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How covid has impacted business in the Philippines

StrategyDriven Editorial Perspective Article |Business in the Philippines|How covid has impacted business in the PhilippinesAsia has become well-versed in dealing with financial crises over the course of the last 50 years or so, from the oil crash of 1973 to the so-called ‘Asian Contagion’ of 1997.

The latter saw a sequence of currency devaluations and after the Thai government reversed the decisions to peg the local currency to the USD, which also triggered stock market declines and reduced import revenues.

This also sent real GDP growth tumbling to a little over 1% (1.3%)overall, which was considerably lower than during the aforementioned oil crash and the great recession of 2008 (against which Asia was relatively well-insulated).

But where will the fallout from Covid-19 rank against similar crises, and how has business been particularly impacted on the Philippines?

Comparing Crisis and the Wider Impact of Covid-19

The fallout from the Asian Contagion and stock market crash of 1997 was considerable, but the latest forecasts from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) suggests this years’ coronavirus-related decline will be even more damaging to the economy.

More specifically, growth in Asia as a whole is expected to stall at zero percent by the end of 2020, confirming the worst economic performance in nearly 60 years.

This will plunge growth levels well below the overall international average, creating an outlook that’s relatively bleak by both contemporary and historic comparisons.

That said, the forecasted slowdown in some Asian nations is slightly smaller than the expected contractions in the US and Europe, where the economies may ultimately shrink by 6% and 6.6% respectively.

Conversely, China’s growth is projected to decline by 4.9% in the year ending December 2020, tumbling from 6.1% in 2019 to just 1.2%. This is slightly better than some nations in the west, and it provides genuine hope that other nations in Asian can follow the trail blazed by China in terms of achieving better-than-expected economic performance.

Appraising the Impact on the Philippines

The Philippines entered a technical recession during Q2, after recording its worst economic growth since a major downturn in 1981.

According to the recent data released by the Philippine Statistics Authority, the nation’s GDP growth rate declined by a whopping 16.5% during the second quarter of 2020.

Overall, there’s even a risk that the Philippines could enter negative growth territory for 2020 as a whole, with minimal growth of just 3% recorded in Q1 and a further (albeit significantly smaller) contraction forecast for Q3. This contrasts starkly with the annualised performance over the course of the last five years, which has delivered average growth of around 6% during this period.

However, there’s some cause for optimism in the country, particularly after the island of Luzon (which accounts for 70% of the nation’s GDP) reopened for domestic travellers. Sure, this increases the risk of a second coronavirus spike, but it also reopens the national economy and improves the prospect for businesses and households alike.

The surprising resilience of the Philippines peso has also helped to prop-up economic sentiment, remaining one of the few emerging currencies to strengthen against the USD in 2020.

This is also indicative of a deceptively robust economy, and one that has the potential to rebound quickly from coronavirus in the future.

StrategyDriven Podcast Episode 44 – The Big Picture of Business: Business Leader as Community Leader, part 2 of 2

StrategyDriven Podcasts focus on the tools and techniques executives and managers can use to improve their organization’s alignment and accountability to ultimately achieve superior results. These podcasts elaborate on the best practice and warning flag articles on the StrategyDriven website.

Episode 44 – The Big Picture of Business: Business Leader as Community Leader, part 2 of 2 examines the role of business leaders within their communities. During our discussion, Hank Moore, Corporate Strategist and author of The Business Tree: Growth Strategies and Tactics for Surviving and Thriving, shares with us his insights and illustrative examples regarding:

  • how business leaders can avoid becoming too politically involved
  • how companies can contribute to the community in a manner consistent with their values without alienating segments of the community
  • the breadth of individuals who should consider themselves business leaders and therefore community leaders

Additional Information

In addition to the outstanding insights Hank shares in The Business Tree and this edition of the StrategyDriven Podcast are the resources accessible from his website, www.HankMoore.com.   Hank’s book, The Business Tree, can be purchased by clicking here.

Final Request…

The strength of our community grows with the additional insights brought by our expanding member base. Please consider rating us on iTunes by clicking here. Rating the StrategyDriven Podcast and providing your comments online improves our ranking and helps us attract new listeners which, in turn, helps us grow our community.

Thank you again for listening to the StrategyDriven Podcast!


