The country’s inflation rate is now on a downward trajectory, following the slowdown recorded in March, the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) said.
“We’re really monitoring the situation and implementing the necessary measures to ensure that by the end of the year, we should be in our target of roughly around 3.5 to four percent. So we are on a downward trajectory already,” Arsenio Balisacan, NEDA secretary, said in a press briefing held in Malacanang yesterday.
Earlier this month, the Philippine Statistics Authority reported that inflation in March slowed down to 7.6 percent from 8.6 percent in February, lower than analysts’ forecasts for the month.
The downtrend is due to the deceleration of food and transportation costs, NEDA said.
Meanwhile, Balisacan said the El Niño phenomenon expected towards the latter part of this year will likely result in lower agricultural production.
“Obviously as in the past experiences of El Niño, that will come with lower production, particularly for our basic agricultural produce. What we want to ensure is that we can mitigate the negative effects of the El Niño, we can start planning and putting the necessary adjustments now to reduce the negative effects, while at the same time already making arrangements for the necessary support for those who are most exposed, particularly the vulnerable groups,” Balisacan said.
“This part of the social protection that I was discussing earlier that when you have an event like that, we (should) prevent people from falling into poverty, (because) once they fall, it’s really difficult for them to go up. We don’t want that. So that’s why with the inflation, elevated inflation that you have now, if you are unable to reduce inflation and then you get this El Niño phenomenon, that is a dangerous combination. And we want to prevent that from happening,” he added.
The creation of the Inter-agency Committee on Inflation and Market Outlook (IAC-IMO) was approved in a sectoral meeting by the President last month as a proactive measure to fight inflation.
It serves as an advisory body to the Economic Development Group on measures that will keep inflation, particularly on food and energy, within the government’s target range.
To provide additional information on the local production of key commodities, the IAC-IMO will be tapping advanced technologies to complement traditional modes of data and analysis. This will allow the Committee to submit a complete and detailed assessment of the country’s market outlook, the Department of Finance recently said.
The IAC-IMO is in close coordination with the Philippine Statistics Authority, Philippine Space Agency, Department of Science and Technology-Advanced Science and Technology Institute, and various government agencies in order to apply advanced science and technology into their assessments.
