Despite being touted by her presidential spokesperson as an “infrastructure icon,” President Arroyo and her 9-year long administration's investment in the country's infrastructure pales in comparison to the Philippines' neighbors. In the recently released 2010 World Competitive Yearbook (WCY), the Philippines slightly improved its overall competitiveness ranking from last year, but is still lagging behind its neighbors in the Asia Pacific region. Like in previous years, the Philippines ranked near the bottom when it came to infrastructure. It ranked 56th out of 58 economies in infrastructure. The Philippines ranked 56th in basic infrastructure, in scientific infrastructure, and in education; 48th in health and environment; and 29th in technological infrastructure. Sereno said that the low score in infrastructure was caused by the country's low secondary school enrolment, high pupil-teacher ratio, and low public spending on education. “Our infrastructure figure has been dragging us down,” Sereno said. “Our port system, road system, water transport system, distribution system are really so bad and the cost of distribution of goods from island-to-island is so high.” The country, she added, is not devoting enough share of its gross domestic product for new infrastructure projects.“We are not making new investment [in infrastructure].” Previously, Deputy Presidential Spokesperson Charito Planas described President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo as an “infrastructure icon” for pushing an infrastructure program that l has built a total of 48,585 kilometers of national roads since 2001 compared to only 34,326 kms of 3 previous administrations l has built a total of 300,048.44 lineal meters of national bridges compared to 274,747 lineal meters by previous administrations l resulted in the completion of the Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway (SCTEx), the ongoing North Luzon Expressway (NLEx)-C5-South Luzon Expressway (SLEx) link projects, and the Southern Tagalog Arterial Road (STAR) Tollway. Least competitive in Asia Pacific The WCY, which was conducted by the Switzerland-based International Institute for Management Development, has 4 criteria: economic performance, government efficiency, business efficiency, and infrastructure. “The Philippines ranked 34th in economic performance, 31st in government efficiency, 32nd in business efficiency, and 56th in infrastructure. The Philippines moved 4 notches higher than last year's overall ranking but remained the least competitive of the 13 economies in the Asia-Pacific region that were included in the study. The Philippines ranked 39th among 58 countries – or 4 notches higher than last year's ranking – in the 2010 World Competitive Yearbook (WCY), but remained the least competitive of the 13 economies in the Asia-Pacific region that were included in the study. This is the second time that the Philippines ended up at the bottom of the list of competitive countries in the Asia-Pacific region. “The results showed that the Philippines has improved but remains mired at the bottom of Asian-Pacific countries,” said Edilberto de Jesus, president of the Asian Institute of Management (AIM). “We were once at par with Thailand. Now Thailand is ranked 26th or 13 places ahead of us,” he added. – abs
