Diversification of RP exports urged

An economist of a government think-tank group has called for the diversification of Philippine exports for the sector to acquire a bigger role in over-all economic growth. Diversification will wean Philippine exports from over-dependence on the performance on transnational companies.

The call was made by Dr. Myrna S. Austria of the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS) in a research paper that reviewed the performance of the Philippine economy’s performance under a globalizing trade environment.

The government has implemented substantial trade and investment policy reforms during the past two decades, Austria concludes.

"While the reforms resulted in positive impacts in resource allocation, competitiveness, productivity and exports, these were not accompanied by a comparable growth of manufacturing output, leading some sectors to question the reforms," the PIDS economist concludes.

She goes on to say that a shift from the export of primary goods like logs, raw sugar, and copper concentrate to manufactured goods does not suffice to rev up over-all growth.

The effect of international trade to economic growth, Austria argues, depends largely on how much trade is linked to the domestic economic activity. The rapid expansion of high-technology exports has not translated to faster economic growth.

Besides the need to diversify product lines for export, Austria also suggests that the Philippines has to graduate to the production of second generation exports of high value-added technology intensive products.

"The government needs to act fast because given the technological race, opportunities for the country to upgrade to the technological ladder have become much more difficult," she adds.

Meanwhile, a new system conceptualized to further simplify export procedures by means of computerization is now fully operational.

The Automated Export Documentation System, also known as the AEDS, aims to make exporting from ecozones simpler, more conventional and less costly to the locators, while attempting to curb smuggling and promote business in the process.

This breakthrough in the country’s export documentation procedure is a joint undertaking by the Semiconductors and Electronics Industry of the Philippines, Inc. (SEIPI), the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (PEZA), Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) Cargo Office and the Bureau of Customs (BOC) as specified in a memorandum of agreement (MOA) among the said offices.

Under this system, the locator need not to go to a Customs or PEZA offices as he can lodge his company’s Export Declaration (ED) in the office. A server for this purpose is at the NAIA Customs House to facilitate and regulate the flow of the transactions.

A brief flow of the system is as follows:

1. The locator electronically lodges the ED his office. Keying in the declarant’s password in this electronic filing of declaration is equivalent to signing the declaration.

2. The BOC-Enterprise Assistance Division (EAD) will view the declarations filed.

3. The forwarder presents the printed ED/ATL at the gate for barcode verification prior to the departure from the zone.

4. The Airline Office will verify the authenticity of the Export Declaration and the Loading of Cargo;

5. The BOC-Export Division will conduct a documentary check of all shipments and issue release of the export documentation.

For this system to work, the exporter needs to have at least a Pentium II Unit, a printer and leased communication lines, and softwares such as Asycuda++, Windows 95/98, Communication SoftwareOnNet and Anti-Virus.

The pilot implementation of the system involved transactions of several major electronics exporters such as Intel Technology Phils., Cypress Semiconductor Phils., Analog Devices Phils., Maxim Phils., Operating Corp., and Luzon Electronics Technology.

Since it was launched in July this year, about 3,345 Export Declarations have been lodged from this firms, according to Luis Magsanoc of the Philippine Economic Zone Authority. – Philexport News and Features