Economic growth

 EDITORIAL

Despite the “rise” in the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), according to the government, cause-oriented groups are saying wealth is unevenly distributed and the gap between the rich and the poor is getting wider.

           

Anakbayan, an organization of young workers and professionals, peasants, out-of-school and community youth and students, said recent rise in the GDP, dubbed by Malacañang as “extraordinary,” has “accrued only to a few while millions live in deep poverty.”

           

The youth group dismissed as “delusional” Budget Secretary Florencio Abad’s statement that “these positive figures reaffirm exactly” Aquino’s “kung walang corrupt, walangmahirap.”

           

The growth recorded merely reflects increased economic activity but it does not actually translate to poverty reduction or better quality of life for the people, according to Anakbayan Cordillera spokesperson Tracy Anne Dumalo. “Hunger and unemployment continue to rise even as the economy has grown.”

           

According to independent think-tank IBON Foundation, out of the 92 million Filipinos in 2010, 65 million or 70 percent are considered poor, living on P104 or less per day. In February, a Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey showed that hunger incidence rose from 4.1 million families to 4.5 million.

           

As proof of the widening gap between the rich and poor, Anakbayan also cited IBON’s findings that the net worth of 25 richest Filipinos in 2009, US $ 21.4 billion, is equivalent to the combined income in a year of the poorest 11.1 million families.

           

According to IBON, while the growth translated to 1.1 million in additional jobs according to the National Economic Development Authority, it is far-flung from the record-high 11.6 million unemployed and underemployed.

           

The mandated minimum wage, on the other hand, falls far short of providing for a decent living and what business-owners can afford.

           

The groups noted the national government’s spending on basic social services such as education, health and housing, among others, as a share of gross domestic product has continued to drop.

           

“If not reducing poverty by not counting the poor (government downplays poverty data by changing methodologies), the government resorts to a rehash of lies and exaggerations that his flagship Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) program has reduced poverty,” said Dumalo.

           

“In fact the CCT, cited as part of “increased government spending”—a major player in the GDP growth—will result in a heavier debt burden for Filipinos, an estimated US $ 508.5 million in 25 years.”    Anakbayan also slammed the government for “not doing enough to prepare for the looming global economic downturn worse than the 2008 crisis and for continuously implementing failed and inequitable neoliberal policies of globalization such as elimination of tariffs, deregulation of important industries and privatization of social services and government agencies.”

           

According to the groups, the Philippine economy relies heavily on export of cheap raw materials or semi-processed goods, OFW remittances, tourism and foreign-dictated programs—the CCT and Public Private Partnership (PPP) Projects—that have caused damage to people’s dwellings and livelihood and foreign loans from ADB and IMF-World Bank which have greatly contributed to the worsening quality of life of millions of people in the world.

           

The groups said there is no substitute for strengthening the domestic economy through strategic agricultural development and creation of national industries with genuine agrarian reform as base in redistributing wealth.

           

The government could take note and act on these observations.