One notch better
Economic performance pushed up the Philippines by a notch in the latest World Competitiveness rankings, putting the country in 41st place among 63 economies.
Any improvement in national competitiveness is welcome news, but it should also be seen as a challenge to work harder. Among 14 Asia-Pacific economies, the Philippines ranked 11th. That’s not much to crow about. And while robust gross domestic product growth and economic resilience led to an improvement in the economic performance criterion, the Philippines still ranked near the bottom in terms of personal incomes.
The International Institute for Management Development, which drew up the World Competitiveness rankings, noted that the Philippines’ rankings fell in two of the four broad categories – government efficiency and business efficiency. And while the country improved by one notch in the fourth category, infrastructure, it was still ranked a low 54th in this area. The country continues to be rated as a laggard in terms of infrastructure.
Those three other categories determine the strength of economic performance. The Philippines continues to rank low in indicators for ease of doing business. This weakness contributed to the slip in the country’s ranking in the government efficiency category.
Last April, the country dropped five spots in travel and tourism competitiveness. In the report prepared by the World Economic Forum, the Philippines fell from 74th place to 79th out of 136 countries.
The private sector has been working with the government in a council to boost national competitiveness. The slight improvement in the World Competitiveness report should spur the nation to do more.
