In search of long-range plans

R. V. Vicerra / Cedar

The official poverty ratio of 24.9 percent means that one out of every four Filipinos today is poor – living on only P52 (a little over $1 a day). This means also that roughly 25 million Filipinos (and perhaps 2 million more) are living on very limited means of sustenance that barely covers a meal or two. Living in dire and subhuman conditions, with limited information and knowledge to guide them, the poor have managed to cope with the risks and difficulties and the daily grind of survival. Aided by a few success stories, including those of Manny Pacquiao and some rags-to-riches political and business personalities, many are still attached to high hopes that somehow, better days could come along.

In their quest for better living conditions, most Filipinos have come to gracefully accept that it is not bad to start from the bottom. And that with good education and a dose of good fortune, the hope of a better life is also fueled by the allure of greener pastures from the other side of the ocean.

 

Daunting problems

For decades, the country has faced overwhelming challenges, apart from the economic ones – the continuing low levels of per-capita income and low savings. Although some pressure has been eased by the entry of business process outsourcing –direct investments in factory plants and other industries as well as in agriculture and processing have never been enough to absorb almost a million jobseekers every year. The country faces very high levels of unemployment and underemployment – officially at 7.5 percent and 19.5 percent, respectively, or more if Social Weather Stations surveys are to be believed.

The government continues to grapple with its huge debt service –P333 billion in interest payments for 2015 alone, occasioned by chronic fiscal deficits running by at least a hundred billion pesos every year to add to existing debt.

The Philippines has done poorly in international indices, such as competitiveness, economic freedom, human development, educational achievement, farm productivity, environmental quality, and control of population growth. Still, rising incidence of crime, epidemics and disaster hog the headlines almost daily. The judicial system is clogged with close to a million cases yet to be resolved. Add to these, the continuing saga of leftist revolutionary and Islamic separatist groups and a million firearms on the loose. Meanwhile, large swaths of land in various key cities are growing squatter colonies as the housing backlog is stuck at the level of 3.7 million units as of 2011 and growing at the average rate of 148,000 yearly.

 

Some good news

The country, of course, is not alone in these kinds of predicament. Dozens of other Third-World nations might even have worse problems. In fact, the Philippines may even be doing better currently than some developed countries, particularly those in Europe. Due to the current relative calm in the domestic economy as a result of prudent macro-economic policies and the continuing strong remittances of overseas Filipino workers, the glowing 6-7 percent growth GNP in recent years has positioned the Philippines as a top-performing economy in this part of the world. Also, because of the sensational discovery of abuses in the pork-barrel system, the high incidence of graft and corruption in one segment of the public sector may have been significantly tempered – thanks mainly to the historic judicially induced reforms on PDAF and DAP.

 

Coasting along

Yet, the sense of weariness is growing in many sectors. As one columnist puts it: “Everything and yet nothing is happening.” One gets the feeling that the government and the nation at large are simply coasting along. This arises from the absence of a guidance and direction coming from our leaders, be it among the political parties, the business sector, etc. Most, if not all, key institutions of the country and economy (government, justice system, the military, power sector, environment, agriculture, and even private industry groups such as the banks, exporters, and manufacturers) have yet to produce synchronized national and regional development blueprints.

The current situation is an assortment of dog-eat-dog competition, “leave it to market” policy stance, and a gradualist approach in planning and budgeting. At best, the country has medium-term development plan documents that change with every elected President and which are mainly used to justify government agency budgets.

This predicament is due to the lack of long-range plans and visions to ignite the imagination of Filipinos and effectively unite them to action. All that government leaders, and even the private sector, can do is to react to problems at hand – which for the most part can be firefighting in nature. There is an on-going process to develop road maps for key industry sectors. Until such plans are acknowledged by the relevant segments of the community, they remain as books on the shelves of a government functionary.

The Philippines has yet no long-range vision or leaders to provide the basis for policy continuity and such compelling dreams that Filipinos would want to work for. [The next column will describe some examples.]

 

Rodolfo Vicerra—Has a Masters Degree in Development Economics from Williams College, Massachusetts. He was Director-General of the Congressional Planning and Budget Office of the House of Representatives from 2004 -2010.