According to DataReportal’s Global Digital Insights report, the Philippines flaunted 86.98 million web clients as of January 2024
The Philippines’ digital economy is expected to hit $35 billion in 2025, regardless of slow internet, which is up 45% from $24 billion in 2023. As per industry experts, this is a noteworthy move. Web-based business has touched off the nation’s economy, making it quite possibly one of the quickest developing economies in Southeast Asia.
According to DataReportal’s Global Digital Insights report, the Philippines flaunted 86.98 million web clients as of January 2024. The Philippines also has the sixth-largest number of Facebook clients on the planet (89.75 million), out of a populace of around 119 million.
E-Payments: A New Favorite
The nation’s use of QR codes is increasing rapidly, making it a part of the country’s new ordinary, and bypassing the Mastercard time. In 2021, because of the pandemic, and despite being a slow poke in web speed, e-installments have hopped by “more than 5,000 percent”, as per the Philippine National Bank (Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, BSP). In 2022, the web economy enrolled a gross worth added of around 2.08 trillion pesos, ($36.11 billion) tending to 9.4 percent of the nation’s complete public result (GDP).
According to the Statista and eConomy SEA report, e-commerce topped economic activity with an expected gross merchandise value (GMV) of $24 billion in 2023—a 60% increase from $15 billion in 2022.
According to a January 2024 Ookla report, the Philippines was positioned 86th out of 146 nations in broadband speed, and 49th out of 178 nations in mobile speed. This could, however, change soon.
The first phase of the National Fibre Backbone (NFB) sent off on Friday (April 19, 2024) – covers 1,245 km and has an underlying optical range limit of 600 Gbps. It’s the first of six fiber-optic availability being moved by Manila to attach the whole archipelago with fiber, considering the speed-of-light network.
The President, Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. promised to promote investments in a “fast and reliable internet across the country” with a 36,289-kilometer shoreline at the NFB Phase 1 inauguration event on Friday in Manila.
The multibillion-dollar domestic submarine link project will cover Visayas and Mindanao via 1,800 kilometers of submarine links, with more than 20 planned “landing stations” across the country.
The organization responsible for project management, the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), projects that when every one of the six stages is done in 2026, the country’s 119 million occupants — or 70 million of them — will have 65% broadband entrance rate, up from its current 33%.
It is also expected that internet connectivity will become as cheap as $5 per megabit per second. Islanders can now use satellite broadband internet thanks to Manila’s May 2022 authorization of Starlink. However, the $500 upfront cost of a necessary device (dish and switch) is prohibitive for the majority of prospective end users, as there is currently no installment plan available.
What does ‘high-speed backbone’ mean
Currently serving Luzon, an island in the Philippines three times the size of the Netherlands, is the first phase of the backbone. As part of the National Broadband Program (NBP), which was moved by the DICT, the NFB plays a crucial role in providing the necessary infrastructure for the computerized economy.
Directly connecting the computerized partition, Manila is putting itself into the communication framework as a team with the confidential region. Essentially, the NFB will use large reserve monies to support various government offices, server farms, and networks, particularly in Northern and Focal Luzon. The NFB’s ultimate test is how many of the 7,640 islands in the nation would undoubtedly reach the fast web.
In order to achieve this goal and promote inclusivity, the president asked for “diligence,” progress, and cooperation. The test is still ongoing. Access to the quick web for millions of people living outside of major cities would undoubtedly be a gift from god, especially considering the rapid advancement of computerized frameworks.
Crunching Numbers
From an economic point of view, the projections reveal development between 6.0 percent and 7.0 percent for 2024, in the wake of hitting a higher-than-anticipated rate in 2023.
In a media briefing, National Economic Development Authority chief Arsenio Balisacan emphasized that the target growth range for 2025 has been reduced from the initial projection of 6.5 to 8% to 6.5 to 7.5%. Development projections for the years 2026 to 2028 stay unaltered at 6.5 percent to 8.0 percent.
