By Joey Sarte Salceda
No matter how heated the politics may look like at the topsoil, things are happening at the subsoil, where the trees of the future are quietly taking deeper roots.
I want to share with you some key points today.
I. Things Are Happening, Reforms at Every Level
Industrial Policy Is Working
For the first time in decades, the Philippines has something resembling a coherent industrial strategy.
The Manufacturing PMI hit 52.9 in January 2026, the highest reading since April 2025, with new orders expanding and export orders returning to growth. Manufacturing production volume grew 4.9% year-on-year in May 2025, its fastest rate in ten months. PMI is a measure of whether purchasing agents of manufacturing companies believe that their factories are expanding.
And consistently during PBBM’s term, our PMI has been higher than Vietnam’s.
The CREATE MORE Act (RA 12066) is delivering. Samsung Electro-Mechanics committed P50.7 billion to expand its Multi-layer Ceramic Capacitors or MLCC manufacturing operations in Calamba, Laguna, creating over 3,500 high-technology jobs. MLCC is often described as the “rice of the electronics industry” because, like rice, it is used in massive quantities (trillions annually) to make devices work.
This is the first project to receive Presidential Incentives under the law. Commercial operations begin July 2027. This is a great opportunity to transition away from packaging, testing, and assembly, which are hardly manufacturing and should almost count as export of services.
The PPP Code (RA 11966) has unlocked P2.81 trillion in 251 projects in its first full year of implementation. That is 124 new projects added in 2025 alone, nearly doubling the pipeline. Thirteen projects were awarded last year.
Power Costs Are Significantly Down
Wholesale electricity spot market (WESM) prices have fallen to their lowest levels since 2020. The average WESM price in the first half of 2025 dropped to P4.14 per kWh, a 26% decline from the 2024 average of P5.58 per kWh and a 36% decline from P6.44 per kWh in 2023.
By February 2025, WESM rates hit P2.73 per kWh, the lowest in over two years.