There are today 90 million Filipinos.

This demographic growth is alarming to those who think that the figures spell out a heavy burden on the nation’s limited natural and financial resources.

Any population increase means more demand for food, water, shelter, health care, education, employment and infrastructure, among others. And it poses a serious challenge to government and to all stakeholders.

But we should not bewail this fact. We must accept and respond to it creatively.

A big population such as ours can be turned into a blessing if we seriously look at it as a vast human resource. Think of all the hands that can be mobilized to create more wealth, the minds which when properly empowered can make many dreams come true.

Moreover, a big population base translates into a sizeable domestic market which can cushion the impact of global recession and a drop in demand for exports.

China is a classic case. Its own consumer base is the pillar of its economy. India is another high population country.

Its own film industry, the biggest in the world in terms of films produced in a year, is sustained by hundreds of millions of India’s cinematic audience. A car manufacturing firm in India is encouraged to mass produce a people’s car for India’s growing middle class market.

Conversely, countries with very small population are the most vulnerable to the effects of a worldwide recession. If their economies are export-driven, a drop in demand from their buyers sends an alarm signal. If the decline in demand persists, the impact can be devastating.

It makes a lot of sense, therefore, to start looking inward and visualize how we can effectively form a consumer base out of our population.

Consumption spending, which is the driving force of economic growth, presupposes purchasing power across all sectors of society down to the grassroots level. This in turn implies wealth-creating or income-generating opportunities in the hand of as many Filipinos as possible.

One way of increasing our demand from our large domestic consumer base is to help improve the productivity of Philippine agriculture and fisheries sectors. When the level of income of our farmers and fisher folk improves, there will be an improvement too in the amount of consumption spending.

The overall effect on the production and consumption cycle cannot be overemphasized.

Those not directly engaged in basic agriculture can be assisted to become self-employed through various entrepreneurial ventures. Training, start-up credit assistance, networking and advisory help are provided by a number of both government and private institutions doing entrepreneurial development work.

We can turn our population level to our advantage.

(You may send your comments/feedback to: mbvillar_comments@yahoo.com)