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Philippines: DOF warns of job losses anew
MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines risks losing the gains it made in recovering job losses if the government decides to revert economic areas to lockdown to stem the spread of new variants, the Department of Finance said.
In an economic bulletin, Finance Undersecretary and chief economist Gil Beltran cautioned that the Philippines has yet to make it out of the woods in its quest to regain the jobs lost in the recent lockdown.
The unemployment rate in May declined to 7.7 percent, from 8.7 percent in April, as the loosening of quarantine measures in Metro Manila and nearby provinces paved the way for industries to reopen.
Beltran said the government should make sure that gains made in minimizing the risks posed by the pandemic are sustained. He warned that another return to the strictest quarantine status would repeat the same economic consequences over and over.
In March, the jobless rate went down to 7.1 percent, the lowest since the pandemic began last year. However, the revert to lockdown in Metro Manila and the provinces of Bulacan, Cavite, Laguna and Rizal resulted in the loss of more than two million jobs.
“The employment figures are encouraging and we have to make sure the gains are not eroded,” Beltran said.
“It is imperative, therefore, that the health risks posed by the epidemic be managed effectively and efficiently and the transmission of the virus contained, especially as new variants arise,” the finance official added.
Beltran also said the arrival of new shipments of vaccine doses boosts the economy’s chances of recovering once herd immunity – or when at least 70 percent of the population is immunized – is achieved by the end of the year as planned.
The government is eyeing to vaccinate 70 percent of the population by December with the hopes of celebrating Christmas without face masks. However, it struggles to speed up the pace of the immunization program due to a global tug of war for vaccine supplies.
The government has administered vaccines to some 11.7 million Filipinos as of Saturday based on Bloomberg’s vaccine tracker. However, just 2.7 percent of the population has received a full dose of the immunity shots.
Source: https://www.philstar.com/business/2021/07/12/2111787/dof-warns-job-losses-anew