An economist in the House of Representatives on Friday said economic recovery and meeting the revised targets of the Development Budget Coordinating Committee (DBCC) will depend on the management of the public health situation and the passage of a third Bayanihan package.
Albay Rep. Joey Sarte Salceda of Albay made the statement in response to the interagency budget group’s announcement on Thursday that it was lowering its 2021 growth target by two percentage points or from 6 -7 percent to 4- 5 percent.
“Everything will depend on whether we can keep ourselves from having to declare lockdowns over broad swathes of the economy, and on whether we can pass a third Bayanihan package to bolster our health response,” said Salceda, chairman of the House Committee on Ways and Means.
“Observe how we adjust our economic projections each time a major surge takes place. The first time we revised the 2021 targets, it was because of the provincial surges in May. The second one was because of the NCR (National Capital Region) lockdowns and the delays in the arrivals of vaccines.”
He said the arrival of vaccines has been picking up and this will help ensure positive economic performance this year.
“Anticipated targeted cumulative vaccine arrivals was at 56,386,810 doses. Only 42,575,350 vaccine doses have arrived so far. The largest delays were in the private sector orders.”
“As a result of vaccine arrival delays, 7-day average of vaccine rollout has been in a continuous decline since August 5 (at 548,000 doses 7-day trailing average). As of August 15, a total of 12.6 million Filipinos have received two doses of the COVID-19 vaccines. This is just 11.63 percent of the population,” Salceda said.
He added that, in view of the emerging economic situation, the House leadership and the economic managers are “mutually sold on some form of Bayanihan 3.”
“Without a Bayanihan package to help us speed things up on the health front, we might have a much harder time recovering,” Salceda said.
“That is why we are hard at work in negotiating a third Bayanihan package with the economic managers. We are already meeting halfway. The House has already reduced its request to P170.1 billion in pandemic response and ayuda. We had a meeting with the economic managers, and the Department of Budget and Management has already found funding for at least 50 percent of the request.”
“There is another option that will fully fund the package, but that means abandoning the unobligated items in the 2021 budget. That has its tradeoffs, and August is too early to tell how much of such items can still be obligated,” Salceda added.