migrants to Cebu City, undertaken in January 1996 by staff members of the Office of Population Studies, located 120 migrants, all of them residents of the densely populated lowland area of the City, which contains the majority of the City population. Not included in the survey are persons who may have settled in the plush sub-divisions of the City located on the foothills of the mountains that form the background of the City. In consequence; the sample respondents do not include members of the upper-class elite. The latter was purposely excluded because its members are neither dependent on the facilities provided by the City as are people in the densely settled city areas, nor are they likely to be, or to become, economic liabilities for the City government as migrants in search of a better life often are or do. In short, members of the economic elite, aside from being relatively few in number or expatriates, are not 'typical' migrants.

The survey located 120 migrants who had lived in the City five years or less. 23 of them (19 percent) males, and 97 females. The heavy concentration of female in-migrants is clearly reflected in the age structure of the City population, which shows large proportions of women between the ages of 15 and 35, and a consequence of the City's economy which favors trade, commerce and services-traditionally heavy on female employees-rather than industry (see Fig.2).5

Table 2. MIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY,
BY AGE

Fig. 2. AGE STRUCTURES OF CEBU CITY, METRO CEBU,
AND CEBU PROVINCE: 1990

Some 90 percent of all sample migrants are between 15 and 35 years of age (see Table 2). It is at these ages that the age structure of the City of Cebu (as well as that of Metro Cebu) shows 'irregular' swellings caused by in-migration (see Fig.2 above). exactly one half of all migrants had never been married, and almost all the rest married. Of the 33 married respondents, all but 3 had migrated with their entire families; two thirds of the never-married migrants had migrated solo or had been accompanied by a relative or town mate.

In migration literature, migration in (and from) the Philippines is often characterized as a (extended) family affair. The family or close relatives provide support, financial and psychological, at the point of origin as well as the point of destination. The extent to which such help had been provided to the Cebu City migrants in terms of financing the trip to Cebu, of offering shelter at the time of arrival in Cebu, of securing a job in Cebu in advance, etc., is not known. That relatives or friends play a role in migration is indicated in the Cebu data by the fact that of the 120 respondents only one third migrated solo, the other two thirds came with their families, relatives, or hometown friends.

In the Philippines, internal migrants tend to be of two types: The first is the relatively uneducated and unskilled person coming to the city in search of a livelihood that the rural area does not, or does no longer, provide. Persons of this description find jobs, if they do, as domestic maids or servants, cargadores at the pier area, laborers at construction sites, etc. The second type is the relatively well educated person searching for a job, or a better job, in his/her area of training. Table 4 lists the 120 Cebu City migrants by educational attainment. For comparative purposes, the educational distribution of Cebu City residents at the time of the 1990 Census (the latest available information) is likewise shown.

Table 3. MIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY,
BY MARITAL STATUS

Table 4. PERCENT OF MIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY AND CEBU CITY
NON-MIGRANTS, BY EDUCATIONAL ATTAINMENT6

Table 4 suggests that Cebu City is drawing both kinds of migrants described above. Some 30 percent of all in-migrants had elementary education (six grades in the Philippines), and not all of them complete elementary schooling. At the other end of the education scale, there are the migrants-more than half of the Cebu respondents-with college or graduate education. It is these people who represent the second kind of in-migrant. If the Cebu sample comes close to being representative, then it can be said that Cebu City is drawing primarily better educated migrants, people who, on the average, have an education superior to that of the non-migrant population of Cebu City.

The occupations of the Cebu City migrants are shown in Table 5. Some 32 of the 120 respondents indicated that they were currently not working.

Table 5. NUMBER AND PERCENT OF MIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY,
BY CURRENT OCCUPATION

It is difficult to compare the job structure of the 1990 Census with that of the survey because of differences in job definitions. When we combine the survey classifications into three broad categories as indicated in Table 5, viz.: (1) high-level jobs, (2) low-level jobs, and (3) no jobs, and do approximately the same with the 1990 Census data for Cebu Province, the following comparison emerges:7

Migrants are found in high-level occupations more often than non-migrants, a situation that corresponds to the on the average higher education of migrants compared to non-migrants.

Occupations of Cebu City migrants are in line with their educational backgrounds: of the 12 respondents with professional and executive occupations, 11 have a college education; of the 35 clerical and sales workers, 29 (83 percent) have either high school or college education, and nearly all of the 39 production and service workers have elementary or high school education.

