By Mortz C. Ortigoza
Economic experts said the Philippines lags
with South East Asian neighbours Vietnam, Indonesia, Thailand, and Singapore in
terms of foreign direct investment (FDI).
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| Filipinos breed like rabbits. PHOTO CREDIT: Rappler.com |
To cite data from the United Nations
Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), it says our country in 2014 got
U.S$ 6.2 billion foreign direct investment (FDI) only while FDI poured
generously at the tune of $ 9.2 billion in Vietnam, $ 22.6 billion in
Indonesia, $12.6 Thailand, and S67.5 billion in Singapore in the same year.
Philippines snared more foreign monies in
South East Asia
Since we talk here about foreign monies that
benefit our people, the Philippine was not a sissy, as many economics expert
painted, on snaring FDI.
We are
Top 2 after Singapore in the burgeoning South East Asian (SEA) economic alliance
in getting foreign monies in and outside the Philippines.
Our country is a recipient of a staggering
U.S $34.60 billion if we include the U.S $28.40 billion (World Bank) remittances
sent by the millions of overseas foreign workers (OFWs), the ballyhooed economic
saving grace of the country, in 2014.
So if Vietnam and Indonesia (second and third
after the Philippines in the SEA region that send workers overseas) have
U.S$21.20 billon and U.S$ 31.15 billion, respectively if we integrate the data
from UNCTAD and the remittances list from the World Bank, the Philippines
becomes No. 2 after Singapore by ranking who got the most foreign monies.
Despite being the Top 2, probably the first
time you read from a columnist, why we are still poor versus Thailand and
Singapore despite the $34.60 billion that entered the country and the 6.7 percent
Gross Domestic Product last year – dubbed as one of the fastest economic growth
engines in the world?
Pathetic Per Capita Income and 9.1 million
unemployed
With a per capita income (PCI) of U.S
$2,872.5 (World Bank, 2011-2014) versus Thailand and Singapore’s PCI of
$5,977.4 and $ 56,284.6,respectively, we
have 6.8 percent unemployment rate or 4, 228,852 unemployed in a labor force of
62, 189,000 according to the Philippine Statistics Office.
But the December 8, 2015 survey of the Social
Weather Station said that 9.1 million Filipinos were unemployed.
PCI, by the way, is the mean money income
received in the past 12 months computed for every man, woman, and child in a
geographic area. It is derived by dividing the total income of all people 15
years old and over in a geographic area by the total population in that area.
This massive number of jobless, aggravated
this year by the dropped of the prices of oil in the Middle East, and the
runaway population explosion, where ironically the poor bear more children than
the moneyed, would aggravate the economic stocks of the poor in the Philippines.
Aggressively Promote Population Control
To arrest the exploding demography, so there
would be less poor Filipinos who will compete with the jobs brought by FDI, our
growing manufacturing base, the jobs generated because of the remittances of
the OFWs, and the business outsourcing firms, the government should
aggressively promote population control by giving contraceptives to the people.
But if these dole-outs of condoms, pills, and
others will smack head on with the legalities as provided by the Reproductive
Health Law, the private sectors through foundations, can play a role on the
promotion (just like Trust Condom promoted then on TV as advertisement) or
their free distribution.
Let’s emulate Thailand how to reduce our
population
