By Macon Ramos-Araneta
The Senate is a step closer to approving the Tatak Pinoy (Proudly Filipino) bill to further develop Philippine industries.
It will eventually propel the economy forward, create more opportunities and higher incomes for Filipinos
Four years in the making, the Tatak Pinoy advocacy of Sen. Sony Angara is now a bill included in the priority legislation of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., set for debates in plenary.
In his sponsorship speech on Senate Bill 2426 or the proposed Tatak Pinoy Act, Angara said it is about time for a national strategy to hasten the growth and transformation of the Philippine economy through strong collaboration between government and the private sector is put in place.
“For true economic development to happen, it needs to be pursued collectively and collaboratively by all sectors of society. Supporting domestic industries and hastening the process of transforming the Philippine economy demands that stakeholders from the public and private sectors organize, plan, align, and integrate their respective efforts,” Angara said.
Tatak Pinoy as a strategy is so comprehensive that it took Angara over an hour to finish his speech in order to demonstrate to his colleagues and the public about how the measure can change the economic profile of the Philippines and more importantly, uplift the lives of the people.
A key to making this vision of an economically strong Philippines happen, Angara said, is to empower domestic enterprises, be it the small, medium or even the industry giants to become more globally competitive; to help them produce more sophisticated products; and provide exceptional, world-class services.
Looking into the steps taken by countries that were able to become more prosperous over time, Angara noted that a lot of their success has to do with their intentional shift towards producing more complex or sophisticated products and aggressively supporting and promoting their goods and services domestically and overseas.
Angara explained that the country cannot be content with what it is already producing but should constantly diversify in order to widen its basket of goods.
Producing more workers that are required by businesses, including potential investors must be coupled with the availability of the necessary infrastructure, good governance, clear and consistent regulations, ease of doing business and a research and development ecosystem, among others.
Another important aspect of the Tatak Pinoy strategy is the marketing and branding of Philippine-made products so that more markets and consumers are able to have access to them.
Angara said that it all starts with the country itself supporting its own products, both in the public and private sector.
“Tatak Pinoy is about more than the products and services we want to make more sophisticated and more globally competitive. It’s also about eliciting pride and hope from our people and empowering ourselves as a nation to present a new, or previously unknown side of ourselves and project both hard and soft power to the rest of the world,” added the senator.
Once in place, Angara believes that Tatak Pinoy will be able to provide solutions to cross-cutting problems like poverty, inclusive growth, the trade and current account deficit, unemployment, underemployment, low salaries, rural to urban migration, among many others. “The crux of our proposal is to mandate all the relevant government agencies to work in tandem with the private sector and ensure that their individual efforts jive towards helping Filipino enterprises produce better products and offer world-class services, resulting in better jobs and income opportunities across the country,” Angara said.
