Wake-up call for PH global competitiveness

The inception of the 2025 IMD World Competitiveness Rankings survey, as announced recently by the Management Association of the Philippines (MAP), is a timely and sobering wake-up call for the Philippines. While we have long celebrated our economic resilience, it is clear that resilience alone is no longer enough. In a world transformed by technology, innovation, and rapidly shifting global markets, we find ourselves lagging behind countries that have been quicker, bolder, and more deliberate in pursuing national competitiveness.

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The 2024 rankings reveal familiar shortcomings. Despite our demographic advantages — a young, English-speaking workforce and strong entrepreneurial spirit — we continue to underperform in critical areas: infrastructure development, education quality, regulatory efficiency, and digital readiness. These are not new problems, yet year after year, progress has been slow, uneven, and often derailed by political distractions.

Our public institutions remain burdened by bureaucracy and regulatory bottlenecks that discourage investment and innovation. Infrastructure projects, while abundant in announcements, are often delayed or plagued by inefficiencies. In education, outdated curricula, skills mismatches, and underinvestment prevent us from fully preparing our people for the demands of a digital economy. Meanwhile, in technology and innovation, we lag behind regional peers who have embraced digital transformation as a national priority.