THE number 8 is believed to be a lucky number. This is especially the case when the number is flipped because it becomes the symbol for infinity or forever.
The current administration may have had this in mind when it chose its eight-point Socioeconomic Agenda. The aim of the agenda is to institute reforms that will not only be good for the near and medium term but also pave the way for the long term.
The agenda is said to be this administration’s strategy in achieving economic transformation in the country. This transformation aims to turn the Philippines into a prosperous, inclusive and resilient society.
“The 8-Point Socioeconomic Agenda of the Marcos administration identifies both the short-term and medium-term priorities in order for the country to return to its high-growth trajectory and reinvigorate high-quality job creation and rapid poverty reduction,” Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan said.
This agenda, Balisacan said, will be fleshed out in the Philippine Development Plan (PDP), the country’s development blueprint. The PDP, a crucial document in the country’s socioeconomic planning efforts, has been the bible of every administration.
One crucial difference this year, apart from the agenda, is the timeline for the PDP. The National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) is “moving mountains” to get a PDP completed and published by the end of the year. This has not been done before.
Balisacan said this is being done to allow the new administration to have a plan even before projects and programs are implemented. Previously, PDPs arrived too late and only get published after many of the projects have already begun.
This dilemma is something Balisacan wants to address. He said having a PDP by yearend will give the current administration the boost it needs to perform a herculean task to recover from the pandemic and get back on track to a higher growth path.
Lofty goals
THE eight-point agenda’s focus is on both near-term and medium-term issues. Foremost of these are efforts to protect the purchasing power of families.
Balisacan said agriculture remains a key factor in bringing down commodity prices, particularly food. Food and non-alcoholic beverages account for 37.75 percent of the consumer price index (CPI).
This is why, he explained, the government is committed to ensuring sufficient food supply and sustained subsidies to help Filipinos access affordable goods and services as inflation persists due to domestic and global pressures.
“Agriculture has a big role in ensuring a steady supply of food for every Filipino family, and accessible and affordable basic goods. That’s why we make sure there’s enough resources for our farmers and fishermen so that the supply of rice, corn, meat and fish is stable,” he recently said.
Apart from agriculture, Balisacan said the national government is also cognizant of the challenges posed by rising transportation, logistics and energy costs.
Transportation and logistics costs feed into prices of food and other commodities. Based on the CPI, transportation accounts for 9.03 percent of the basket. This means 9.03 percent of the income of Filipinos is usually spent on transportation.
Housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels is also one of the major causes of inflation as it accounts for 21.38 percent of the CPI. This is second in terms of weight to food and non-alcoholic beverages in terms of weight.
Apart from protecting the purchasing power of families, the eight-point agenda also aims to reduce vulnerability and mitigate scarring from the Covid-19 pandemic.
This includes ensuring the capacity of healthcare in case there are Covid-19 surges; addressing learning losses; and strengthening social protection.
Further, ensuring sound macroeconomic fundamentals and government processes is essential in the near and medium term. This agenda aims to enhance bureaucratic efficiency and sound fiscal management in the national government as well as ensuring a resilient and innovative financial sector.
“Socioeconomic scarring in health and education—made worse by the poor’s limited access to adequate healthcare as well as tools for remote learning—is expected to linger if it is not remedied. This is compounded by the poor’s vulnerability to environmental shocks and the lack of social protection that can cushion the impact of such shocks,” Balisacan earlier said.
But these agenda are just for the short term. The government said the rest of the eight-point agenda will be dedicated to addressing the medium-term constraints to the country’s economic transformation.
This includes efforts to create more jobs through an increase in investments; improving infrastructure; and ensuring energy security. A twin agenda to this is to create quality jobs.
The government aims to do this by increasing employability of workers; advancing research and development and innovation; and enhancing the digital economy.
The eight-point agenda was also specific in terms of what kind of jobs needs to be created. The agenda includes the creation of green jobs by establishing livable and sustainable communities as well as pursuing a green and blue economy.
The last two agenda items aim to ensure a level playing field and uphold public order and safety, peace and security in the country. These aim to ensure that Filipinos enjoy equal opportunities and the businesses that seek to invest in the country would be able to do so without fear.
“We must further strengthen our policy interventions so we can generate more jobs, green jobs, and high-quality jobs that provide adequate income for Filipino workers and to attain significant poverty reduction. These are necessary steps towards achieving economic transformation,” Balisacan said in a recent statement.
“We need to make sure that we are effectively implementing our disaster risk management measures, including social protection programs for communities affected by the recent calamities. Leveraging technology will improve preventive and responsive measures and mitigate possible labor market downturns in times of disasters,” he also said.
Reality bites
THE scarring brought by the lockdowns on the economy continues to be felt. And this is no surprise as the country’s former Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Karl Kendrick T. Chua said the pandemic and the lockdowns imposed by the government are expected to cost the Philippine economy a total of P41.4 trillion in the next 40 years.
Neda estimated that in 2020, the economy lost P4.3 trillion and is expected to continue to lose another P37 trillion in the next 10 to 40 years.
