WB study notes Phl’s poor jobs record

MANILA, Philippines - Over the decade, only about a fourth of the potential entrants to the labor force in the Philippines land good jobs, according to a study conducted by the World Bank.

World Bank Philippines senior country economist Karl Kirk Chua attributed the poor employment conditions – despite the strong growth figures – to the country’s long history of policy distortions and complex regulations.

Policy distortions slowed the growth of agriculture and manufacturing in the last six decades, he said.

By 2016, around 12.4 million Filipinos would still be unemployed or underemployed and would end up as reserves for the low quality, low paying informal sector, he added.

Chua explained that agricultural productivity has remained depressed, manufacturing has failed to grow, and a low-productivity, low-skill services sector emerged as the dominant feature of the economy.

Likewise, the lack of competition in many sectors, lack of security of property rights, complex regulations, and severe under-investment by the government and the private sector has led to this growth pattern, which is not the norm in the East Asia region, said the report, titled “The Philippine Development Report (PDR): Creating More and Better Jobs.”

“This economic growth pattern failed to provide good jobs,” the World Bank economist said.

Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan earlier pointed out that the agriculture and manufacturing sectors are critical to sustainable economic growth, job creation and poverty alleviation.

He pointed to agri-food processing, furniture, tourism, infrastructure/logistics and construction; business process outsourcing/management; and agri-business.

The country’s total labor force now numbers 41 million, or which the number of employed reached 38.2 million, a mere 1.7 percent more than the 37.6 million last year.

According to the World Bank report, good jobs need to be generated for around 10 million Filipinos, either unemployed (three million) or underemployed (seven million) and to around 1.15 million potential entrants to the labor force every year from 2013 to 2016.

That is a total of around 14.6 million jobs in the formal and informal sectors that need to be created, sustained or improved in the next four years.

The Philippines boosts of an average 4.1 percent growth rate in the last three decades which is, in fact, lower than the 6.5 percent average growth of its more dynamic East Asian peers.