Almost every kind of industry have been greatly affected by the impact of Covid-19 pandemic in the Philippines and this is true as well with our infrastructures.
It has been a hard 2 years for most of us since the pandemic started and everyone was surprised with the changes that we all have to adjust to, with the new work schedule and setup introduced to continue and make the economy run. The impact of Covid-19 in the Philippines have been too great and some even lost their jobs because of companies not making any sale that is used for operations and salary for employees. You may know of some local small businesses in your neighborhood who closed down because of this unprecedented crisis.
We have seen what the pandemic did to all of the industries needed by our economy to function, from the food industry down to trade, retail, agriculture, e-commerce, energy, & real estate, we have been at a loss when it comes to the response that almost every government in the world has to conduct. The real estate industry has suffered plummeting volume of sales in the first year since this virus affected the reliance this industry has for physical interaction especially with clients. The food industry suffered greatly as well, especially for those who rely on the clients received in-store as well as the cost of rent and production. The trade industry was astonished with the changes it has to adjust to due to the availability of demand as well as the supply from factories and their suppliers.
Now that we are slowly going back to going outside world again, not threatened by the virus and equipped with the knowledge we need to prevent us from getting or spreading it again, we see a change on how we look at infrastructures and what are the more important industries to focus our attention to. Construction, manufacturing, and trade are slowly getting back to the way they were continuing to provide services to the public as well as create jobs again for the labor force of our economy.
The Benefit of Infrastructures
According to Investopedia and the Cambridge Dictionary, the term “infrastructure” refers to the basic physical systems of a region, business, or nation. These systems tend to be capital intensive and high-cost investments, and are vital to a country’s economic development and prosperity. Much like how small businesses rely on other businesses to thrive, infrastructures help in connecting these systems as well as providing services to them. In economic terms, infrastructure often involves the production of public goods or production processes that support natural monopolies. Examples of infrastructure include transportation systems, communication networks, sewage, water, and electric systems.
Projects related to infrastructure improvements may be funded publicly, privately, or through public-private partnerships. Applicable to large and small-scale organizational frameworks, infrastructure includes a variety of systems and structures as long as physical components are required. For example, the electrical grid across a city, state or country is infrastructure based on the equipment involved and the intent to provide a service to the areas it supports. The maintenance of these structures are also important to the continuity to ensure that it will serve generations to come. Infrastructures that have been developed from even before we are born are still used until today and still gives value to the life we create, whether we choose to be employed or start our own business.
Read ALso: Infrastructure Development Highlights of 2022
All developing cities and even developed ones need infrastructures in order for them to operate allowing companies and corporations and even small businesses to continue to with the growing supply and demand of the masses. All thriving cities in Metro Manila rely on new and quality infrastructures to make sure that everything runs smoothly in terms of management in the different sectors of the government. Not everyone appreciates how infrastructures help the economy grow with the help it provides the businesses surrounding it. It enables trade, power, and the food industry to carry on with the service they provide to the community as well as connect workers to their jobs and companies to their employees. Infrastructures play a crucial role in the development of cities and provinces as well as making a certain place desirable for business owners and corporations to conduct business in. The construction of infrastructures give way for the country’s economy to grow on a much larger scale and allow its citizens to be provided with opportunities for success and financial independence.
The impact of Covid-19 pandemic in the Philippines have been too great and almost all projects that are intended to provide a better community for us halted. The construction of highways and flyovers were stopped in the middle of operation. This means that the work provided by these projects were also cut down in half. Most of our construction workers lost jobs to the pandemic giving way to another problem the government has to face – unemployment. All in all, infrastructures help the economy grow by connecting trade routes and supply chains as well as creating jobs for millions of skilled workers. There are a ton of jobs per year created by this industry alone and everything connected to it, from locomotive engineers and electrical power line installers, to truck drivers and airline pilots, to construction workers and meter readers, infrastructure jobs account for nearly 11% of the nation’s workforce. Infrastructures and the jobs they create offers a lot of employment opportunities that has a low barrier of entry and will most likely provide us more opportunities to a better economy growth.
