Economics Literacy

What does it mean to be economically literate?

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) defines economic literacy as “literacy knowledge or competence in individual and group decisions on how to use scarce resources to satisfy their wants and needs”. However, Ekonsepto adopts broader attributes to describe an economics literate individual. They:

Are there Philippine government agencies working on this issue?

Yes. One of them is the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) who leads the annual celebration of the Economics and Financial Literacy Week (EFLW) every second week of November as mandated by Republic Act No. 10922, also known as the Economic and Financial Literacy Act. This Act is aimed towards developing a national consciousness on economic and financial literacy. The Philippine Economic Society is mandated by the same law to coordinate with NEDA to lead and encourage the participation of the private sector and civil society during the said event.

WATCH: Ekonsepto joins NEDA's 2021 panel session during the 59th Philippine Economics Society Conference.

How is economics literacy measured?

Unfortunately, there is no available evidence-based measurement on what stage Filipinos might have achieved economics literacy. Current public sector efforts are more geared towards financial literacy. Ekonsepto is on an ongoing quest to work on this issue. We start by launching pre- and post-event diagnostics tests in our webinars. 

If you are interested in joining our Monitoring and Evaluation team to answer this big question, click here

In the meantime, we leave you with existing research on how scholars around the world tried to measure competencies in economics:

Other partners in economics literacy

Ecnmy
United Kingdom / International