Strategy 1 of the Philippine Export Development Plan
Business Mirror
June 14, 2016
THE 2015-2017 Philippine Export Development Plan (PEDP) will implement a two-track intervention to identified sectors named as key and emerging export sectors. These sectors have been identified as having at least one of the following criteria: Those that significantly contribute to exports, have high growth potential, and with competitive and comparative advantages.
Key export sectors are those that have met one or several of the following criteria: (1) at least more than $1-billion export revenues in 2014; (2) substantial impact on employment; and/or (3) high-growth potential or remarkable export performance. The key export sectors include electronics, motor vehicle and parts, coconut oil, information technology and business-process management sector, technical and computer and information services, and processed food and beverages. Emerging exports are those products for which global demand has been increasing and for which Philippine exports has been growing faster than world demand since 2006. Emerging export sectors include chemicals, activated carbon, metal components and fish, both preserved and fresh.
The intervention in the next three years would focus leveraging on the comparative strengths of the country and in exploiting the opportunities presented by fast-growing markets. Strategy 1 of the PEDP designs comprehensive packages of support for these key and emerging sectors.
The packages of support aim to address vulnerabilities of a particular sector, increase production capacity and provide solutions to cope with the challenges in the global marketplace. Support packages could include Investment and marketing promotion, business matching, training and capacity building, financing options, and support for innovation, product development and design.
Programs will be formulated based on a global value-chain analysis of specific sectors. Among these are the implementation of Phase 2 of the Product and Technology Holistic Study Program: clustering industry road maps; sector global value-chain analysis workshops; business matching; investment and marketing-promotion programs, which include participation in various trade fairs, road shows, expositions and business missions in the country and abroad; reverse trade fairs for industrial products and branding programs.
In terms of capacity-building, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) spearheads the Regional Interactive Platform for Philippine Exporters Plus, a program to handhold companies in exporting by providing consultancy services, along with various training programs to enhance their competitiveness.
There will also be active support programs, for innovation, product development and design, which includes a proposal for advanced materials technology testing laboratory for the electronics sector, development of national standards and research and development assistance from the Department of Science and Technology, Commission on Higher Education, academe, and the Technical Education Science and Development Authority. To ensure all the programs’ effectiveness, a system of monitoring and evaluation will be implemented by the DTI, the government agency taking the lead on this initiative.□