Out in the Storm

How the Philippine government forces its poor to brave each typhoon

- LAURA FORNELL

Teresita Boljoran, now a widowed mother in her early fifties, has been cleaning houses since 2010 to support her family of six. In 2013, the super typhoon Haiyan-locally known as Yolanda-destroyed her house on the island of Malapascua, in Cebu province in the Philippines. Yolanda was one of the most powerful typhoons ever recorded in the country, affecting more than 14 million people and claiming over six thousand lives. "For a year, we lived in makeshift tents on the beach until we were able to rebuild the house thanks to several [government] aids," Boljoran told me, in May 2022. Many such typhoons on Malapascua have forced her to rebuild her life from scratch. "Although I always live with the uncertainty of what might happen," she said, "I don't intend to leave here."

Each year, about twenty severe cyclones, which cause torrential rains and heavy floods, hit the archipelagic state comprising thousands of islands. The worst affected are the poorest, who live in fragile structures on the coastland and are exposed to extreme weather conditions. In 2022, five tropical cyclones made landfall in the Philippines, triggering floods and landslides. Like most years, they resulted in deaths, property destruction, damage to agriculture and infrastructure, as well as displacement of thousands of people and disruption in their livelihoods.