ORGANIZED labor has expressed grave concern over the continued absence of wage hike orders in two regions in Mindanao, even as all other 14 regional wage boards across the country had issued their respective minimum wage increase orders before the end of 2025.
Still to issue their wage orders were the Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Boards (RTWPBs) in Region 5 (Bicol) and Region 11 (Davao).
The Federation of Free Workers (FFS) on Sunday pointed out that workers in the said regions should not be left waiting for the meager increase in their minimum wages amid the continuous rise in the prices of food, transportation, electricity, rent, and basic services, which, the group said, were proofs of the structural defects or weaknesses of the regional wage-setting system under Republic Act (RA) 6727, otherwise known as the Wage Rationalization Act.
It pointed out that the absence or inadequacy of wage relief is not a technical delay but a daily subtraction from food on the table, medicine for the sick, school expenses for children, and dignity at work.
“A wage policy that produces such outcomes cannot be called development, it is institutionalized deprivation,” said FFW president Atty. Sonny Matula.
Beyond the disturbing delays, FFW warns of a deepening geographic inequality in wages among the 16 regional wage boards across the country, saying that the pattern is clear and increasingly unjust.
“The farther one moves away from Metro Manila, the lower the wage floor becomes,” it pointed out.
To date, the National Capital Region (NCR) or Metro Manila remains the region with the highest daily minimum wage rate ranging from P658 to P695 for workers in private establishments, while the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) is at the bottom of the wage ladder, with daily minimum wages ranging from P386 to P411, or a wage gap of more than P280 per day between NCR and the BARMM.
Matula pointed out that the same is true in other regions, noting that even Palawan, part of the Mimaropa region, continues to register minimum wages significantly lower than NCR despite rising food and fuel prices aggravated by transport costs.
He added that even Batanes, geographically isolated and among the most expensive places to live due to logistics and weather conditions, remains subject to regional wage floors far below Metro Manila levels.
This stark disparity exposes a system where location — not human need, not the actual cost of living — determines survival wages, averred Matula.
He stressed that the disparity in minimum wages underscores the urgent need for a national, legislated wage hike — one that sets a real and humane wage floor applicable to all workers, regardless of region, saying that regional wage boards may supplement this floor, but they should never be allowed to justify delay, inequality, or poverty wages.
For his part, Labor Secretary Bienvenio Laguesma, who sits as ex-officio of the National Wages and Productivity Commission (NWPC), said RTWPBs 11 and 5 are expected to commence their wage determination processes this January and February 2026, respectively.
The 14 RTWPBs that issued before the end of 2025 their orders granting daily minimum wage increase ranging from P20 to P100 for workers in private establishments in the NCR, Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR), Regions 1, 2, 3, Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal, and Quezon), Mimaropa (Mindoro, Marinduque, Romblon, and Palawan) or the Southwester Tagalog Region, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, and 13.
“All wage orders were issued motu proprio, majority of which were issued unanimously by the concerned RTWPBs,” added Laguesma.
Likewise, 11 wage orders granting monthly minimum wage increases for domestic workers were also issued by RTWPBs in CAR, Regions 1, 2, 3, Mimaropa, 6, 7, 8, 10, 12, and 13. The increases range from P300 to P2,000 per month.
More than 4.5 million minimum wage earners in the private sector, along with 755,000 domestic workers, benefitted from the wage orders issued by the RTWPBs in 2025.
