The Philippine gwearing face masksovernment on August 18 revised its economic growth projection for 2021 from 6-7 percent to 4-5 percent due to the re-imposition of lockdown in Metro Manila to curb the spread of COVID-19 in the country, Xinhua news agency reported.

In a statement, the Philippines’ Development Budget Coordination Committee (DBCC) said in the first half of 2021, careful balancing of COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 risks allowed the committee to improve the gross domestic product growth to 11.8 percent in the second quarter.

However, with the global emergence of the Delta variant, the DBCC said the second-half growth outlook was revised downwards "to reflect the additional restrictions imposed by the government”.

Meanwhile, the DBCC retained its growth targets for 2022 at 7-9 percent and 2023, 2024 both at 6-7 percent.

The Philippine economy shrank by 9.5 percent in 2020, the lowest rate since 1946, due to the pandemic.

The Philippines now has 1,776,495 confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 30,623 deaths. Metro Manila is under a hard lockdown until August 20.

Source: VNA