Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Karl Kendrick Chua (File photo) MANILA Innovation is needed in the most basic sectors to attain the country's 2040 vision of eradicating extreme poverty and becoming a high-income country, the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) said. "The country's economic performance has exceeded expectations in 2021. We expect to recover to the pre-pandemic level in early 2022. However, as this pandemic has shown, we cannot simply return to business as usual. Except for some city-states, no country has achieved high-income status without first addressing agricultural productivity," Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Karl Kendrick Chua said on Wednesday during the Inclusive Innovation Conference 2021 organized by the Department of Trade and Industry. Chua cited the case of the Rice Tariffication Law, which succeeded in bringing down rice prices for all Filipino consumers while increasing the productivity and income of rice farmers thr