Having a good educational background and work experience does not necessarily increase the chances of a migrant to Cebu City to actually find a job. Table 6 describes the current work status of the Cebu City migrants by level of education.

Table 6. PERCENT OF MIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY,
BY CURRENT WORK STATUS AND EDUCATIONAL LEVEL

In early 1996, currently working sample migrants consisted to almost equal parts of persons with elementary, high school and college education. Since most Cebu migrants are young people in their most productive working years, it is safe to assume that also the majority of those not currently working wanted a job. A comparison of the figures in the first and second lines in Table 6 suggests that previous work experience apparently counts much in high-level jobs but is of lesser importance for blue-collor jobs.

The importance of job experience becomes also apparent when the age patterns of currently working migrants and migrants who never worked before are examined.

Table 7. CURRENTLY WORKING MIGRANTS AND
MIGRANTS WHO NEVER WORKED, BY AGE

The large proportion of working teenagers despite the absence of work experience is explained by the types of jobs these young people hold: most of them are servants (house maids) and cheap laborers on jobs requiring little skill. People in their twenties and without job experience tend to be those who just have finished their education and begun to search for a first job. All Philippine labor statistics show that unemployment is most rampant in this group, especially among the educated.

Migrants vary considerably according to place of origin, as Table 8 indicates. Four different general migration streams are identified

Table 8. MIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY, BY PLACE OF ORIGIN

The majority of the sample migrants (60 percent) had come from places outside of Cebu City. Census statistics of 1990 for Cebu City indicate the same fact: 60 percent from outside the province, 40 percent from within. Of the intra-provincial migrants, the vast majority came from rural places. By contrast, most of the inter-provincial migrants had their origin in urban places of the Philippines.

Variations among in-migrants according to place of origin implies more than geographic differences; it implies differences in terms of the qualities migrants bring to the City. Table 9 permits to compare the educational background of migrants by area of origin.

Table 9. PERCENT OF IMMIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY,
BY PLACE OF ORIGIN AND EDUCATION

The last column in Table 9 delineates two main types of migrants according to education: college educated, and elementary-school educated. Whether high-school educated migrants are rare in Cebu City, the data do not permit to tell. The majority of all migrants with little education originated in rural areas, while the majority of migrants with college and graduate training came from urban origins. Among those with some college education are large proportions of students currently studying in Cebu City. These students, as Table 9 shows, came from all types of origins, urban and rural ones alike.

In Table 10, the occupations of migrants are correlated with the migrants' place of origin.

Table 10. PERCENT OF IMMIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY,
BY PLACE OF ORIGIN AND OCCUPATION

There is little difference in the proportions 'currently not working' by type of migration stream. A comparison of the percent not working in Table 10 with the percentages shown under 'some college education' in Table 9 will show a pretty good resemblance between them, suggesting that the majority of currently non-working migrants are students still in college.

The most important suggestion emerging from Table 10 is that different types of migration streams deliver different types of skills to the City. Professionals and persons in clerical occupations (especially secretaries) come to Cebu City primarily from other urban places in Cebu Province. Sales workers originated primarily in rural Cebu as well as rural and urban places of other provinces, craftsmen and laborers in rural Cebu and urban places outside Cebu Province, and service workers (including domestic servants) predominantly in rural places of both Cebu and hon-Cebu.

In terms of current work status, variations among migrants seem to be small; place of origin apparently makes little difference with respect to currently holding a job or not. Table 11 below shows that the proportions of migrants 'currently working' are almost the same in all place-of-origin categories. The most Table 11 can suggest is that intra-provincial migrants may have a somewhat easier time finding and holding a job than inter-provincial migrants. Table 11 confirms the observation made earlier that highly educated people with work experience-- as those coming from urban Cebu-- find it more difficult to obtain a new job than migrants with lesser education (cf. p.7).

Table 11. PERCENT OF IMMIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY,
BY PLACE OF ORIGIN AND CURRENT WORK STATUS

The 'currently working' category in Table 11 is broken down into two, thereby making a distinction between migrants who are employed by others and those who are self-employed. The latter can mean a number of things such as opening a business or store. But it also may mean opening a small eating stall on a city street, selling peanuts or cigarettes or bottled water, or appointing oneself a fare collector in a jeepney.

