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LIFE

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Sports BusinessMirror

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| THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 25, 2016 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph sports@businessmirror.com.ph

Rio mayor reacts vs Aussie ban

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The Associated Press

NTI-DOPING leaders scolded ESPN for sending the wrong message by not conducting drug tests at the X Games in Norway this week.

The network’s answer: Feel free to test whomever you’d like.

Hit with criticism from the heads of the Olympics, the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada) and Norway’s anti-doping federation, ESPN responded by reiterating its own policy—while it doesn’t conduct its own testing, the network has always offered federations space and credentials so they can set up and conduct their own “out-of-competition” tests.

Created in 1997 as an independent event, the Winter X Games provided the most visible platform for snowboarding and other action sports. A few of those sports were introduced into the Winter Olympics in 1998. Now they make up a sizable portion of the Olympic program.

Wada Director General David Howman called ESPN’s lack of a testing program “surprising and regrettable.”

“This sends the wrong message to athletes at a fragile time for clean sport worldwide,” Howman said.

His comments came after Norway’s skiing federation backed out of a deal with an ESPN partner because Wada rules aren’t

being followed. Also, Norway’s anti-doping chief called on Oslo to withdraw financial support of the Norwegian version of the X Games, which begin on Wednesday and will include both winter and summer sports. International Olympic Committee (IOC) President Thomas Bach said he was monitoring this issue.

“We want to see the clean athletes protected in all sports events, so we will discuss this issue with Wada,” Bach said.

An ESPN spokesman sent a statement to The Associated Press that said the network has “consistently communicated that X Games is an independent event, with its own guidelines for competition and athlete participation.”

“At X Games Oslo, federations can operate as they have for 20 years at X Games events around the world and we are happy to provide accreditation and space for them to perform their normal ‘out of competition’ testing procedures,” the statement said.

“However, we are not prepared to change the X Games guidelines for participation at this time.”

Because many snowboarding and freeskiing events are run by organizations other than the ski federation that oversees the Olympics, the X Games aren’t the only event subject to different anti-doping standards.

‘THEY SHOULD BE ASHAMED’

ANY athletes that want to keep Russians from competing at this year’s Olympics in Rio de Janeiro should be “ashamed,” the

president of country’s track and field federation said on Tuesday.

Dmitry Shlyakhtin was elected president of the track federation last month on a promise to fulfill International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) demands for antidoping reform in Russia. The country was banned from track and field last November when a Wada commission report detailed systematic, state-sponsored doping.

“To take away a strong opponent and then win, that’s the position of a weak person,” Shlyakhtin said when asked about those who oppose Russian inclusion in the Olympics. “Let them be ashamed if they do that, whether they win or they don’t win. It’s illegal, undeserved.”

Shlyakhtin also said he believes the IAAF will drag out its decision on Russia’s readmission and that July will be “the point of no return” for Olympic eligibility. Shlyakhtin met IAAF President Sebastian Coe on February 12 for the first time since he was elected.

Last month American athletes sent a letter to IOC and Wada leaders urging an investigation of possible Russian doping in sports other than track and field.

Also on Tuesday, Olympic steeplechase champion Yulia Zaripova returned to competition following a doping ban for abnormal blood data, coming third in a 3,000-meter race at the Russian indoor nationals.

Zaripova’s time of 9 minutes, 1.20 seconds was almost seven seconds off her personal best for the event.

IO DE JANEIRO—Rio Mayor Eduardo Paes has criticized the Australian Olympic Committee’s (AOC) decision to declare the city’s favelas off limits for its 450 athletes during the Olympics in August.

“There is a lot of ignorance about Rio and Brazil, a certain drama of how things are,” Paes told a news conference on Tuesday. “Just between us, the Australian committee has been a source of aggressions to Brazil. And we love Sydney.”

There was backlash in Brazil after AOC President John Coates, a member of the International Olympic Committee’s coordination commission for the games, said in April 2014 that Rio’s Olympic preparations were the worst he had experienced. Coates quickly backtracked to say he was confident that Rio organizers would get the job done. But subsequent comments from Australian officials about security and infrastructure have been perceived by some in Brazil as overly critical.

AOC Spokesman Mike Tancred told The Associated Press, “We love Brazil and we look forward to sharing the excitement—Rio has made tremendous progress with their games’ preparations and...we have no doubt Rio will deliver.”

Tancred said the decision by team leader Kitty Chiller to make Rio’s hillside shantytowns and slums off-limits for team members was based on feedback from a security expert who advised “it would be impossible for us to allow our athletes to visit the favelas because we could not control visits involving a large number of athletes going to different places at different times.”

“Our athletes will certainly engage with the residents of Rio, and they will join in the fun on Copacabana Beach,” he said. “But the favelas are areas we cannot control and the personal safety of our athletes must come first.”

Rio favelas are among the most violent areas of the city, but they also attract thousands of visitors on formal and informal tours. In recent years, some foreigners have chosen to stay in the safer favelas because of high price of accommodation near the beaches.

