22 November 2022

DivinaLaw Senior Partner Atty. Estrella C. Elamparo moderated the webinar “2023 Philippine Economic Outlook” held earlier today. Organized by the European Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines (ECCP), the event provided insights on the country’s state of economic health and shared forecasts for the year ahead.

World Bank’s Dr. Ndiamé Diop, the country director for the Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, and Brunei, and Asec. Sarah Lynne Salvador Daway-Ducanes of the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA) served as resource speakers. Dr. Kevin Chua, senior economist at World Bank Manila, joined the panel discussion on behalf of Dr. Diop.

Sharing World Bank’s forecast for 2023, Dr. Diop said, “For ASEAN, the growth projection is about 5.1%. The ASEAN-5 (Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand) really does much better than the rest of the world. Within ASEAN, we expect the Philippines to grow slightly above average next year – around 5.4%, lower than 2022 which is a very strong year for the Philippines.”

Speaking on the health of the economy, Asec. Daway-Ducanes observed: “Robust recovery is underway with robust domestic demand. Of the 7.7% growth in Q1-Q3, around 85% was contributed by consumption growth on the demand side and nearly two-thirds from the services sector on the supply side. Both were driven largely by domestic demand. As such, we expect domestic demand to continue to support the country’s growth momentum with the recovery of sectors performing below their pre-pandemic levels as the economy fully reopens. Additionally, improving mobility, tourism, remittances are also expected to buoy the economy despite external headwinds.”