Sustaining an economic growth remains the biggest challenge under the government’s five-year Philippine development plan.

“We need to develop and implement coherent policies and programs, including labor policies and programs, in order to achieve a sustained growth,” says Socio-economic Planning Secretary Arsenio Balisacan.

He stressed that improving and sustaining competitiveness is the key to rapid and sustained growth.

The Philippines has improved its competitiveness to 65 this year from 75 in 2011 out of 142 countries.

Balisacan noted that Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand are ranked 50, 27 and 38, respectively. “We aim to be among the top one-third of countries and this means moving up at least 27 notches.”

Competitiveness ranking is based partly on the quality of governance which the Philippines has improved 31 notches.

“The factor that continues to pull down our ranking is labor market efficiency. The challenge is to be able to improve on this but not at the expense of ensuring decent work and social protection for all,” says Balisacan.

He pointed out that the government continue to invest in the health and education, skills training, technology and innovation and infrastructure to create an environment that encourages private investment to increase labor productivity.

original source: www.mb.com.ph