Tag: industry

Blame on Marcos and, now, Duterte for the Philippines’ underdevelopment is a LIE

July 21, 2021July 21, 2021 Ramon Ortoll 9 Comments

I keep wondering why everything that is wrong with this country is blamed on former President Ferdinand Marcos and current President Rodrigo Duterte and not the political bloc that was in power for thirty years since 1986. Marcos was in power for twenty-one. Duterte six. That’s a total of twenty-seven. You don’t need to have…

Development, Economy

Philippines, the sick man of Asia “again”? No. It ALWAYS HAS been sick!

March 18, 2021 benign0 26 Comments

Certain “thought leaders” are issuing shrill commentary on the economic fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting lockdowns aimed to mitigate its effects. The fact is, most if not all countries are suffering from economic crises in varying degrees thanks to the brittle world order of intricately interdependent and interlinked economies created by “globalisation”….

Culture, Development, Economy

The Philippines is reverting back to an agrarian economy thanks to COVID-19

August 11, 2020 benign0 6 Comments

Nothing necessarily bad about agrarian societies though these get their bad rep from their association with the Third World and “underdevelopment”. Some “economists” would measure “modernisation” in terms of the proportion of the workforce employed in agriculture. As the thinking goes, a progressive shift in the workforce from farming to manufacturing and services and, therefore,…

Business, Development, Economy

COVID-19 further highlights how important it is for the Philippines to be INDEPENDENT

March 22, 2020 benign0 22 Comments

One thing the COVID-19 pandemic is teaching the world is that it is important for communities, both at local and at national levels, to be self sufficient. The drastic equalising effect of this global disaster can be felt in the accelerated dismantling of the fragile international inter-dependencies built up over decades of the “globalisation” frenzy….

Economy, Technology

Angkas and the #SaveAngkas activist fad are parts of the problem, not the solutions

December 22, 2019 benign0 4 Comments

The latest fashionable hashtag at the moment is #SaveAngkas. Angkas (a colloquial term for “hitch a ride”) is a motorcycle ride hailing and delivery service that is one of those modern-day jeepney-style solutions to systemic problems that could have been avoided if Filipinos exercised a bit more foresight and longer-term planning. The Philippine government is…

Development, Economy, Money Talks

Filipinos’ addiction to OFW remittances is incompatible with economic development

June 10, 2019 benign0 5 Comments

Look more closely at the facts surrounding the much-vaunted stellar growth of the Philippine over the last several years and one will find the same old disturbingly-familiar drivers of that growth. Or, rather, it is the absence of the right drivers that is more disturbing. Growth is still chugging along the traditional way — through…

Development, Economy, Money Talks

Jeepneys remain a constant reminder of how backward and fundamentally WEAK the Philippines is

June 3, 2019 benign0 55 Comments

It is the 21st Century. Yet the most iconic symbol of the Philippines remains the jeepney. Once hailed a triumph of “Filipino ingenuity”, it now persists as a stark reminder of a failure to develop engineering excellence at a time when engineering excellence is an even more important foundation upon which global competitiveness could be…

Culture, Development, Tech Talk

China knows how things “work” in the Philippines

November 21, 2018November 18, 2019 benign0 37 Comments

Indeed, the Chinese know how thing “work” in the Philippines. They have, after all, been prominent figures in Philippine industry since the Middle Ages. They know enough to fly above the radars of the natives and deal directly with the powers-that-be. That strategy of knowing and dealing with the right people continues to this day….

Culture, Economy, Money Talks