About the Author

Hank Moore has advised 5,000+ client organizations worldwide (including 100 of the Fortune 500, public sector agencies, small businesses and non-profit organizations). He has advised two U.S. Presidents and spoke at five Economic Summits. He guides companies through growth strategies, visioning, strategic planning, executive leadership development, Futurism and Big Picture issues which profoundly affect the business climate. He conducts company evaluations, creates the big ideas and anchors the enterprise to its next tier. The Business Tree™ is his trademarked approach to growing, strengthening and evolving business, while mastering change. To read Hank’s complete biography, click here.

Nathan Ives, StrategyDriven Principal is a StrategyDriven Principal, and Host of the StrategyDriven Podcast. For over twenty years, he has served as trusted advisor to executives and managers at dozens of Fortune 500 and smaller companies in the areas of management effectiveness, organizational development, and process improvement. To read Nathan’s complete biography, click here.

StrategyDriven Podcast Episode 43 – The Big Picture of Business: Business Leader as Community Leader, part 1 of 2

StrategyDriven Podcasts focus on the tools and techniques executives and managers can use to improve their organization’s alignment and accountability to ultimately achieve superior results. These podcasts elaborate on the best practice and warning flag articles on the StrategyDriven website.

Episode 43 – The Big Picture of Business: Business Leader as Community Leader, part 1 of 2 examines the role of business leaders within their communities. During our discussion, Hank Moore, Corporate Strategist and author of The Business Tree: Growth Strategies and Tactics for Surviving and Thriving, shares with us his insights and illustrative examples regarding:

  • the benefits businesses realize through strong community relationships
  • risks business leaders face if they do not cultivate a positive relationship with their communities
  • outward signs of good business – community relationships
  • actions business leaders can take to build and maintain good community relationships

Additional Information

In addition to the outstanding insights Hank shares in The Business Tree and this edition of the StrategyDriven Podcast are the resources accessible from his website, www.HankMoore.com.   Hank’s book, The Business Tree, can be purchased by clicking here.

Final Request…

The strength of our community grows with the additional insights brought by our expanding member base. Please consider rating us on iTunes by clicking here. Rating the StrategyDriven Podcast and providing your comments online improves our ranking and helps us attract new listeners which, in turn, helps us grow our community.

Thank you again for listening to the StrategyDriven Podcast!


About the Author

Hank Moore has advised 5,000+ client organizations worldwide (including 100 of the Fortune 500, public sector agencies, small businesses and non-profit organizations). He has advised two U.S. Presidents and spoke at five Economic Summits. He guides companies through growth strategies, visioning, strategic planning, executive leadership development, Futurism and Big Picture issues which profoundly affect the business climate. He conducts company evaluations, creates the big ideas and anchors the enterprise to its next tier. The Business Tree™ is his trademarked approach to growing, strengthening and evolving business, while mastering change. To read Hank’s complete biography, click here.

Nathan Ives, StrategyDriven Principal is a StrategyDriven Principal, and Host of the StrategyDriven Podcast. For over twenty years, he has served as trusted advisor to executives and managers at dozens of Fortune 500 and smaller companies in the areas of management effectiveness, organizational development, and process improvement. To read Nathan’s complete biography, click here.

StrategyDriven Podcast Episode 41 – The Big Picture of Business: When the Next Recession is Coming

StrategyDriven Podcasts focus on the tools and techniques executives and managers can use to improve their organization’s alignment and accountability to ultimately achieve superior results. These podcasts elaborate on the best practice and warning flag articles on the StrategyDriven website.

Episode 41 – The Big Picture of Business: When the Next Recession is Coming explores the marketplace markers that signal a recession’s start and the timing of the next American recession. During our discussion, Hank Moore, Corporate Strategist and author of The Business Tree: Growth Strategies and Tactics for Surviving and Thriving, shares with us his insights and illustrative examples regarding:

  • the cyclic nature of economic recessions
  • markers indicating a recession is forthcoming
  • when the next recession is likely to occur
  • where to look for business improvement opportunities learned during a recession
  • how to be prepared for business opportunities the next recession will present

Additional Information

In addition to the outstanding insights Hank shares in The Business Tree and this edition of the StrategyDriven Podcast are the resources accessible from his website, www.HankMoore.com.   Hank’s book, The Business Tree, can be purchased by clicking here.

Final Request…

The strength of our community grows with the additional insights brought by our expanding member base. Please consider rating us on iTunes by clicking here. Rating the StrategyDriven Podcast and providing your comments online improves our ranking and helps us attract new listeners which, in turn, helps us grow our community.

Thank you again for listening to the StrategyDriven Podcast!


