Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III said he and the entire economic team are optimistic the country will shift to the looser Alert Level 1 by the start of 2022 due to the government’s aggressive vaccination program, which will boost the economy in the coming months.
In his message on Wednesday during the 47th Philippine Business Conference and Expo organized by the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI), Dominguez said the arrival of an adequate supply of vaccines and an aggressive COVID-19 inoculation program starting in the third quarter allowed more people to return to work.
Under Alert Level I, all businesses are allowed to operate at full-site capacity, subject to minimum public health standards.
Dominguez urged businesses to prepare to thrive under the terms of this new economy, particularly adapting more quickly to the new market realities created by digital technology.
“This event happens at a more buoyant time. We contained the Delta variant and sustained our economic expansion even as stringent quarantines were in place for certain periods. Our strategy was correct. The results are clear,” Dominguez said.
As of Nov. 15, the total number of vaccine doses administered has reached 70,677,771. Fully protected Filipinos are now at 31,868,120.
With its goal of vaccinating 70 percent or 77 million of the Philippines’ total population, the national government is on track to fully inoculate half of this number and administer at least one shot to 54 million Filipinos by the end of the month.
The government is set to hold a three-day national COVID-19 vaccination drive from Nov. 29 to Dec. 1, President Rodrigo Duterte said in his “Talk to the People” on Tuesday.
The economic managers led by Dominguez recently said in a joint statement that the economy’s third-quarter growth of 7.1 percent year-on-year and year-to-date expansion of 4.9 percent means that it is “on track to reach the high-end of our 4 to 5 percent growth target for 2021.”
“As the main drivers of wealth and job creation in our economy, I trust our private enterprises are adjusting quickly enough to the rapid changes in our economy. We cannot be slow-footed in keeping up with the challenge,” Dominguez said.
Dominguez said the country should take full advantage of its demographic sweet spot, in which its workforce is made up mostly of young and talented people ready to swiftly adjust to the transformations taking place in the new economy.
The PCCI, for its part, urged the government to fully open the economy now, even before achieving herd immunity from COVID-19, to rescue and rejuvenate commerce and industry.
This and nine more proposed resolutions will be submitted to the President Thursday, during the concluding ceremonies of the two-day Philippine Business Conference.
PCCI president Benedicto Yujuico shared his optimism that the government will heed the call of the business sector to implement the short, medium, and long-term proposed solutions to not only go back to normal but to rebound to become more resilient, competitive, innovative, and sustainable.
“We will not concede this projected future amid all the grim outlook from many sectors. We, at PCCI, believe we still have what it takes for a nation to become one of the most robust economies in the world.
The Philippine business sector will lead this change,” he said at the opening of the two-day conference.
The resolutions covered 10 specific areas including reopening the economy, jobs generation, internet connectivity, innovation advocacy, ease of doing business, agricultural productivity, education, environment,. energy efficiency, and infrastructure.
Specifically, PCCI called on the government to institutionalize innovation for economic development; assist businesses to create new and preserve existing jobs; fully implement ease of doing business; improve internet connectivity at competitive rates; modernize agriculture for food security; innovate and digitize the education system; balance industry growth and environmental protection; assure adequate power supply at a competitive cost; and, make infrastructure a cornerstone of economic development under Build. Build, Build.
PBC chairman Jeffrey T. Ng said the resolutions will be addressed to the outgoing government and aspiring new leaders of the country as the country braces for the 2022 national elections.
PCCI is the country’s largest business group with an estimated membership of 35,000 enterprises from direct and indirect members, which are mostly micro, small and medium enterprises.
Meanwhile, the independent OCTA Research Group said the number of new daily COVID-19 cases could drop to as low as 500 by December and 200 before the year ends.
OCTA fellow Guido David offered this projection during an interview on radio dzBB.
The Philippines logged 1,190 new COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, bringing the total number of cases to 2,820,494.
There were 309 new fatalities, bringing the COVID-19 death toll to 46,117. The Department of Health (DOH) said the deaths reported Wednesday represented several days worth of data that was encoded late.
The DOH reported 2,759 new recoveries, bringing the total recoveries to 2,750,531.
The COVID-19 positivity rate was at 3.5 percent, based on samples of 33,567 people on Nov. 15. The positivity rate is already below the World Health Organization's (WHO) requirement.
There were 23,846 active cases, of which 58.1 percent were mild, 5.2 percent were asymptomatic, 5 percent were critical, 12 percent were severe, and 19.6 percent were moderate.
The active case count is the lowest since 23,532 were recorded on Jan. 12.
Nationwide, 33 percent of ICU beds, 29 percent of isolation beds, 21 percent of ward beds, and 21 percent of ventilators, were in use.
In Metro Manila, 33 percent of ICU beds, 25 percent of isolation beds, 25 percent of ward beds, and 22 percent of ventilators, were in use.
Also on Wednesday, the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) said mall security should bar the entry of unvaccinated people as some restaurants were not strict about requiring dine-in customers to present their vaccination cards.