5 The age structures shown in Fig.2 are those of 1990.
6 Data of migrants refer to 1996, of non-migrants to 1990.
7 No separate census tabulation for Cebu City exists; census reports list occupations only for provinces. The sample migrant data refer to 1996, the provincial data to 1990.

III. FAMILY PLANNING PRACTICES OF MIGRANTS

Of ever-married migrants, inquiries were made during the survey about their number of children, the number of children wanted, and family planning practices. Exactly one half of all sampled migrants (60) were ever married, 52 of them women, and 8 males. Because most of the migrants were relatively young, the mean number of children of the 60 ever-married migrants is 2.

Table 12. NUMBER AND PERCENT OF MIGRANTS TO CEBU,
BY SEX AND NUMBER OF CHILDREN EVER BORN

Of the 124 children whom the migrants either had brought along to Cebu City or to whom they had given birth after their arrival in the City, 8 were no longer alive: five migrants had lost 1 child, and one migrant 2.

When asked how many more children they would want, 42 percent (22) of the ever-married women replied 'none'; the other women gave answers ranging from 1 to 3.8

Table 13. NUMBER AND PERCENT OF EVER-MARRIED
FEMALE MIGRANTS, BY NUMBER OF
ADDITIONAL CHILDREN WANTED

The mean number of children currently alive plus the mean number of additional children wanted, which is one, the total number of children wanted on the average is 3, a figure not different from that for all Cebu women. Cebu women with 2 living children mentioned 2.8 children as their ideal number of children (see Cebu family planning report, p.7).

Among the 52 ever-married migrant women, exactly 50 percent were current users of family planning. Another ten percent had practiced before but were not doing so now, and the remaining 30 percent had never practiced. These figures are almost identical with those given by the 100 respondents of the family planning survey: 47 percent current users, 22 percent previous users, and 31 percent never users(see Cebu family planning report, p.8).

The method mix shown in Table 14 likewise is very close to that of all Cebu women. The methods reported there, by order of use frequency, is calendar rhythm, IUD, female sterilization and the pill. The overall contraceptice prevalence rate for the migrant women is 50 (percent), that for all Cebu women is 11 percent higher. However, the difference can most probably be attributed to the fact that the prevalence rate for all Cebu women is the rate for currently married women. By contrast, the rate for migrant women refers to ever-married women, four of whom were not currently married at the time the survey was conducted.

Table 14. NUMBER AND PERCENT OF EVER-MARRIED FEMALE
MIGRANTS, BY CONTRACEPTIVE METHOD USE

The reasons migrant women gave for not practicing contraceptives are similar to those forwarded by all Cebu women. While the reasons were the same, the distribution of reasons was somewhat different. Since the migrant women do not include many older women, the answer 'want more children' was given more frequently by the migrants than the general female population. No differences between the migrant and general populations are apparent with respect to answers alluding to fear of side effects. The four ever-married migrant women currently separated or widowed answered with 'inability to perceive'.

Table 15. NUMBER AND PERCENT OF EVER-MARRIED FEMALE MIGRANTS,
BY REASON FOR NOT USING FAMILY PLANNING

8 The questions on number of additional children wanted and family planning practices are tabulated here only for the 52 ever married women respondents.

IV. MIGRANTS IN CEBU CITY: SATISFACTION WITH LIFE IN THE CITY

The sample migrants were asked about their reasons for moving to Cebu City. As Table 16 points out, the answers can be classified into three main groups: (1) job-related reasons, (2) education-related reasons, and (3) marriage-related reasons.

Table 16. NUMBER AND PERCENT OF MIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY,
BY REASON FOR MOVING TO CEBU CITY

Almost 80 percent of all reasons that prompted the respondents to move to Cebu City have to do with job change or search. Job-related moves are usually motivated by desires to improve one's economic lot and living conditions. Did the Cebu City in-migrants feel that their lives had been changed to the better since they came?

When asked point-blank whether or not they were satisfied with their living conditions as they are now, three fourths answered with 'satisfied', while the remaining fourth expressed dissatisfaction. Who are the dissatisfied? Table 17 looks at satisfaction by migrants' place of sorigin.

Table 17. PERCENT OF IMMIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY,
BY SATISFACTION WITH CURRENT LIFE AND PLACE OF ORIGIN

The most dissatisfied were those who had come from rural Cebu Province and urban areas outside of Cebu Province. Why were these particular migrants more dissatisfied than others. It cannot be the fact of currently having a job and not having one because the proportions satisfied and dissatisfied in these two groups were not basically different:

However, the not currently working migrants contained one of the largest contingents of dissatisfied migrants when compared with migrant workers of different occupations.

