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The Philippines dropped five ranks to 23rd out of 50 of the world’s most promising emerging logistics markets in the latest edition of the Agility Emerging Markets Logistics Index
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After three consecutive years in 18th place, the Philippines fell in the 2025 index with an overall score of 4.91, down from its 5.18 score in 2023
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The Philippines’ ranking dropped in digital readiness and international logistics opportunities, improved in business fundamentals, and maintained its position in domestic logistics opportunities
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In the overall ranking, the same 10 countries remained the top emerging logistics markets in 2025, with China, India and the United Arab Emirates leading and maintaining their ranks
The Philippines dropped five ranks to 23rd out of 50 of the world’s most promising emerging logistics markets in the Agility Emerging Markets Logistics Index 2025.
After three consecutive years in 18th place, the Philippines fell in the 2025 index with an overall score of 4.91, down from the 5.18 score in 2023.
READ: PH remains in 18th place among emerging logistics markets
The annual index—conducted by global logistics industry research and analysis service provider Transport Intelligence and global logistics company Agility—ranks countries for overall competitiveness based on their logistics strengths, business climates, and digital readiness — factors that make them attractive to logistics providers, freight forwarders, air and ocean carriers, distributors and investors.
It examines key areas for logistics market development: domestic logistics opportunities, international logistics opportunities, business fundamentals, and digital readiness.
For this year’s index, 567 logistics industry professionals were surveyed.
As in the past few years, the Philippines performed strongest in digital readiness, even though its 2025 score of 5.05 is a slight decline from its 5.50 score in 2024. This resulted in the country dropping 11 places to 23rd from 12th place in 2024.
Digital readiness measures the potential and progress of an emerging market in becoming a digitally led, skills-rich, innovation-oriented and sustainable economy for the future.
According to the index, the Philippines, Pakistan, and Lebanon “struggled” in this segment with “declining network readiness and lagging innovation indices as major contributors to their downward trajectory.”
The Philippines also dropped rank in international logistics opportunities, which measures internal and external demand for trade intensive logistics services and the capacity of individual emerging markets to facilitate cross-border logistics operations. For this year, the country was at 16th place from 13th last year, with its score down to 4.95 from 5.22 last year.
For business fundamentals, on the other hand, the Philippines improved its ranking to 31st in 2025 from 36th in 2024 as it scored 4.53 from 4.23 previously. Business fundamentals measure the openness, robustness, fairness and strength of each emerging market’s business environment, rule of law and market independence.
For domestic logistics opportunities, the Philippines remained at 17th place, even when its score declined to 4.97 from 5.06 previously. Domestic opportunities measure the performance of each emerging market and its potential to sustain and develop domestic demand that requires competitive logistics markets.
In the overall ranking, the same 10 countries remained the top emerging logistics markets in 2025, with China (1st), India (2nd), and the United Arab Emirates (3rd) leading and maintaining their ranks. Completing the top 10 were Saudi Arabia (up two ranks), Malaysia (down one rank), Indonesia (down one rank), Mexico (up two ranks), Qatar (down one rank), Thailand (up one rank), and Vietnam (down two places).
Colombia (21st place) and Iran (32nd) took leaps up the rankings, while Nigeria (43rd), Bangladesh (39th) and Ukraine (40th) tumbled.
The six Gulf countries are all among the top 11 for business conditions: UAE again tops the rankings for best business climate; Saudi Arabia is 3rd ; Qatar 5th. The 2025 index features an in-depth analysis of the Arabian Gulf economies, which individually and as a group, are positioning themselves as global trade hubs, investing heavily in infrastructure, artificial intelligence, energy transition, and workforce development. Despite increasing risk to global supply chains, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries have become “beacons of stability” and resilience, the index concludes.
The countries most digitally ready are China, UAE, Malaysia, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
In international logistics opportunities, China, India, Mexico, Indonesia and Saudi Arabia rank highest. In domestic logistics, the leaders are China, India, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and UAE.
Overhaul of supply chain
More than 62% of logistics industry professionals surveyed for the latest index say they’ve overhauled their supply chains to safeguard against inflation, looming trade tariffs, the possibility of a global economic downturn and other major risks.
Entering 2025, the logistics industry is looking to protect itself from rising costs and a potential trade war ignited by expected US tariff hikes and a flood of exports from China.
Nearly 55% of respondents see a global recession as likely or certain. Almost 82% say tariffs and other trade protectionism are having a significant impact on their supply chains. Seventy-two percent say risks in emerging markets have increased over the past year.
“There is wariness and uncertainty among shippers, carriers, forwarders and others when it comes to the geopolitical factors that drive up costs, affect trade volumes, and alter supply chains,” said Agility vice chairman Tarek Sultan.
“Companies doing business internationally continue to shift production as they re-evaluate investment plans and search for durable paths to growth,” he added.
For his part, Ti chief executive officer John Manners-Bell said: “The supply chain industry is entering a new era in which the ability to respond to macro-economic and geopolitical events will be critical. The looming prospect of tariffs and trade wars will force shippers to re-evaluate the resilience of their production, off-shoring and sourcing strategies and it will be imperative for logistics providers to respond appropriately in a timely and effective manner. – Roumina Pablo
