|
|
Philippines Freight Transport Report Q3 2008Product Type: Market Research ReportPublished by: Business Monitor International Published: July 2008 Product Code: R302-3442 Description In May the World Bank approved a previously delayed US$232mn loan for a Philippines road project,having ensured new anti-corruption measures were put in place. These included independent procurementevaluation, stronger internal controls at the Philippine Public Works Department, and a mechanism forcivil society groups to exercise a degree of oversight. Corruption is often described as endemic in thePhilippines, and seen by local business leaders as a factor turning investment away from the Philippinesto the benefit of other countries in the region such as China. A survey of 1,400 business leaders carriedout by Economic Risk Consultancy Ltd, a Hong Kong based company, found that the Philippines wasconsidered the most corrupt of the 13 Asian economies, followed by Thailand, China, and Indonesia. ThePhilippines was separately ranked number 131 out of 179 countries by corruption watchdogTransparency International in its 2007 report, placing it on a par with Libya and Burundi. Investmentas a share of GDP in the Philippines is around 15%, one of the lowest levels in the region. The loan wasdesigned to support the national road project. The first phase of the project had led to the construction orresurfacing of 1,400km of roads since the year 2000. The second phase of the project has a total value ofUS$576mn, and is designed to upgrade 146km of roads and rehabilitate or widen a further 304km. BMI’snewly released Philippines Freight Transport Report concludes that road haulage should grow by anannual average of 6.2% in 2008-2012..The outlook for the Philippines economy over the next five years is for moderate to strong growth,averaging 5.7% per annum in 2008-2012. The effect is to give freight transport a good, but notspectacular platform for development. We expect overall freight tonnage volume to increase by an annualaverage of 5.8% per annum over the forecast period, ahead of overall GDP by 0.1 percentage points.While in many developing economies freight growth usually exceeds GDP growth by a significantmargin, the narrower gap between the two rates in the Philippines shows the extent to which the transportsector is failing to live up to its full potential. The air freight sector is expected to experience the mostsignificant growth rate, averaging 8.0% y-o-y This takes account of the recent negative impact of recordjet fuel prices. Next in importance will be rail freight, growing by 6.7% from a low base as a result of theNorthrail and Southrail projects. One constraint facing the industry is the environment in which itoperates. Comparatively speaking, the Philippines’ BMI freight rating is relatively poor in relation toregional peers, with an overall score of 45.3 (out of a potential maximum of 100.0). Under mostcategories, the national industry received a medium to low score. Freight and infrastructure growth rates,together with the transport intensity index (a measure of the dynamism of foreign trade) are all at thelower end of the scale. For the 2008-2012 forecast period, we expect the transport and communications sector to outpace theeconomy as a whole by a small margin, as far as value of output is concerned. It will achieve averageannual growth of 5.9%, versus 5.8% for overall GDP. Again, the gap between these two rates is narrowerthan experienced in many other emerging economies. The total value of transport and communicationsGDP will rise to US$15.1bn in nominal terms by 2012, representing 7.1% of the Philippine’s GDP. Table of Contents |
|
||||||||
MindBranch has been the leading provider of industry and investment research from more than 550 independent research firms since 1992. With over 90,000 market research reports, MindBranch is your trusted source of competitive business intelligence. |