Mountain Province is one of the first priority provinces for the government's Alleviated Hunger Mitigating Program (AHMP), a project that aims to eradicate hunger and malnutrition in the region.
Dalog said families in the province provide their own food and they are not bothered by hunger problems.
Ifugao Governor Teddy Baguilat supported the claim of Dalog as he said there is no acute hunger in the region. "We may be having a malnutrition because of the (imbalanced diet we have), but not hunger," he said.
Health executives have identified the provinces of Mountain Province, Ifugao, Kalinga, Abra and Apayao as "food poor" areas. These provinces are expected to benefit from the AHMP project. Benguet is not included in the list.
Experts define hunger as the feeling of discomfort because of not being able to eat.
Recent surveys done by the Social Weather Stations revealed that people in Cordillera suffer from hunger but political leaders but also from other ranking government officials disagreed with the finding.
Earlier, Agriculture Assistant Regional Director Pedro Baliang refuted the survey. He said families in the region do not really go hungry.
"They may suffer from malnutrition, as a result of the imbalanced diet, but they eat three times a day and never go hungry," said Baliang.
Presidential assistant for Cordillera affairs Thomas Killip also disagreed with the declaration. He said Cordillerans may be poor but they do not go hungry.
"Generally, the so-called poor in the Cordillera region are not that extremely poor economically, but many cannot afford the necessities that make a decent life. Many are malnourished but we do not see the face of endemic hunger and starvation that stalk whole societies and tribes of Africa," he stressed.
