The economy of Central Luzon posted a 5.3 percent growth rate in 2015, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported.
PSA Regional Director Edgardo Pare said the gross regional domestic product (GRDP) of Central Luzon was recorded at P704.28 billion in 2015, which is approximately P35 billion more than the region’s economic output in 2014 at P668.99 billion.
GRDP measures the economic performance of a region in terms of goods and services produced. It measures the relative contribution of the three major economic industries namely Agriculture, Hunting, Forestry, and Fishing (AHFF), Industry, and Services.
Despite the increase in the GRDP’s nominal value, Pare noted that such increase is still lower than the 9.3 per cent growth rate in 2014, primarily brought about by the slowdown in industry and AHFF.
“Industry decelerated from 15.9 per cent in 2014 to 6.7 per cent in 2015, while AHFF plunged to 0.6 per cent in 2015 from 6.0 per cent in 2014,” he said.
Manufacturing, which accounted for the biggest share in the industry sector decelerated from 15.9 percent to 6.7 percent.
Mining and quarrying also further declined from negative 8.7 percent to negative 39.2 percent.
Similarly, electricity, gas and water supply slowed down from 19.1 percent to 7.0 percent.
“The good news though is that construction in our region is booming as shown in its acceleration from 6.0 per cent to 11.1 per cent,” Pare explained.
In terms of the AHFF, agriculture and forestry decelerated from 6.8 per cent to 0.8 per cent, while fishing declined from 2.1 percent to negative 0.6 percent.
Under the services sector, financial intermediation and public administration and defense; compulsory social security also decelerated from 11.8 percent to 5.7 percent, and from 4.2 percent to 1.3 percent, respectively.
“Nonetheless, this decline is mitigated by the acceleration in other services, which contributed to the over-all up-tick of the whole industry from 4.1 to 5.7 percent,” he cited.
In particular, Transportation, Storage and Communication expanded from 4.7 to 7.6 percent; Trade from 1.3 to 4.4 percent; and Real Estate, Renting and Business Activities from 3.8 to 6.7 percent.
In addition, other services also redounded from negative 0.1 to 4.9 percent in 2015.
For his part, National Economic and Development Authority Regional Director Severino Santos said that overall, Central Luzon continues to perform well, especially in terms of the tourism industry and that the regional economy remains promising. (Press Release)