The National Economic Development Authority (NEDA) on Wednesday announced that better delivery of government services was the primary driver in the Philippines improved ranking in the 2018 Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI).

Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto Pernia said the “whole-of-government” approach acted as agent in the implementation of efforts “to ensure efficient delivery of public goods and services.”

“More than the passage of the Ease of Doing Business Law, it has been government agencies themselves that made the difference in complying with these measures to make their services efficient,” Pernia said.

The cabinet official further noted that the continuous integration of technology and institutionalization of regulatory impact assessments in government processes have helped in developing their effectiveness and regulatory quality.

The latest WGI ranking showed that the Philippines gained ground in terms of internal efficiency in the government as its Regulatory Quality improved with 56.73 from 55.77 in 2017.

This exceeded the target of 54.0 percentile rank, as outlined in the Philippine Development Plan (PDP) 2017-2022.

Government Effectiveness also achieved a better percentile rank of 55.29 from 51.92 in 2017.

However, other governance indicators posted a low percentile rank compared with their performance in 2017.

Voice and Accountability declined further to 47.78 percentile rank versus 48.77 in 2017; Control of Corruption dropped to 34.13 percentile rank versus 39.42 in 2017; Rule of Law fell to 34.13 percentile rank versus 37.02 in 2017.

To compete with other ASEAN countries, Pernia said the government will work closely with different sectors to address the issues that pushed down country’s ranking in the corresponding categories.

“The government will address shortcomings in other governance indicators by expanding inter-agency initiatives and engaging citizens to reduce corruption. Also, strengthening local development councils to ensure participation of civil society organizations, and addressing fragmentation in the justice system to ensure the swift and fair administration of justice,” Pernia said.