Peru: National Competitiveness and Productivity Policy

Supreme Decree No. 345-2018-EF establishes the National Competitiveness and Productivity Policy (PNCP) as the guiding framework for government policy on economic growth. The policy is designed to be sustained over time and evolve into a true State Policy, aligned with the strategic guidelines of the National Agreement. The PNCP brings together various tools and institutions aimed at facilitating inter-institutional coordination, providing essential public goods, and creating favorable conditions for the functioning of market actors and consumers. Its core objective is to promote sustained growth based on increasing productivity. Achieving this goal requires aligning economic incentives and fostering an environment where economic actors can leverage the country’s comparative advantages. The PNCP outlines nine Priority Objectives (POs), which guide action across three levels of coordination: 1.Coordination among public entities at all levels of government. 2. Public-private collaboration to boost productivity. 3. Public-private articulation focused on citizen well-being. The Priority Objectives (POs) are as follows: PO1. Provide the country with quality economic and social infrastructure by focusing on efficient planning and prioritization, ensuring the sustainability and functionality of economic, social, and natural infrastructure, all within a territorial development and disaster resilience approach. PO2. Strengthen human capital by improving services that support capacity building and the certification of labor competencies, aligning training supply with labor demand, enhancing access and quality in higher education, ensuring access to quality basic services, and advancing teacher reform and appreciation. PO3. Develop capacities for innovation, adoption, and transfer of technological improvements through mechanisms that elevate scientific research and technological development, support technology transfer to close productivity gaps, and ensure proper intellectual property protections through coordinated public-private-academic interventions. PO4. Promote local and external financing mechanisms by creating financial instruments tailored to business needs, leveraging opportunities provided by information and communication technologies. It also aims to enhance access, usage, and competition in financial and capital markets, as well as to promote financial education and inclusion. PO5. Establish conditions for a dynamic and competitive labor market that fosters decent employment, with an adequate regulatory framework and improved labor inspection processes that support worker formalization. PO6. Create an enabling business environment by improving productivity and associativity tools, facilitating quality standards adoption, incorporating regulatory impact analysis, streamlining administrative processes and removing barriers, ensuring interoperability among public entities' IT systems, and implementing digital identity. PO7. Facilitate foreign trade of goods and services by developing a diversified and competitive export supply, optimizing access to logistics services, enhancing trade facilitation systems, coordinating among relevant entities, and combating customs-related crimes. The policy also encourages integration into global and regional value chains and other internationalization strategies. PO8. Strengthen national institutions by improving the justice system, promoting public integrity and anti-corruption efforts, establishing coordination mechanisms, building intersectoral and intergovernmental management capacities, encouraging meritocracy in public service careers, and developing systems for data collection and territorial management information sharing. PO9. Promote environmental sustainability in economic activities by conserving natural infrastructure, encouraging circular economy practices in markets, building capacity to enhance the value of natural resources, and generating sustainable and diversified solutions for productive business development.