More than a quarter of a million firms were deemed permanently closed between 2018 and 2021 and more than half of these firms closed during the pandemic, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).
Based on the 2021 Updating of the List of Establishments Preliminary Results, some 259,707 establishments were tagged with permanently closed status. More than half or 53.5 percent of these firms ceased operation within 2020 to 2021.
This affected 1.052 million workers and more than a quarter of these workers are employed by firms based in the National Capital Region (NCR).
“The 2021 ULE was conducted generally to update the status and characteristics of establishments in the PSA’s List of Establishments [LE] and to provide information on the distribution of establishments and employment across areas and industries. The LE serves as the source of the sampling frame for all establishment-based surveys and censuses conducted by the PSA,” PSA explained.
Based on the data, out of the 259,707 firms that closed, nearly half or 124,699 establishments were closed in 2020 and 14,144 firms were closed in 2021. The closure of these establishments affected 499,375 workers nationwide in 2020 alone while another 66,071 workers were affected in 2021.
Of the firms that permanently closed between 2018 and 2021, PSA said 55,959 were based in NCR. The cities that posted the highest number of closed establishments were the City of Manila with 13,449 closed companies; Quezon City, 11,729; and Caloocan City, 6,810.
However, data showed 33,183 firms closed in NCR in 2020 alone. This was driven by the closures in the City of Manila involving 8,788 establishments; Caloocan, 5,455; and Quezon City, 5,430 firms.
In terms of employment, a total of 295,041 Filipinos working in NCR-based firms were affected by the closures. The cities with the highest number of affected workers were Quezon City at 75,238; City of Manila, 60,546; and Makati City, 30,930 workers.
Based on the preliminary results, more than 1.08 million establishments were in operation and generated 8.57 million total employment during the reference year.
Compared to the results of the 2018 ULE, the number of establishments increased by 7.7 percent while total employment declined by 5.2 percent.
NCR still hub
The National Capital Region (NCR) remained as the hub of business and industry with 201,080 establishments comprising 18.6 percent of the total number of establishments in 2021.
More than one-third (33.6 percent) of the total employment was generated by these establishments. Next to NCR are two adjacent regions, Calabarzon, and Central Luzon, with 160,056 (14.8 percent) and 137,528 (12.7 percent) establishments, respectively.
Calabarzon and Central Luzon also generated the next highest employment figures with 1.3 million and 0.84 million, respectively.
Source: BusinessMirror