About the Author

Hank Moore has advised 5,000+ client organizations worldwide (including 100 of the Fortune 500, public sector agencies, small businesses and non-profit organizations). He has advised two U.S. Presidents and spoke at five Economic Summits. He guides companies through growth strategies, visioning, strategic planning, executive leadership development, Futurism and Big Picture issues which profoundly affect the business climate. He conducts company evaluations, creates the big ideas and anchors the enterprise to its next tier. The Business Tree™ is his trademarked approach to growing, strengthening and evolving business, while mastering change. To read Hank’s complete biography, click here.

StrategyDriven Editorial Perspective – Job Killers

With the elections over and unemployment reaching 9.8 percent, we once again see politics shifting into high gear as the posturing and power grabs in Washington D.C. continue to prevent the creation of marketplace certainty needed before business leaders begin to create new jobs. In our closing commentary for 2010, Perspectives reflects on the several pending and enacted pieces of legislation that continue to plague the job market and have the potential to do so for the foreseeable future.

Expiration of the Bush Tax Cuts – regardless of your position on whether the Bush tax cuts should be allowed to expire or extended in part or in whole, two things are certain – our leaders are in a deadlock split over what action to take and without action the tax rate for all individuals will rise on January 1, 2011. This uncertainty is clearly unnecessary and should have been avoided. Democrats bent of pushing through healthcare, financial, and carbon reforms should have moved on this issue as a priority as it is the only one of these issues with a deadline; though all are bad for the U.S. economy. According to Deloitte Tax LLP, the following impacts will be realized if the Bush Tax Cuts are allowed to expire:

  • A typical family of four with a household income of $50,000 a year would have to pay $2,900 more in taxes in 2011
  • The same family making $100,000 a year would see its taxes rise by $4,500
  • Wealthier families of four making $500,000 a year would pay $10,800 more in taxes
  • A family making $1 million a year would get a tax increase of $53,2001

Net Result: higher taxes reduce disposable income; resulting in less spending and slower economic growth

Healthcare Reform – with several hundred new regulations and standards not yet defined, the cost of Obamacare remains unknown. However, as Perspectives addressed in You Don’t Get Something for Nothing, the added benefit requirements mandated by the Obamacare legislation have to be paid for by someone; whether those payers are businesses, individuals, or some combination of the two. In fact, the Wall Street Journal reported that healthcare insurers Aetna, some BlueCross Blue Shield plans and other smaller carriers are seeking premium increase between 1 – 9 percent to cover the extra benefits mandated by healthcare reform.2

A report by Senators Coburn M.D. (R-OK) and Barrasso M.D. (R-WY) finds Obamacare as having the following impacts:

  • New penalties and costs discourages the hiring of American employees
  • The law will eliminate about 800,000 jobs; possibly more
  • Real income will be depressed for millions of Americans
  • Employers are struggling with rising health care costs that are increasing more quickly because of the new law3

Net Result: labor costs increase and/or disposable incomes decrease; resulting in fewer jobs as employers hire less and outsource more and reduced consumer spending – both driving slower, if not negative, economic growth

Grim Diagnosis, A check-up on the federal health law, can be downloaded by clicking here.

No Federal Budget – by law, the Congress of the United States is to develop and pass a budget for the coming fiscal year by April 15. Not unlike most years since the law was enacted, Congress has failed to meet this obligation; thereby failing to signal market participants as to how and when the economy’s single largest consumer will spend its money.

Net Result: uncertainty as to the government’s coming year spending heightens employer risk to maintaining and expanding business operations; depressing workforce retention and expansion as well as research and development and other growth projects.

Carbon Legislation – passed by the U.S. House of Representatives and stalled in the Senate, carbon legislation that would assign fees to carbon producing business activities, namely energy generation, looms as an uncertain and daunting risk of increased energy cost. If passed, this legislation would increase energy costs for all consumers; raising personal and business energy consumption expenditures.

A study by the Heritage Foundation of carbon legislation proposed by Representatives Waxman (D-CA) and Markey (D-MA) revealed the following potential economic impacts of this legislation as being:

  • Elimination of 1,145,000 jobs on average, with peak year unemployment increases of over 2,479,000 jobs
  • Increased electric rates of 90 percent after adjusting for inflation
  • Heightened, inflation-adjusted gasoline prices by 58 percent
  • Raised residential natural gas prices by 55 percent
  • Increased energy bills for the average American family of $1,241 per year4

Net Result: increased energy costs will add to the costs of every product and services produced within the United States and increase residential heating, cooling, general living, and transportation costs; reducing consumer’s disposable income and subsequently their spending which will slow economic growth if not shrinking the overall economy.

