海角大神

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte signed an executive order on Monday creating free access to contraceptives for as many as 6 million women who have unmet family planning needs, in what his government describes as a poverty-reduction measure.

Of those women, 2 million who have been identified as poor will get access by 2018, followed by the remaining 4 million. The order directs government agencies to partner with civil services and mobilize at the village level to locate eligible couples.

That drive, economic planning secretary Ernesto Pernia told the Associated Press, is designed to achieve 鈥渮ero unmet need for family planning鈥� as part of the government鈥檚 larger goal of cutting the poverty rate before the end of Mr. Duterte's term of office: from 21.6 percent in 2015 to 13 or 14 percent by 2022.

The move could add a bit of unexpected shading to the profile of a president who is known mostly in the West for his bloody war on drugs and impertinent treatment of foreign emissaries. It isn鈥檛 the first such gesture, as 海角大神 noted in a November article on Duterte鈥檚 meeting with the leader-in-hiding of the secessionist Moro National Liberationist Front rebels, an effort to jump-start peace talks:

The executive order could face resistance from the Roman Catholic Church, as have similar initiatives in the past. A landmark law passed in 2012, for instance, established free and universal access to contraceptives and mandated reproductive-health programs in government schools. Legal challenges from conservative Catholic groups managed to get several of the law鈥檚 provisions struck down, and in 2015 the Supreme Court suspended indefinitely the distribution of a contraceptive implant and renewal of licenses for other contraceptives.

The church has taken a leading role in ousting Philippine leaders in the past: Along with the 鈥淧eople鈥檚 Power鈥� movement that dethroned dictator Ferdinand Marcos, it helped get president Joseph Estrada impeached in 2001. But it has kept quiet on the wave of drug-war killings in the early months of Duterte鈥檚 administration, as Reuters noted in October.

The UN Population Fund said last year that the Philippines was the only Asia-Pacific country where the rate of teen pregnancies rose over the past two decades, although its overall fertility rate declined 鈥� a potential obstacle, it said, in the Philippines鈥� hopes for faster economic growth.

This report contains material from Reuters and the Associated Press.