MANILA, Dec 5 (Reuters): The Philippines lowered its growth target for 2023 to 6.0%-7.0%, from 6.5%-8.0%, a government inter-agency panel said on Monday, factoring in the impact of a weak peso and high inflation.
The government also revised its foreign exchange rate assumptions for 2022-2024. It now expects the peso to trade against the U.S. dollar at 54-55 in 2022 compared with the previous assumption of 51-53, at 55-59 in 2023, and at 53-57 in 2024, compared with the previous forecast of 51-55 for 2023 onwards.
The growth target for 2024-2028 was maintained at 6.5%-8.0%, the Development Budget Coordination Committee (DBCC) told a media briefing.
The peso has recovered slightly against the dollar after declining to a record low of 59 in recent weeks, thanks to a series of interest rate hikes by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilpinas (BSP) to match U.S. Federal Reserve's aggressive tightening.
It was trading at 55.73-55.88 on Monday.
Officials said the economy was on track to meet this year's growth goal of 6.5%-7.5%, which is faster than the 5.6% expansion in 2021, after the government removed nearly all Covid-19 restrictions and allowed more business activities to resume.
Meanwhile, The Philippines reported 1,173 new Covid-19 infections on Sunday, pushing the number of confirmed cases in the Southeast Asian country to 4,041,023.
The Department of Health (DOH) said the number of active cases dropped to 18,256, while 24 more patients died from Covid-19 complications, pushing the country's death toll to 64,725.
Metro Manila, the capital region with over 13 million people, tallied 409 new cases.
The Philippines reported its highest Covid-19 single-day tally of 39,004 new cases on Jan 15.
The country, with a population of around 110 million, has fully vaccinated over 73.7 million people. - Reuters
