43rd WORKSHOP MEETING OF HEADS OF NPOs
18-20 February 2003, Manila, Philippines
Inaugural Address
by Dr. Eduardo T. Gonzalez
President, Development Academy of the Philippines
Mr. Takashi Tajima, Secretary General of the Asian
Productivity Organization, Hon. Renato de Rueda, Undersecretary
of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources,
Excellencies, distinguished delegates:
In behalf of the Development Academy of the Philippines,
I am very pleased to welcome you to the 43d Workshop
Meeting of Heads of the National Productivity Organizations.
Hosting this important event is always an honor
for us. And I hope that the unique spirit of Filipino
hospitality will stoke up your determined efforts
in charting new directions for the NPOs in the next
two years.
Asia is a heterogeneous regional setting of nations
with differing sizes, levels of development and governance
systems. Some are generally more endowed with managerial
capacity and systems, and farther along the route
to liberalization. By contrast, the transition economies
of Asia still have much to learn in terms of productivity
and quality and are behind in the path toward open
and competitive societies.
As a group, APO member countries are an increasingly
important force in the world economy. Their collective
weight in global economic activity has been rising.
Southeast Asia for example, is fast-growing, next
only to East Asia: the average annual growth rate
of its GNP as a bloc is nearly 6 percent; that of
its GNP per capita about 4 percent. That is about
three times the record of the OECD countries between
1990 and 1998.
Many of these nations have embraced trade liberalization
as a means to progress. Some, like Singapore, Thailand
and Malaysia have become benchmarks in key areas with
characteristics of global public goods, including
poverty reduction, health care and education. Asian
countries invest selectively in priority areas such
as information technology, biotechnology, and worker
training, in the process transitioning to fully networked,
knowledge-intensive economics.
Many parts of Asia are also being carefully watched,
because of their exposed weaknesses in the areas of
financial stability, protection of environmental commons,
and movement of capital. Thus, increasing reliance
on exports (at a time when global trade is contracting
and domestic demand continues to be stagnant) makes
Asia highly vulnerable to a global economic downturn.
Most of the Asian nations are part of a broader
set of middle-income countries, which have become
important suppliers of global public goods. They are
crucial in any collective action to address market
failures in the production of such goods as growth
and productivity, knowledge management, and good governance,
all of which have considerable potential benefit for
the regional and international community. In most
of Asia, progress in productivity and quality improvement
is needed in order to recover the momentum for broad-
based and equitable growth, and to forestall another
financial crisis.
In the next two days, our task is to strengthen
the supply of global public goods in the Asian region
by reviewing and evaluating the recent productivity
movement efforts and formulating plans that will enable
our governments, firms and civil society organizations
cope with the rapid socio-economic changes taking
place in Asia and around the globe.
Certainly there will be many external and internal
issues that will surface in each country. In the case
of the Philippines, our external challenge is to keep
up with the fluctuations in the global market where
we depend heavily, Within our borders, we need to
win the confidence of investors to raise the currently
low volume of investment that is necessary for the
country's development.
The Philippine government has recently shifted its
focus in economic planning from the dominantly macroeconomic
and demand side to the macroeconomic and supply side,
thus putting productivity enhancing measures at center
stage.
With this new perspective, we are all the more encouraged
to strengthen our efforts to promote and institutionalize
productivity and quality to specific economic sectors
- agriculture, small and medium enterprises, service
sector and the public sector.
For the NPO in the Philippines, the challenge now
is to promote a productivity driven economic growth
- where there is a culture of efficiency, quality,
and excellence as we pursue national, sectoral, firm,
community and household economic and livelihood efforts.
Along with this are our other thrust areas that we
consider equally significant to boost our social and
economic progress. These are sustainable human development,
knowledge management, transparency and accountability
in governance, democratic reforms and education for
excellence.
So much about what we will do.
Despite the threat of war in the middle east and
the sluggish global economic performance, our work
must continue. Our goal is to make sure no country
is left behind, and no country is barred from moving
ahead.
In closing, I would like to wish you a harmonious,
fruitful and productive discussion for this workshop,
which I now open.
Thank you and mabuhay!
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