Finance Secretary Ralph Recto said every peso collected by his agency is being stretched to fund education, food security, social protection and infrastructure programs in line with the administration’s goal of producing a generation of globally competitive Filipinos.
“Education must be a top priority of the government. And it is the last expenditure upon which the Philippines should be willing to economize,” he said during the 2024 Philippine Association of State Universities and Colleges (PASUC) Annual Convention and General Assembly at the SMX Convention Center in Pasay City on Monday.
“Because a country’s progress hinges on the quality of its human capital, education dictates whether a nation prospers or remains poor,” he added.
According to the 2024 General Appropriations Act (GAA), education has the bulk of budget allocation worth P969 billion – 8.2 percent higher compared to the 2023 budget
Of the total, funding for State Universities and Colleges (SUCs) reached P132.9 billion, a double-digit or 19.3 percent increase from last year.
This includes a P21.7 billion allocation for SUCs to provide free tertiary education to over 3.1 million students across the country, a law Recto championed in 2017 during his tenure as a legislator.
“It was my goal to ensure that every student who cannot make it to college on his own receives a helping hand from the government. After all, building the country’s talent pool is not the responsibility of families alone. The government has to be proactive and give its share,” he said.
With the Philippines currently enjoying a demographic sweet spot or a median age of only 25 years old, the Finance chief said having more workers with college diplomas could fuel a transformative surge in productivity, innovation, and economic growth–breaking the cycle of poverty in the country.
To fully harness this potential, he said the government is also equally prioritizing social protection, food security, and physical infrastructure to ensure that Filipinos are not just well-educated but are healthy and thriving.
This year, the government is spending around P440 billion on social protection programs like “ayuda” (assistance); P221.7 billion on the agriculture sector to improve agricultural productivity; and P1.47 trillion on infrastructure projects to enhance the country’s logistics backbone, including disaster-resilient school buildings.
To prepare the next generation of students for a future driven by artificial intelligence (AI), the government is also working on bridging the digital divide from Luzon to Mindanao through the Philippine Digital Infrastructure Project and the National Broadband Program, Recto said.
