Economy

After many years of struggling, the Philippines’ electronics industry appears to be finally making a turnaround, thanks to an improving investment climate and strengthening global demand. Bankers, economists and business executives who follow the industry’s fortunes say the turnaround began in late 2013 and has been gathering pace since. The...

How can connectivity to and from economic zones be facilitated to complement growth?

After years of lagging behind its South-east Asian peers, the Philippines is seeing a long-awaited awakening of foreign direct investment (FDI). Although FDI volumes are still smaller than what countries in its peer group attract, the Philippines has been catching up at an impressive pace. Although many of the challenges that impeded...

Labour exports are usually thought of as signifying a lack of opportunity in the domestic economy, and countries that do so are often seen as tacitly admitting that they are unable to organise domestic production. Indeed, the Philippines initiated its policy of labour exports in the 1960s under dictator Ferdinand Marcos, largely because he was desperately short of hard-...

The Philippine economy continues to enjoy a period of rapid, broad-based growth as the business process outsourcing (BPO) sector and growing remittances from overseas workers drive growth in consumer-oriented industries and construction. Although real growth decelerated in 2014 to 6.1%, it remained higher than Southeast Asian peers, and it is expected to remain near 6%...

The current run of rapid growth is an opportunity for the Philippines to do something much more valuable than just advance material wealth and catch up with middle-income peers. With the right policies, the Philippines government believes that this could be the era when the country is finally able to successfully address widespread poverty.