StrategyDriven Recommended Practices

Individually any one of these items damages the U.S. economy; taken together, Perspectives believes they crush any hope for a near-term economic recovery and may even bring about the return of the economist defined recessionary conditions. The combination of these four unnecessary uncertainties results in:

  • prolonged high unemployment rates
  • sustained lower consumer spending
  • perpetuated hording of cash by individuals and businesses
  • continued slow economic growth with the possibility of reentering recessionary conditions

To protect ones company from these unnecessary risks, StrategyDriven recommends business leaders consider the following options:

  • Eliminating, streamlining, and outsourcing all processes and activities. The goal is to reduce headcount in order to avoid the potential costs associated with the new healthcare legislation and reduce the energy needed to produce the company’s goods and services to avoid the impacts of the proposed carbon tax. Additionally, more efficient processes increase the organization’s supply flexibility in response to market demand allowing for a reduction in inventory levels. In the case of outsourcing, those functions not absolutely required to be performed within the United States should be transferred to overseas providers.
  • Increasing employment of temporary staff. The goal is to minimize the company’s commitment to a higher number of full-time staff members that necessarily brings with it the elevated entitlement costs associated with Obamacare. A clearly defined return on investment should be identified prior to hiring any additional full-time staff.
  • Relocating operations to another country not as heavily burdened with taxes and other mandates. The goal is to reduce non-value adding payments required by the government. Consideration must be given to other added costs such as transportation and importation taxes when evaluating whether or not to relocate.
  • Limiting production and inventory levels. The goal is to reduce labor and energy consumption to avoid costs while at the same time preparing for the probable decline in the demand for goods that would result in slower inventory turns and subsequently higher inventories and warehousing costs should current production rates be maintained.
  • Expanding the organization’s cash reserves. The goal is to prepare the company for the heightened expenses that will be incurred as a result of Obamacare and the potential carbon tax as well as the reduction in revenues that will likely result from the expiration of the Bush Tax Cuts.

Final Thought…

Perspectives acknowledges that our recommendations include provisions that would result in fewer American jobs. We believe these recommendations are sound.

Perspectives believes the Obama Administration and Democrat controlled Congress passage of Obamacare, desire to rescind portions of the Bush Tax Cuts, proposed carbon tax legislation, and failure to pass a Federal budget is devastatingly harmful to the American economy. We believe business leaders have a responsibility to their company’s shareholders to maximize their return on investment and that the legislative initiatives discussed drive leaders to transfer operations overseas. Therefore, it is our opinion that the Obama Administration and Democrat Congressional Leaders are culpable for the ongoing unnecessary uncertainty preventing real economic recovery.

As always, we’ve provided our perspective and hope you’ll share your thoughts, lessons learned, and recommended resources with us and the StrategyDriven audience.

Final Request…

StrategyDriven Editorial Perspective PodcastThe strength in our community grows with the additional insights brought by our expanding member base. Please consider rating us and sharing your perspectives regarding the StrategyDriven Editorial Perspective podcast on iTunes by clicking here. Sharing your thoughts improves our ranking and helps us attract new listeners which, in turn, helps us grow our community.

Thank you again for listening to the StrategyDriven Editorial Perspective podcast!

Sources

  1. “Expiring tax cuts hit taxpayers at every level,” Stephen Ohlemacher, Associated Press, September 16, 2010
  2. “Health Insurers Plan Hikes,” Janet Adamy, The Wall Street Journal, September 7, 2010 (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703720004575478200948908976.html)
  3. “Senate Physicians Conclude Health Law a ‘Grim Diagnosis’ for American Economy,” The Office of Senator Tom Coburn M.D., October 25, 2010 (http://healthreformreport.com/2010/10/3rd-congressional-district-in-profile-democratic-incumbent-titus-focuses-on-those-who-lost-jobs-face.php)
  4. “Son of Waxman-Markey: More Politics Makes for a More Costly Bill,” William Beach, Ben Lieberman, Karen Campbell, Ph.D., and David Kreutzer, Ph.D., The Heritage Foundation, May 18, 2009 (http://www.heritage.org/Research/Reports/2009/05/Son-of-Waxman-Markey-More-Politics-Makes-for-a-More-Costly-Bill)