Manufacturing sector posts double-digit growth in February

MANILA, Philippines — Factory production significantly grew in February, the Philippine Statistics Authority reported on Thursday.

Manufacturing output—as measured by the Volume of Production Index—climbed 24.8 percent in the second month of the year, data released by the PSA show.

That was higher than the 21.9 percent growth posted in January and the 9.8 percent recorded in February 2017.

The PSA said factories churned out more output last February on the back of increments in 16 major sectors—11 of which registered two-digit increases.

“The increasing working-age population, rising productivity, improvement in business environment, and aggressive infrastructure development will also help spur growth in the sector,” National Economic and Development Authority Officer-in-Charge Rosemarie Edillon said in a statement.

“The industries’ outlook for both the current and succeeding quarters remains bullish with the expectation of sustained robust demand, improvement in production capacity, new product lines, and enhanced marketing strategies,” she added.

Despite NEDA’s sanguine forecast for the sector, Edillon said the government must stay on guard against risks posed by rising inflation that may lead to higher cost of production for manufacturing firms.

“Strategies are needed to be pursued to sustain the upward growth trajectory of the manufacturing sector,” she said.

“We need these initiatives to produce raw materials and intermediate goods that meet the requirements of international markets. We also need to pursue bureaucratic and regulatory reforms that incentivize compliance across all levels of government to eliminate red tape and reduce the cost of doing business,” she added.