Lifting restrictions on foreign investments ‘good for economy’

Removing the protectionist provisions of the Constitution will make the Philippines more attractive to foreign investors and power up economic growth, the government’s chief socioeconomic planner said.

“Clearly, if we can remove all these restrictions, particularly constitutional restrictions, it’s good for the economy because we know all along that these very protectionist [and] restrictive provisions have prevented us from moving as fast as we want to,” Secretary Arsenio Balisacan of the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) said in an interview with reporters.

Balisacan was responding to questions on moves at the House of Representatives to amend the charter for the sake of attracting more investors.

No less than President Marcos himself said he would study the latest attempt at the House led by his cousin, Speaker Martin Romualdez, to revise the Constitution for the purpose of making the Philippines “an investment friendly place.”

However, analysts have said that the Philippines might have already missed the economic Charter change (Cha-cha) boat, adding it would take more than constitutional tweaks to convince foreign investors to come here like enacting new business-friendly reforms.

Same objective

Experts also said there were existing laws, which could achieve the same objective of Cha-cha.

During the twilight years of his administration, former President Rodrigo Duterte enacted two key reforms meant to open up the economy to more foreign investments.

The first one was the Retail Trade Liberalization Act that sought to simplify and ease restrictions for foreign retailers that wish to set up shop in the Philippines. The other was amendments to the Commonwealth-era Public Service Act, which opened industries once deemed off-limits to foreign capital—such as telecommunications, airlines and railways—to full foreign ownership.

While those laws helped eased restrictions on foreign investments, Balisacan said those were “kind of a piecemeal thing.”

He added that Mr. Marcos has not yet given any instructions to study the Cha-cha proposal being pushed at the lower chamber.

“We’ll look at it when we get there,” Balisacan said.