The “Turbulent World Economy” and Industrial Development Strategy in the Philippines

This article is presented before the 19th Annual Meeting of the Philippine Economic Society at the Manila Hotel on December 11, 1982. This article argues that in contrast with the industrial and trade policies in the past two decades that have promoted inward-looking industrial development, 1970s have witnessed significant improvement in the incentive structure for exports. Hence, the country has experienced an export growth, which decelerated on the onset of 1980s. It has been emphasized that the culprit can be the intensive protectionism during the period. This article determines the underlying reasons of and proposes solutions to the laggard movement of the Philippine industrial economy.