READ: Palace’s statement on Gallup International’s 41st Annual Global End of the Year Survey

• READ: Palace’s statement on Gallup International’s 41st Annual Global End of the Year Survey
• Philippines is the 3rd happiest country in the world, the 5th most optimistic about the country’s economic prosperity, and the 9th most optimistic about the prospects for 2018.

We enter the new year with the good news that the Philippines is the 3rd happiest country in the world, the 5th most optimistic about the country’s economic prosperity, and the 9th most optimistic about the prospects for 2018.

We Filipinos are known as a happy, resilient people. We even manage to smile amid difficulties. It is therefore not surprising that we rank high in the global happiness index.

On the other hand, hope about the country’s economic prosperity and hope about the new year can be attributed to the palpable change our people have felt under the leadership of President Rodrigo Roa Duterte. Our economy is one of the fastest growing in the region. The local stock market ended the last trading day of 2017 in an all time-high. Board of Investments-approved investments are record-breaking. The government decisively liberated Marawi.

Our people have, indeed, appreciated these changes as reflected in the survey numbers. The challenge, therefore, is for us in the government to sustain the pace and momentum of our economic growth and bring it to the greatest number of our people.