Tag: Victor Andres C. Manhit

Financial inclusion has become a global challenge. In a recent International Monetary Fund (IMF) report, about 1.7 billion adults around the world remain unbanked which simply means that they are still without an account in a financial institution. China has the greatest number of these unbanked individuals, followed by India and then Pakistan.

In the recent Technology and Innovation Summit entitled, “Innovative Philippines: Transforming Barriers to Productivity, Transparency and Inclusive Growth,” organized by the Stratbase Group, thought leaders from government, and the information and communications technology (ICT) sector came together to discuss the challenges faced by the industry, as well as the policy directions and strategies to cope with and succeed in the changing landscape of the digital economy.

A wide-ranging value chain analysis on the Philippine economy leads us to try new strategies, which can eventually jumpstart “real” development. The fact remains that our country is the fifth most mineralized country in the world; the issue of effective resource management in order to unleash the potentials of this “underground” wealth is a good strategic approach as this can finance development and activate key industries in the process.

In the playbook of democratic governance, government and its institutions perform the role of an enabler that provides the necessary legal and regulatory environment for the delivery of better and affordable public services.

For two straight quarters, the Philippine economy has not grown as projected by its economic managers. The 5.5% gross domestic product growth in the second quarter of the year is considered the lowest in the past 17 quarters. This should be a wake-up call for lawmakers and economic managers; we are in “challenging times,” as economic planning secretary Ernesto Pernia put it.

27.8 million learners are starting the 2019-2020 school year during what could be considered a relatively propitious time marked by four positive events.

The post-election period is of many things -- grudging, irregularities, media hyping, protests, and celebration. Today, however, the major current has shifted toward electoral stability, improvement and reforms.

The conduct of electoral contests has been a defining element of a democratic life. As a litmus test for democracy, elections bring into the fore the power of the ballot and the sanctity of the vote.

The election spirit is in the air!

In both colonial and post-colonial periods, political contestation in Philippine society has always been dynamic, in which elites and the masses engage in a particular exercise called elections.

After more than two years in office, the Duterte administration has not fulfilled its promise to end contractualization. Reports indicate that there are an estimated 1.3 million Filipinos who are contractually employed in the country. The efforts of the Office of the President and the Department of Labor and Employment had not been able to resolve the perennial problem of job insecurity. The President himself admitted that the Executive Order he issued last year was not enough and it’s Congress that should pass a legislation to ensure security of tenure for laborers.

Political contestation is one of the major components of a democratic setup. It involves challenging the position of incumbent and outgoing leaders of government at the national, congressional, and local levels. In particular, electoral contestation has been recognized as the regular form of political contest and has been recognized to represent electoral democracy.

It is said that it takes at least five years to see either the benefits and/or the ill effects of a particular legislation. However, now that we are in an inflation jam, it only took six months to see the very negative effects from the imposition of more taxes.

Eight months since the first phase of the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (TRAIN) Law was implemented, inflation hit a near-decade-high 6.4%, well beyond government forecasts and, more crucially, something that may upend years’ worth of significant economic growth.

States do not act in isolation from other states. As they attempt to achieve political and economic goals, it is foreign policy that keeps them interactive and engaged with regional and international actors. In so doing, some “rules,” both formal and informal, have emerged and developed and eventually became the way toward international relations.

As we commemorate the second anniversary of our nation’s victory in the Arbitral Tribunal, we reflect on how the Philippine government has used this landmark ruling to generate support from the international community and to uphold our claims over the West Philippine Sea.

A chorus of local and international economic analysts made a unanimous forecast for 2018: economic growth is expected to be faster than the 6.7%...