Credit Management September 2023

COUNTRY FOCUS
AUTHOR – Adam Bernstein
dropping and over the same points in time
fell from 2.68 percent, 2.24 percent, 1.64
percent to the current rate of 1.54 percent.
A plateau is expected around 2083 with a
population of 180m and a dangerously low
birth rate of 0.12 percent.
The Philippines is quite diverse with
seven distinct ethnicities and a multitude
of ‘others’. In terms of language spoken,
Filipino is the official tongue as is English.
The CIA says that there are eight other
major dialects.
And in terms of religion, an estimate
in 2015 suggested that 79.5 percent were
Roman Catholic, 6 percent Muslim, 2.6
percent Iglesia ni Cristo, 2.4 percent
Evangelical, 1.1 percent National Council
of Churches in the Philippines, 7.4
percent other, and less than 0.1 percent
were classed as ‘none.’
Data from Statista shows that the
country is becoming more urbanised
as time progresses, albeit it as a slowing
pace. In 2011 45.5 percent lived in urban
environments. By 2016 that figure stood
at 46.48 percent and by 2021 47.68 percent
were urban dwellers. Interestingly, UN-
Habitat offers different numbers from
Statista suggesting that in 2015 51.2
percent were urbanised. On top of that
comes data from the Philippines Statistics
Authority (PSA) which says that in 2020, 54
percent of the population was urbanised.
Who to believe?
The Philippines is administratively
divided into 81 provinces which are then
sub-divided into cities and municipalities.
As of December 2022, the PSA recorded
148 cities and 1,486 municipalities. Of the
cities, Quezon City is the largest with 2.96m
residents, Manila is second with 1.84m,
Davao City with 1.77m, and Caloocan
with 1.66m. There are 16 other cities and
municipalities with more than 500,000
inhabitants, another 187 with between
100,000 and 500,000, 363 with between
50,000 and 100,000 and a further 1060 with
between 193 and 50,000 population.
Transport network
At this juncture, given the island
nature of the country, it’s natural to
seek information about the Philippine
transportation system. Data from 2019,
The Project for Improvement Quality
Management for Highway and Bridge
Construction and Maintenance, Phase III,
said that as a result of investment there
were (then) 217,317 km of roads of which
33,018 were national roads, 31,620 were
provincial, 31,063 city and municipal, and
121,702 rural. Notably, the Pan-Philippine
Highway is a 3,517 km network of roads,
bridges, and ferry services that connect
the islands of Luzon, Samar, Leyte, and
Mindanao. It’s the Philippines' principal
transport backbone. There are other
similar multi-lane roads throughout the
country along with the Philippine Nautical
Highway System which links many of the
islands' road networks through a series of
roll-on/roll-off ferries, some rather small
covering short distances and some larger
vessels that might travel several hours or
more.
Rail is used presently only for passenger
transport mainly within Metro Manila and
the provinces of Laguna and Quezon, as
well as offering a commuter service in the
Bicol Region. There are 11 international
gateway airports.
The Philippines
has issues that
every exporter will
need to counter –
geography, low per
capita incomes and
corruption. But that
doesn’t mean that it
should be ignored.
The economy
S&P Global commented, in April 2023,
that “the Philippines economy grew at
a pace of 7.6 percent in 2022, the fastest
rate of economic growth recorded by
the Philippines since 1976. With strong
growth forecast over the medium-term
outlook, the size of Philippines GDP
measured in US dollar nominal terms is
set to reach one trillion by 2033.” In S&P’s
view the Philippines set to become one
of the world’s fastest growing emerging
markets. The IMF, in Press Release 23/148
which was issued following a visit to the
Philippines, thought the same. It said:
“The Philippine economy achieved one
of the highest growth rates in emerging
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