Lawmakers told to align policies with biz tactics
The World Bank is calling on Philippine policy makers to update policies along with its infrastructure, firm capabilities, and job creation strategies to meet the demands of a more technologically advanced world.
In a study, World Bank warned that the rapid changes in technology and trade patterns pose threatening effects on industries especially in export-led manufacturing if reforms will not be immediately adopted.
In the past, the manufacturing sector created jobs for unskilled workers and increased productivity. In the future, developing countries, like the Philippines, will need to update their policies to accommodate the changes and thereby bolster export-led manufacturing.
According to the study, to make the most of each economy’s potential, policymakers and privatesector decision-makers will need to seize new opportunities by re-thinking their manufacturing-led development strategies.
According to World Bank, technology and globalization are changing how manufacturing contributes to development.
"We will need to embrace this change rather than fear it," it further suggested.
Those countries that don’t implement needed reforms are likely to face not just economic costs, but also social costs associated with increased inequality and more limited access to opportunities.
“New processes and new technologies will change how traditional goods are made,” stressed the report.
The study recommended that the reforms should adopt on 3Cs of competitiveness, capabilities and connectedness.
Smart automation, advanced robotics, 3-D printing and other advances being incorporated by global manufacturers of cars, electronics, apparel, consumer and other goods are shifting how countries and firms compete for production.
Reforms that reduce unit-labor costs are highly recommended in order to ensure competitiveness.
But competitiveness will also require each economy to be better able to consider new business models, seek new contracting relationships that embrace new technologies, and devise new ways for manufactured goods to also deliver services.
The study emphasized, that building capabilities will involve giving workers new sets of skills, strengthening firms’ abilities to absorb new technologies, and providing new infrastructure and new rules to support the use of new technologies.
Promoting connectedness will continue to emphasize openness to trade in goods, including raw materials and components. But it also increases the importance of grasping the synergies with services that are increasingly embodied and embedded within manufactured goods.