IT is heartwarming to see the Philippine economy now going strong after the debilitating effects of the pandemic that saw businesses close down, unemployment rise, and household income decline. In fact, traffic has again slowed down and new buzzwords have cropped up, like “revenge spending,” that shine a spotlight on the extent of the economic recovery.
And even the peso has strengthened against the US dollar, from near the P60 level to below P54 as the economic activities came back in full force after being whipsawed as a result of Covid-19. And with the contribution from the country’s overseas Filipino workers as well as Business Process Outsourcing, the economic growth is seen eclipsing its pre-pandemic levels.
So far, the only dark cloud in the horizon is the rise in the prices of agricultural products such as onions, which went up to a dizzying height of P700 a kilo in some places that resulted in several memes in the social media showing onion bulbs as replacement for the diamond that grace rings. There were even memes of photos of women sporting onion earrings to show the bulb’s newfound popularity.