Gov’t nearing aspirational growth target

MANILA, Philippines - The Aquino administration is getting close to achieving its “aspirational growth” of seven to eight percent as it begins to address “constraints” in economic expansion, Finance Secretary Cesar Purisima said yesterday.

“As you know, our aspirational growth target is from seven to eight percent and we are sticking to that. We believe we have moved up the growth capacity of our country,”  Purisima told reporters.

From 4.7-percent “trend growth” over the last decade, Purisima noted that the local economy grew by an average of 6.1 percent over the past three years.

The local economy expanded by 7.8 percent in the first quarter.

“What we need to do is to continue to bring that up by removing constraints to growth,” he added.

The Philippine economy was Asia’s fastest growing economy in the first quarter, expanding 7.8 percent which beat the government’s six -to seven-percent target this year.

For next year, the target has been set at 6.5 percent to 7.5 percent, but Purisima said the “aspirational target” remains as the government looks at curbing one of Southeast Asia’s highest unemployment rate of 7.5 percent.

In 2010 when the Aquino administration took over, the aspirational target over the next six years was unveiled to include boost coming from the centerpiece economic program, the public-private partnership (PPP).

This time around, Purisima said “everything will be included” from the PPP, which has been hit with delays for the past three years, the government’s own infrastructure spending and creation of fiscal space.

“We continue to create space so that we can continue to spend on infrastructure and social services,” he explained.

For instance, he cited the 35.6-percent increase in infrastructure spending to P104.6 billion for the first five months of the year. For the whole of 2013, the Aquino administration plans to spend a total of P312.3 billion in infrastructure.

The amount would account to 16 percent of the P2.006-trillion national outlay, Purisima said. For next year, 20-percent of the proposed P2.268-trillion budget, equivalent to P403.5 billion, will be spent for infrastructure.