Gross domestic product (GDP) from the Philippines likely slipped in the second quarter by nearly a fifth year-on-year at the height of the region’s longest. In addition, it was the most serious coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), London-based Capital Economics said.
Capital Economics senior Asia economist Gareth Leather told that their projection showed the Philippines’ GDP shrank by 18 percent year-on-year. He described as “one of the biggest in the region,” during the April to June quarter.
“Countries heavily dependent on tourism, such as Thailand, or experiencing long lockdowns like the Philippines, last quarter’s GDP would have dropped 15-20 percent year-on-year,” Leather said in a July 24 article titled “Rupiah worries resurface, Korea’s ‘strong’ slowdown.”
Last week, in a webinar, global economists from Capital Economics lumped the Philippines, Indonesia, Mexico, and Southern Europe among the economies most likely to suffer permanent loss of production from their respective domestic tourism sectors because of the pandemic.
Capital Economics had projected the Philippines’ GDP to fall by 8 percent by 2020. In other words, it could be the biggest economic contraction in history in the region.
GDP Was Reviewing
The economic team was currently reviewing its earlier forecast of 2-3.4 percent full-year GDP contraction. It was after the nation fell into a recession in the first half as the economy took a deeper than anticipated plunge in the second quarter.
The government will announce the official figure of GDP on 6 August.
In a July 21 report, Barcelona-based FocusEconomics also further downgraded its 2020 GDP forecast for the Philippines to 3.9-percent contraction. It was from 3.2 percent in June due to “a sharp recession in the second quarter.”
Last June, many parts of the country were placed under a less-restrictive general community quarantine (GCQ) status. It allowed 75 percent of the economy to operate.
And then, it was following about 2.5 months of a very stringent enhanced community quarantine (ECQ). Hence, it put a halt to three-fourths of economic activities.
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