Extreme poverty happens when you have more children than you can raise. Citing a 2008 National Demographic and Health Survey, former Sen. Vicente Paterno emphasizes that mothers from the poorest Filipino families bear more children than the family can afford to feed or to send to school. “The heart of the Consensus Bill on Population is to help the poorest parents and couples avoid unwanted births and evade extreme poverty,” Paterno has said. Paterno heads the Joint Steering Committee that crafted the bill.