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Manila Bulletin devider Business devider NEDA expects faster investment, construction in coming quarters

NEDA expects faster investment, construction in coming quarters

Published May 30, 2024 06:19 am

Construction growth and investment spending are expected to reverse in the coming months amid more investments from the private sector, National Economic and Development Authority Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan said.

Speaking at a panel during the Philippine Economic Briefing last Monday, Balisacan said that the slowdown in investments was prompted by high policy rates which were felt in the last quarter.

“But with all the things going on right now, I would expect that that would reverse in the coming quarters,” Balisacan said.

“All the public projects, the infrastructure projects of government are in full swing. About a third of those are now ongoing. And another third of that are in various stages of implementation,” he added.

“Even as we are constrained by our fiscal consolidation efforts, the private sector, we believe, will come in quite strongly in the next coming quarters,” he further said.

Investment, or gross capital formation, contracted substantially during the year's first quarter to 1.3 percent from 11.6 percent.

Meanwhile, construction growth slowed to 6.8 percent from 10.1 percent in the previous quarter, and the 14.7 percent expansion in the first quarter of 2023.

The NEDA chief said that a possible reduction in the policy rate would also help in bringing up the investments in the country.

“I think that overall, the investments in the coming quarters will free up, as we hear, for example, from the Bangko Sentral eventually reducing the policy rate as we succeed in managing, continuing the downtrend in inflation, particularly addressing the food inflation,” he said.

Balisacan also underscored the importance of the recently approved Public-Private Partnership (PPP) Code, which he said “has created expectations and enthusiasm from the business community.”

The PPP Center currently has 125 projects in its pipeline totaling over P3 trillion, wherein 103 projects will be implemented at the national level, while the remaining 22 are at the local level.

The projects under the government’s infrastructure flagship program have a total value of about $161.7 billion or P9.14 trillion.

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National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) private sector Arsenio M. Balisacan
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