Effects of the Liberalization Policy of the Government on the Footwear Industry in Marikina

Abstract

Local industries in the Philippines continue to struggle these days. A lot of local industries continue to shutdown because of bankruptcy or unknown reasons. The government is also trying to resolve the issue but it seems that decades had already passed and the efforts seems to be worthless because the trend of slow death for our industries still occurs. Looking at the situation of Marikina Footwear Industry, one of the promising industries during the 70's and early 80's, it is also suffering from a slow death. A lot of firms had already shut down or stopped their production due to the reason that they cannot sustain the needs of the local market that is now craving for foreign goods. And if we are going to look closely to the current condition of our industries, we can derive that even if the government exerts a lot of effort to help our local industries, they cannot resolve this issue immediately or they will not be able to resolve it at all without focusing to the root cause of the problem. This study will help us understand what is the root cause of the demise of our local industries, not just Marikina Footwear Industry but all of the local industry as well and how can the government play a major role in order to resolve this issue.