Philippines to face longer, shallower economic recovery

In this photo taken on Nov 24, 2020, a child eats free packed meals distributed by a Catholic religious order in Manila.Charities are struggling to meet the ever-growing demand for food as millions of families go hungry across the country where Covid-19 restrictions have crippled the economy. - AFP

MANILA (Philippine Daily Inquirer/ANN): The Philippines’ return to prepandemic economic growth levels will take longer than expected, with next year’s expansion likely to remain constrained by downside risks, including challenges to the distribution of the coronavirus vaccine.

Thus concluded economists and investment managers who spoke in an online forum hosted by the Inquirer, opining that the recovery of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) would come in the form of a “dirty L” — resembling a shallow-trajectory check mark—rather than the V- or U-shaped recovery that government planners were earlier predicting.