Exporters urged to help wipe out joblessness

The export sector must now take the lead in helping solve the pestering problem of joblessness and widespread poverty in the Philippines.

This can be done if regional export leaders help small and medium enterprises (SME) in the provinces grow faster and be able to create one additional job each, every year.

The call was made by Philippine Exporters Confederation (Philexport) president Sergio R. Ortiz-Luis, Jr. to regional chapter presidents of the federation on the opening day of a two-day regional planning session of the nation’s export leaders.

"There are over 800,000 government registered SMEs. If our regional chapters can help the SMEs in their respective areas grow faster to be able to hire one more employee a year, we can help solve the unemployment problem in only five years," Ortiz-Luis said.

He pointed out that most of our neighbors have conquered poverty and joblessness through their export-led growth.

Philexport, he said, called on its regional leaders to come out with doable regional plans for the rest of the year in the wake of widespread uncertainty in both the economic and political fronts.

He expressed alarm over official government reports that the sector registered its lowest growth rate of only 1.5 percent last year, a record low for the past 12 years with the exception of the year 2001 when the industry retreated for over 15 percent under a global trade slump.

Other East Asian economies have rebounded with grace while the Philippines bounced back erratically.

Unless the nation’s exporters compete as a national team out to fight in the global trade Olympics, each company will be swallowed live by the sharks, he pointed out. In the wake of globalization, competition is no longer limited to individual enterprises. Nations and their industries now compete to win or lose markets, he added.

Next to building a national trading team and assisting the smaller members of the federation, the export leader also called on the federation’s over 3,000 enterprise members, 19 sectoral associations and 16 regional chapters to adopt plant-level programs to help rein in run-away population growth.

He said the Philippines can not hope to win the fight against widespread poverty if the speed industries make goods and services are just about equal to the rate young Filipino couples make babies. – Abe P. Belena, Philexport News and Features