Google cites ‘amazing growth’ of PH economy under Marcos

Google Philippines lauded the robust and “amazing growth” of the Philippine economy under the Marcos administration, saying the government’s data reflect Google’s digital economy reports.

Google Philippines country manager

Jackie Wang said this during the question-and-answer portion of the “World Economic Forum” in Malacañan on March 19.

According to Wang, Google’s digital economy report reflects a lot of President Marcos’ remarks about the growth potential in the Philippines.

“Our reports reflect a lot of what you mentioned about the growth potential and the amazing growth that we’ve seen in the Philippines,” she told Marcos.

The Google official said that since 2023, the Philippines’ digital economy has been as big as $23 billion in growth in merchandising value and has a compound “giga growth” of 16 percent.

In response, President Marcos invited the private sector to help the government improve the country’s internet connectivity and fortify critical infrastructures against cyber-attacks.

“Well, we are still at the level where we are worried about connectivity and we are working very hard because being an island nation that becomes a real factor, that becomes a real challenge,” he said.

According to Marcos, the government is catching up with the help of several groups that have come to set up fiber optic networks and data centers.

Meanwhile, President Marcos expressed his hopes for the efforts to design a cloud specifically for the Philippines to improve cyber security, citing the importance of the private sector in ensuring cyber scams and cyberattacks are effectively managed.

He described the cyber security problem as “the darker side of the technology,” which has become quite pronounced prompting the government to respond.

“We have many instances where there are scams, there is hacking. We, in terms of actual security, also have been–have fallen victim to many of these nefarious activities,” Marcos said.