In his presentation in Manila’s Makati business district, Luz highlighted the Philippines’ lowly ranking in a range of categories, from “paying taxes” (143rd), to “starting a business” (161st) and “resolving insolvency” (165th). That is only about 3 percent of the total that flowed last year to a group of five peer economies including the Philippines in the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
Total FDI is on course to hit around $1.5 billion this year - about half its level in 2007 and less than the average $1.7 billion received every month in remittances from Filipinos overseas. While foreign funds have poured into Philippine assets this year, driving the main stock index up around 30 percent to a succession of record highs and lifting the peso currency about 7 percent, foreign direct investment (FDI) remains embarrassingly low. “I do not want to live with that ranking.”Īs the Philippines gallops ahead with the strongest economic growth in Southeast Asia and one of the world’s best-performing stock markets, its shortcomings are being laid bare, including stubborn problems that have already started to undermine its economic renaissance. “It’s a lousy neighbourhood,” he said of the two-notch fall this year.
Luz, head of the Philippines’ National Competitiveness Council, projected a deck of slides onto two pull-down screens that showed the fast-growing Philippine economy slipping in the World’s Bank’s “Ease of Doing Business” index to 138 out of 185 countries, near Tajikistan and Sudan. About 100 executives and government officials listened quietly as Guillermo Luz poked holes in the Philippines’ fairytale economic revival. MANILA (Reuters) - The gathering had the air of a post-mortem.