Good afternoon to our friends in the media.
We expected Sulong 2017 to be as productive as Sulong 2016. The participants in this forum concluded just now worked hard to ensure this would be a productive dialogue.
This is how public-private partnership works. The government side delivers the medium. The private sector delivers the content. It is a productive symbiosis.
You will recall that in the first Sulong meeting last year, we arrived at 10 actionable points. Those actionable points have been substantially complied with by the Duterte administration.
In this day-long discussion, we have initially worked on another set of action programs which include:
1. Identifying Best Competitive Advantages vs other countries in ASEAN and rally both government and private sector to drive growth and competitiveness;
2. Improving ease of doing business through the convergence of different agencies including local government units;
3. Completing C-6 (from Skyway/FTI in Taguig to Batasan Complex in Quezon City) to ease Metro Manila congestion;
4. Allowing new players in the telecommunications industry; and
5. Improving agricultural support infrastructure and services such as farm-to-market roads, cold storage, and irrigation to facilitate the distribution of agricultural products and increased farmer incomes
Discussions are currently ongoing on the improvements that we need to implement in the social sector. These include the following concerns:
1 Improving health services by expanding public access to healthcare which would entail expanding Philhealth coverage, providing more free medicines, and strengthening rural health units.;
2 Addressing the job-skills mismatch through the joint identification of of job profiles needed by per industry by government, industry and the academe;
3 Improving land tenure security in all areas;
4 Intensifying and speeding up resolution of the conflict in Marawi; and
5. Providing entrepreneurial education for farmers, fisherfolk and other agricultural workers.
This is a running list. But then consultations between government and the private sector should be an ongoing affair.
On our part, we will study closely the suggestions and see what specific policy actions might be taken.
This has been a productive day and I thank all of those who have made this possible.