Table 18. PERCENT OF IMMIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY,
BY SATISFACTION WITH CURRENT LIFE AND OCCUPATION

The largest proportions of dissatisfied migrants are found among (1) sales workers, (2) the currently not working, and (3) service workers. The largest number of migrant workers with these particular 'occupations' had originated from rural Cebu Province and urban Philippines outside Cebu, i.e., those areas of origin with the largest proportions of dissatisfied in-migrants to Cebu City.

Table 19 describes in detail how migrants compare life at their places of origin with life in Cebu City.

Table 19. PERCENT OF MIGRANTS TO CEBU CITY,
BY COMPARISONS OF SELECTED ASPECTS OF LIFE
BEFORE AND AFTER MIGRATION AND PLACE OF ORIGIN

Despite the fact that three quarters of all Cebu City migrants claimed to be satisfied with their current life, answers to more specific questions demonstrated that actual satisfaction was much lower. The greatest degree of satisfaction was expressed with respect to income: 62 percent stated that it was higher in Cebu than it had been 'at home'. However, the overall satisfaction with income was so high because of the migrants from rural areas of non-Cebu. Among them, 83 percent claimed higher incomes in Cebu.

With respect to living quarters in Cebu City, two thirds of all migrants were unhappy. Unhappiness was especially large among migrants who had moved to Cebu City from other urban places in the Province. Over one half of all migrants claimed that there living quarters in Cebu City were more crammed than there quarters had been at home.

Satisfaction with social services offered in and by the City of Cebu received the second highest approval ratings of the migrants. It was especially high among rural migrants from Cebu Province. Almost one third of all migrants believed that what the City had to offer was not more than what they had had at home.

Conveniences, i.e., the ease of getting easily to often frequented places like markets, churches, stores etc. because they are located in the vicinity received no good rating. Just a little over 50 percent of the migrants believed that Cebu offered an improvement. One third believed that Cebu City was not better than their previous places of residence. The same attitude is reflected in answers to questions asking people to compare the satisfaction of their current life in Cebu City with the satisfaction about life they had had before migrating: 28 percent of the migrants thought that it was the same now what it had been before; 18 percent believed that it had been better before, and 53 percent reported that life was better now than it had been before.

Overall, migrants from urban places outside of Cebu Province were the least satisfied, and those coming from urban places in Cebu, the most. In just two of the categories mentioned in Table 19, a few of the urban intra-provincial migrants claimed a worsening of their situations; in all other categories, the saw at worst no change. The most negative assessments came consistently from those who had arrived in Cebu City from urban places of other provinces.

The dissatisfaction with living in Cebu City is reflected in the large proportion of all migrants who expressed the hope of leaving for home or elsewhere at some point in time. A mere 40 percent of the respondents declared unequivocally that they intended to keep living in Cebu City, and another 25 percent stated that they had not yet made up their minds. One third of the respondents, however, had made up its mind and expressed the clear intention of returning to either their home towns, to the places they had lived in immediately before moving to Cebu, or elsewhere.

Intentions of leaving Cebu do not necessarily have their basis in dissatisfaction with the conditions encountered in the City. Of those yet undecided whether to stay or move on, two thirds were satisfied with their life in Cebu City, and the same holds true for those planning to return to their home towns. Only those contemplating to return to the place they had resided in immediately before coming to Cebu City were, to 75 percent, displeased with their life in the City.

That dissatisfaction with life in Cebu City is not necessarily the reason for eventually leaving for elsewhere is also indicated by the fact that of those who earned a higher income than before, some 21 percent were undecided about staying or leaving, and more than 30 percent had decided that they would leave some day. The intentions of leaving again have to be viewed in relation to the fact that over 80 percent of the migrants had come for job-related, i.e. income-related, reasons (see Table 16, p.12).

The most compelling reasons for staying in the City seem to be marriage-related. Among all types of migrants examined in the course of this analysis, the proportion to stay on was largest (60 percent) for those who had come to Cebu City because of marriage. By contrast, people who move to the City for educational purposes, more often than not do not intend to stay. Just 25 percent of people who had come as students had definite intentions of staying.