Arroyo urges economic managers to ‘move faster’ to curb inflation

FILE: President Rodrigo Roa Duterte is joined by Former President and Incumbent Pampanga Second District Representative Gloria Arroyo and Sec. Bong Go of the Office of the Special Assistant to the President as they witness the program proper during the 116th Labor Day Celebration at the IEC Convention Center in Cebu City on May 1, 2018. (RICHARD MADELO/PRESIDENTIAL PHOTO)

House Speaker Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo called on President Rodrigo Duterte’s economic managers to “move faster” on implementing their policies to curb the country’s rising inflation rate.

“My advice is for the economic team to move faster on implementation of their policies which are more or less correct,” Arroyo told reporters on Friday, October 5.

The former president’s remarks came after the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported that the inflation or the increase in the prices of goods jumped to 6.7 percent in September. This is higher than the 6.4 percent recorded in August.

The September inflation is also higher than the 6.4 percent forecast of the Department of Finance (DOF) but .01 lower than the 6.8 percent forecast of Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP).

During Arroyo’s regime, the inflation rate hit 6.6 percent in March 2009, but they were able to bring it down to 1.5 percent in June that year. The House Speaker, an ally of Duterte, believes that the current administration can also ease up the inflation quickly.

“What I can say is that it happened to me before but then within a few months we were able to bring it down to 1.5 percent so it can be done,” she said.

Arroyo earlier said that increasing the budget for the agricultural sector will help boost the Philippines’ economic growth.

She also believes that investing in agricultural development will be a long-term solution to the skyrocketing inflation rate in the country.

“‘Dun sa karaniwang mamimili, ang pinakaimportante ano ang impact nitong lahat sa presyo ng pagkain? Isang dahilan nga kung bakit nagmamahalan ang mga presyo, ng pagkain mismo, dahil nagkukulang ‘yung produksyon (For the consumers, the most important thing is what will be the impact of all the prices in food? One of the reasons why the prices of food are increasing is because of the lack of production),” Arroyo stressed.

“So talagang ang masasabi ko kung gusto talaga natin ng pangmatagalang solusyon sa problema ng inflation, ayusin natin ‘yung agrikultura (That is why I said, if we want a long-term solution to the problem of inflation, let’s fix our agricultural sector),” she added.

On Wednesday, the House of Representatives approved on second reading the proposed P3.757-trillion national budget for 2019. The Department of Agriculture (DA) will receive a P76.1-billion budget for the next year.