QUEZON CITY, Philippines (UCAN) -- The agenda President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo announced for the second half of her term tackles the concerns of some Philippine bishops.

In her State of the Nation Address on July 23 at the opening of the 14th Philippine Congress, Arroyo told officials and guests who packed the House of Representatives Hall in Quezon City, northeast of Manila, her administration will focus on fighting poverty, hunger and generating foreign investments.

"It is my wish that the Philippines be among the ranks of developed nations in 20 years," Arroyo said in Filipino. "By then," she added, "poverty shall have been marginalized and the (former) marginalized raised to a robust middle class." Her term ends in 2010.

The president said her administration will work to counter poverty and hunger through infrastructure and other projects focused in underdeveloped regions, such as Mindanao in the southern Philippines.

Bishop Dinualdo Gutierrez of Marbel told UCA News hours before Arroyo spoke that the government must urgently address the hunger problem. His diocese in South Cotabato province is based 980 kilometers southeast of Manila.

Bishop Gutierrez, chairman of the bishops' social justice and peace commission, said Arroyo's administration "has done something" to address poverty, such as government-funded stores in communities that sell basic goods and rice to people without profit. However, government programs must aspire to develop more permanent "food security," the bishop insisted.

In 2000, the National Statistics Office estimated that 40 percent of the country's 76 million people were poor. In June, a survey of the Social Weather Stations, a private research group, estimated that 2.6 million Philippine households were experiencing hunger.

Bishop Gutierrez said Congress also must prevent moves to open the country to foreign mining corporations, as well as create laws to stop extrajudicial killings and reform the electoral process. He said he hopes legislators will revise the 1995 Mining Act, whose repeal bishops have been demanding.

As of July 7, says human rights group Karapatan (rights), 885 persons have been killed and 183 have been abducted since Arroyo became president in 2001.

Many alleged victims belonged to leftist groups that accuse the state of resorting to killings and abductions to silence critics and suspected sympathizers of the Communist Party. About 5,000 members of leftist groups rallied with human rights advocates, including priests and other religious, outside the House of Representatives as Arroyo was delivering her address.

Arroyo said she aims to "fight against lawless violence" by asking Congress to enact laws enabling a proper state response to political violence.

Bishop Arturo Bastes of Sorsogon echoed the Church's concern about the killings and poverty. In a statement the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines media office issued on July 24, he said, "The picture of the Philippines is not as good as what she (Arroyo) told us because we (still) experience real poverty and extrajudicial killings."

The bishop, who led the mining investigation commission on the 2006 Lafayette Mine spill in his diocese, based 370 kilometers southeast of Manila, said he is "glad" Arroyo "did not mention mining activities, which is a very destructive way of earning money."

Arroyo has been accused of cheating in the 2004 presidential elections, but attempts to impeach her have failed. As vice president, she succeeded ousted president Joseph Estrada in 2001 and publicly stated she would not run in the 2004 presidential elections. However, she filed her candidacy for 2004, explaining that she knew how to steer the country toward progress.

In her recent address in Congress, she said, "I will not be in the way of anyone's ambition" for president in 2010. However, she added that she also will not allow anyone to prevent her vision of a modern Philippines from becoming "permanently rooted" and bearing fruit by the end of her term.

The last Congress had an output of 84 bills, the lowest number passed since the bicameral body was revived in 1987. Of 237 members in the 14th Congress, 219 represent geographic districts and 18 are party-list representatives. Twelve senators were elected with them in May 14, also for three-year terms.

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