By FR. EMETERIO BARCELON, SJ
November 22, 2012, 5:46pm
Our present economy is praised by most, even by the International Monetary Fund President, Christine Legarde. In spite of recession in Europe and difficulties in other parts of the world we are growing positively for about 5% to 6% pa. Shouldn’t we be happy? However, we should be growing at a 9% clip, for at least for a couple of years if we are to get out of the poverty that plagues a good 20% to 40% of our people. We have at least 8 million to ten million working abroad instead of here at home. What can we do to push the economy faster? Most jobs are created by small-scale and medium industries. The big ones, however, are just as important. We need to push not only innovation and entrepreneurship but also provide liquidity for those who engage in enterprise. Our financial systems are still immature and untried. We also need to facilitate doing business easier. Time is of the essence. Bureaucratic regulations are favorable to petty functionaries to hold a project hostage. Withholding permits is a common ploy. The enterpriser either has to come up with a bribe or acknowledge that he owes a debt of gratitude to the functionary. (A local builder was invited to Papua New Guinea and he says he had all the permits he needed to do construction work in two days, a task that would have taken him six months to obtain in the Philippines.) Is it possible for all of us to look at the common good of the country?
Our laws are not really welcoming to foreign direct investments. We reserve areas of business to local companies especially exploitation of natural resources. There was probably a time that this was necessary and reasonable. But it is no longer necessary. There are two bad effects of this. One is that since we do not have the capital to do this work, the resources remain untouched. Secondly we do not have the jobs that we need to feed our people and move the economy. Some think it only protects the hundred or so families that are rich in this country. Direct investments are hampered by loud mouths. We have laws that regulate all transactions but instead of waiting for Congress to modify the laws, they block good projects because they are foreign. A good example is the Tampacan mine. This has the potential to be the biggest copper and gold mine in the world. But local politicians have blocked this project although approved according to our laws. Passing laws against open pit mining on the local level is unthinkable in any other country. We have to think in broader perspectives, national versus local, the now versus the longer future. In the past they say the country did not get enough benefits from mining projects. This may have been true then, but now foreign mining firms have to share fifty-fifty with the government their net income over and above other taxes. With the prices of copper and gold at present high level we should be experiencing a mining boom. But meddlers are endangering our missing this advantage of high prices. Talk is cheap while mining is a difficult enterprise.
We are fortunately experiencing a construction boom which should last at least another five years. But that is not enough. We have to look at the longer run. We can no longer industrialize and export manufactured goods but we can mine and export the products. We are lucky that we have the BPO and other computer servicing opportunities but again this is not enough to give all our people good jobs. We have to be realistic and plan for the long run, the national good, and the benefit to as many as possible of our people. We already missed the East Asian boom in exports as well as the chance to industrialize with manufacturing. We cannot let the opportunity for a mining boom to slip through our hands. >
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