Telecommunications & Technology
One of the essential element that helped us through this pandemic is the advanced infrastructure we have on telecommunications. It is true that the impact of Covid-19 pandemic in the Philippines was not seen as a threat at first, but when the worst came to all the nations of the world, telecommunication played a big part on how humanity was still able to continue its businesses. The advancement in technology allowed us to be connected to our loved ones, to still be able to complete work even when we are at home, to still connect with important business partners to plan the future with. Everything and everyone relied greatly in telecommunications. The projects that continuously upgrade and advance our telecommunication facilities substantially relies on the creation of new infrastructures as well as the maintenance and upgrade of old ones. The BPO industry, even before the pandemic, in a great extent, base the reliability of the work being provided in telecommunications. This allowed this industry to still continue their operations even in the midst of the pandemic, as they are the first industry to allow remote work on a large scale to save what they can in the wake of the crisis. With this step, the country’s economy was still saved, even by a little, to still provide income to those who doesn’t want to lose their jobs.
Technology has been one of the key players in the pandemic and the economy’s recovery since almost everyone relied with the use of technology, since before the pandemic, to help run businesses as well as innovate new ways to do and manage things. For example, communications in the early 2000s were so basic that you wouldn’t even have imagined video calling to have been possible. The digitalization of money has been a very important factor to the management of businesses and how they run it. Most of us now depend more on services like online banking, GCash, Paymaya, and the like, to pay bills, buy stuff physically or over the internet, or order food from stores. The forced advancement on technology the pandemic has given us made the way people look at money and how it is traded more openly. Although we all know that if given a choice, we wouldn’t even want this pandemic to happen, we inevitably realize the importance of certain infrastructures that needs to be improved and will have the need for further advancement in their respective sectors, so that we will be more ready in the future to fight threats that may show up in the future.
Transportation
One of the projects greatly affected by the pandemic is the planned LRT-1 extension to Cavite. This project aims to cut the travel time of commuters from Baclaran to Cavite from 70 minutes down to only 25. It was a really good news when this was announced in 2013 but when the construction is coming along, and the pandemic hit the world, suddenly the construction stopped and we can’t do anything about it. The expected time for its completion added years to the target due to the unexpected issues we have to face in terms of construction supply and the limited amount of work force available. There are also a lot of local construction of infrastructures in our neighborhood that was affected by the pandemic and this caused roads to be left untouched for the ones currently being serviced or constructed. There are also offices and government facilities that were not finished due to the availability of workers. A lot has changed since the protocols to fight the impact of Covid-19 pandemic in the Philippines was released by the different sectors of the government, local or national.
Read Also: Evolution of Philippine Transportation; Then and Now
Transportation has been one of the key aspects to a growing economy. Local transport facilities like jeepneys, UV express vans, and trains provides a way for the workforce to go to and from the places of their jobs. Since the state of transportation in the Philippines, especially in the urban areas, is getting worse even before the pandemic happened, what the virus did is give us more problems on how to manage or sustain it now that social distancing has been the norm for everyone. The start of the pandemic cut off certain routes that is usually taken by the workforce for their jobs and boundaries of cities have been strictly implemented. The transportation sector suffered significantly due to this, making most of our public transport system unavailable to the people. Not only that, the planning and construction of new highways have been stopped since most of the people that are needed to implement the completion of these projects doesn’t have options for transport.
Healthcare
The healthcare infrastructure is undoubtedly the part of our economy that has been hit the most by the impact of Covid-19 pandemic in the Philippines, with the problems brought to them by the virus and every branch of problem it created. There are shortages in staff as well as the problem of getting to places where they are needed. We sought help from the different national and local government sectors to help in the management and resolution of this pandemic but it proves to be insufficient. Starting from the contract tracing protocol of every company and every local establishment is required to do, not everyone is following it and it proved to be a difficult task, even for the government. Our healthcare system is also challenged with the fact the with the rising cases of people getting infected at the time, some of them that requires immediate care is not given one since our facilities could not serve the massive amount of cases coming in. We also have to take into consideration the number of licensed health practitioners being burned out from the enormous number of infected people coming in and the unending instances of surges in the curve of the people getting infected. It appears that this trend will never end at the time, and this was also large contributor to the overall wellness of the doctors and nurses with the acceptance of what is happening, as well as how long it will be. Most of our nurses quit and found jobs in another industry to get a break from the extreme pressures this pandemic is giving. Some even went to another country to provide their professional service since they feel that they are not getting paid enough with the crisis at hand. The negative effect of this pandemic really showed us our shortcomings and the importance of the healthcare system currently in place in our country. We need to focus our budget and effort into making this system better to be prepared in the future for scenarios like this one.
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