The total losses are P4.5 trillion in consumption; P21.34 trillion in private investment and returns; and P15.528 trillion in human capital investment and returns. (Full story: https://businessmirror.com.ph/2021/09/25/neda-pandemic-to-cost-phl-economy-p41-4-trillion-in-total-losses-over-next-40-years/)
Further, more recently, commodity prices have been increasing. The spike in inflation has brought down the purchasing power of Filipinos to only 0.86 centavos for every peso.
This means, in order to buy P100 worth of goods and services in 2018, every Filipino needs to spend an additional P14 or a total of P114 in today’s money.
The Neda attributes the erosion of Filipinos’ purchasing power to problems linked to the agriculture sector. Food prices have risen on the back of supply constraints as well as the most recent depreciation of the peso.
The Philippines is also a net food importer, which means the country imports more of its food needs than it can produce on its own. The weak peso is pushing up the cost of these items and eroding the purchasing power of Filipinos.
Jobs data
On the jobs front, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) announced that the country’s unemployment rate significantly declined to 5.3 percent in August 2022 from 8.1 percent in the same period last year.
This translates to a decrease of unemployed workers to 2.7 million in August 2022 from 3.9 million in August 2021.
However, the underemployment rate remained at 14.7 percent or 548,000 more employed individuals seeking additional hours of work.
PSA data also showed that invisible underemployment posted a 35-percent increase year-on-year and 11 percent on a month-on-month basis in August 2022.
The 35-percent increase translated to an addition of 654,000 Filipinos who are invisibly underemployed compared to August 2021, while the 11 percent translated to 253,000 more under this classification compared to July this year.
It can be noted that underemployed persons are employed persons who expressed a desire to have additional hours of work in their present job or to have an additional job, or to have a new job with longer hours of work.
Invisible underemployment is experienced by underemployed persons working at least 40 hours in a week. The PSA data includes a number of underemployed persons but with unreported hours worked under invisibly underemployed.
Poverty
THESE realities compound other deep-seated problems such as poverty. The pandemic has worsened poverty nationwide. Balisacan, citing PSA data, said poverty incidence increased to 18.1 percent in 2021 from 16.7 percent in 2018.
This, he said, is equivalent to around 2.3 million additional Filipinos being pushed into poverty compared to 2018. According to Balisacan, the unprecedented scale of the health and economic crisis, coupled with policy response challenges, caused such an increase.
The blueprint
IN a recent televised briefing, Neda Assistant Secretary for Planning and Policy Sarah-Lynne Daway-Ducanes said the focus of the Philippine Development Plan is to flesh out the eight-point agenda in order to address the many challenges the country faces in the near and medium term.
“In the 2023 to 2028 PDP, the focus will be job creation and poverty reduction. This PDP is based on the Ambisyon Natin 2040, which is the aspiration for a stable, prosperous and secure life for every Filipino,” Daway-Ducanes said.
AmBisyon 2040 was the brainchild of Balisacan during his first stint at the Neda under the administration of the late former President Benigno Simeon Aquino.
The AmBisyon Natin 2040 is the long-term visioning project of Neda. It articulated the long-term aspirations of Filipinos, and will serve to frame future development plans.
Based on the results of the long-term vision, AmBisyon2040, data showed Filipinos want a simple and comfortable life. This means owning a medium-sized home; earning enough to support everyday needs; owning at least one car/vehicle; providing for their children’s college education; and traveling around the country for vacation.
These cannot be achieved without the availability of jobs. “We will focus on creating a vibrant innovation system that can generate new ideas, products and processes in order [for the country] to undergo economic transformation,” Daway-Ducanes said.
The PDP 2023-2028 will, according to Neda Undersecretary for Policy and Planning Rosemarie G. Edillon, also be a roadmap towards improving the investment climate in the country with the objective of generating more and higher-quality employment in the medium term.
The blueprint also aims to transform the economy and make it more inclusive and resilient to unexpected shocks. The Plan will also be drafted with short-term issues in mind.
Edillon said that the game-changing reforms and policies passed or initiated in the previous administration shall serve as a strong foundation for these strategies.
These include the National Competition Policy, the Corporate Recovery and Tax Incentives for Enterprises (CREATE Law), and the amendments to the Public Service Act, Foreign Investments Act, and the Retail Trade Liberalization Act.
More than these lofty goals and ideals, the Neda said, the PDP is grounded on what Filipinos think should be prioritized and what should be done to achieve not only the administration’s goals for the next six years but also of Filipinos who want a better life.
Based on surveys done during PDP consultations, Neda said the objectives of the plan that resonated the most among the private sector were transforming production sectors to generate more quality jobs.
The private sector also identified with the goals of having competitive products followed by developing and protecting capabilities of individuals and families, as well as practicing good governance and improving bureaucratic efficiency.
Also included is ensuring macroeconomic stability and accelerating climate action and strengthening disaster resilience.
“For a nation of over 110 million people, a unified and cohesive development plan enables all of us in the public sector to work collaboratively so that our efforts are concerted and geared towards common goals. Importantly, a common understanding of where we are headed, how we will get there, and what role each of us will play is crucial to delivering results efficiently so that public resources do not go to waste,” Balisacan said.
Indeed, the goals may seem ambitious. But the hurdle has been rendered more challenging by the crisis of the past three pandemic years, and any effort to attain growth beyond simply recovering to prepandemic levels must set high goals.
Image credits: Nonie Reyes, Nonoy Lacza