Philippines urged to leverage key competencies

Instead of complaining about how the Philippines tend to rank low in various competitiveness surveys, both the public and private sectors should consider collaborating to capitalize on the country’s key competencies and address inadequacies.

According to Center for Industrial Competitiveness executive director Virgilio Fulgencio, what was often noticed was the country’s low overall position in these surveys, neglecting to see where the country excelled and which areas could be leveraged for better ranking results in the future.

Fulgencio said that in various country competitiveness surveys—including those conducted by the World Bank, World Economic Forum, and the International Institute for Management Development—the Philippines ranked No. 1 in some areas.

“We ranked No. 1 in senior management competency, worker skills, number of women in executive positions, and high-tech exports. We should also take note of where we got good scores and not just focus on where we fell short,” Fulgencio said.

This is not to say that the country must become complacent in these areas, he said. These high scores should motivate agencies and enterprises to work harder to boost the country’s level of competitiveness in other aspects.

In the WEF Global Competitiveness Report 2010-2011, the Philippines placed 85th among the 139 economies surveyed. This particular survey evaluated the conduciveness of an economy for doing business.

Respondents to the WEF survey cited corruption, inefficient government bureaucracy, inadequate infrastructure, unstable policies, and tax regulations as the biggest hurdles to doing business in the country.

On the other hand, in the latest IMD World Competitiveness Yearbook, the Philippines ranked 41st among the 59 economies included in the study, with a score of 63.29 out of a possible 100.

The country ranked very low—almost at the bottom—in foreign direct investments, basic education, basic infrastructure, scientific infrastructure, governance and ease of doing business.

National Competitiveness Council co-chairman Guillermo Luz had earlier said that the agency would “map each indicator and assign it to the concerned departments, which would identify and implement programs to improve” the country’s ranking in the said area.