I take great pride in having been able to overcome the Asian financial crisis and seeking the opportunities available to bring about an unprecedented growth in the economy.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Asia has a great future; we here in the Philippines will benefit from this Asian prosperity.
The position that I take partly as a result of living in Asia is where you stop living according to your expectations and you become available to experience things as they are.
I was a professor at Princeton University. And, in that capacity, I studied for many years the role of financial crisis in the economy.
I've been surrounded by some of the best economic minds in the country, and hopefully I've absorbed some of that.
It has given me a global vantage point, being the daughter of immigrants from China, who had nothing when they came here. And now I am leading a company. It speaks to something deep in me, the concept that you don't have to start with anything.
The first initial feeling, at least for me, was to go out and play well and hopefully win and have the Asian community be even more proud.
Asia has always been a really exciting part of the world for me, personally. And it actually was the first part of the world that bought my brand, strangely enough.
My administration is focused on continuing to grow our economic foundation while ensuring emerging industries have the infrastructure and workforce they need to succeed in the global economy.
Although I am a young leader, I actually came to it strangely quite late. I have a different perspective, partly because of my family, partly because of what I did for ten years: negotiating trade deals, working out in Central Asia doing assistance projects.
I come from a country in which I experienced economic collapse.