PH development plan to complement SDGs

Philippine Daily Inquirer, Apr 18, 2017

The government is working on a roadmap that will tie in the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with the country’s own medium to long term progress plans.

“The government aims to bring development planning to the next level by considering the interplay of economy, society, and environment,” National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) Undersecretary Rosemarie G. Edillon said in a statement, adding that the planned roadmap “will enable the country to maximize the current economic momentum” prescribed under the AmBisyon Natin 2040 vision.

Launched last year, AmBisyon Natin 2040 is aimed at tripling Filipinos’ per capita income to $11,000 in 24 years’ time by sustaining at least 6.5-percent gross domestic product growth annually.

Last October, President Duterte signed Executive Order No. 5, which stated that “by 2040, the Philippines shall be a prosperous, predominantly middle-class society where no one is poor.”

Programs aimed at achieving the SDGs would also be implemented side by side with the Philippine Development Plan (PDP) 2017-2022, which serves as the Duterte’s administration’s development blueprint. The PDP targets 7 to 8 percent GDP growth in the medium term by pursuing the 10-point socioeconomic agenda ultimately aimed at reducing the poverty incidence to 14 percent by 2022.

The SDGs serve as a follow-up to the Millennium Development Goals aimed at putting an end to poverty, hunger, disease and illiteracy.