Despite ongoing concern over delays to the construction program for some infrastructure, Rio 2016 organizers have vowed that the Games will be delivered as promised. AP

$250 A MONTH

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AO PAULO—A survey of Brazil’s football players shows 82 percent are paid a maximum of 1,000 reals ($250) a month.

The survey of registered professionals nationwide was carried out in January by the Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF).

Only one unidentified player is paid more than $125,000 a month, according to the CBF survey, while almost 14 percent of players in Brazil earn between 1,000 and 5,000 reals ($1,250) a month.

Top-flight players earn from 10,000 reals ($2,500) to 500,000 reals ($125,000) a month.

Brazil’s minimum wage is 880 reals ($220), which is the pay for most footballers in small clubs in state championships and lower national divisions. AP

SEPP BLATTER’S book about life at Interntional Football Federation set to be published. AP

‘MISSION FOOTBALL’ Z

URICH—Sepp Blatter’s book about his life at International Football Federation (Fifa) is expected to be published within weeks.

The website of Swiss publisher Werd & Weber has said Sepp Blatter: Mission Football will cost 39 Swiss francs ($39) and intended to make it available in February.

Blatter previously said it would be a photograph-led book with anecdotes about his 40 years at Fifa, including as president since 1998.

“Despite the success, Blatter repeatedly had to put up with harsh reviews and prejudices,” the publisher’s preview said. “In this richly illustrated book, Sepp Blatter tells how he learned to deal with the hostility.”

The 300-page, hardcover book was written by his spokesman, Thomas Renggli.

Renggli told The Associated Press on Tuesday that the publishing timetable had been pushed back by some weeks, and the book would include the result of Friday’s Fifa presidential election.

The election will formally end Blatter’s near 18-year presidency in the week he should receive the verdict of his appeal to Fifa against an eight-year ban for conflicts of interest.

Blatter hopes to be cleared of wrongdoing so he can host the presidential election meeting in Zurich.

Blatter and one-time election favorite Michel Platini, the Union of European Football Associations president, were banned by the Fifa ethics committee last December over a “disloyal payment” of $2 million to the former France great in 2011.

Both men claim they had a verbal agreement for Fifa to pay Platini additional salary for his work as Blatter’s presidential adviser from 1999 to 2002.

Fifa ethics prosecutors have counter-appealed to seek life bans for both men. AP

SPORTS

COLLISION

New York Islanders right wing Kyle Okposo (left) and New Jersey Devils right wing Kyle Palmieri collide while competing for the puck during the third period of their National Hockey League game won by the Islanders, 1-0, on Friday in Newark, New Jersey. AP

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| THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 25, 2016 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph sports@businessmirror.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao Asst. Editor: Joel Orellana

DISAPPOINTING RETURN

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Let race begin!

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ALM BEACH GARDENS, Florida—Whether the road to the Masters started at Riviera (Rory McIlroy), Professional Golfers’ Association (PGA) National (Rickie Fowler) or Doral (Jordan Spieth), qualifying for the most restricted field of the majors starts with the Florida swing.

Last year ended with 89 players having earned invitations to Augusta National. Seven weeks into the new year, the number is likely to be unchanged.

The only PGA Tour winner to earn a spot so far is Vaughn Taylor, who won the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am. The other addition was Paul Chaplet, who won the Latin America Amateur Championship.

While there have been no official subtractions, Jim Furyk had wrist surgery and is hopeful of a return in May at The Players Championship, and the latest report on Tiger Woods is no report at all. It would be surprising if he returned to the Masters.

There are six PGA Tour events left for players to earn a spot in the Masters and two of them are World Golf Championships: The Cadillac Championship at Doral and the Dell Match Play in Texas. The latter has the top 64 in the world and currently only seven of those players are not yet eligible for the Masters.

After two years of the Masters field coming close to 100 players or more for the first time since 1966, it most likely won’t come close to that this year. Augusta National will take the top 50 in the world ranking after the Match Play. As of Monday’s world ranking, everyone in the top 50 already is exempt.

Among those not yet eligible are Matt Jones (No. 52), Rafael Cabrera Bello (No. 58), Thorbjorn Olesen (No. 60), Thomas Pieters (No. 61), Marcus Fraser (No. 62), Gary Woodland (No. 63) and Ryan Palmer (No. 64).

Jones lost a good opportunity when he missed the cut at Riviera. The top 50 effectively get a free start at Doral, though Jones can still qualify if he were to move into the top 50 after the Honda Classic this week. Cabrera Bello and Fraser earned spots in Doral by being in the top 10 on Europe’s money list. Pieters narrowly missed out when Nathan Holman won in Malaysia.

Woodland and Palmer are playing in the Honda Classic this week.

Let the race begin. AP

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OHA, Qatar—Australian Open champion Angelique Kerber made a disappointing return to tournament tennis on Tuesday, losing 7-5, 6-1, to China’s Zheng Saisai in the second round at the Qatar Open.

Kerber beat Serena Williams at Melbourne in the opening Grand Slam of the year on January 30. The top-seeded Kerber split two matches in Germany’s loss to Switzerland in the Fed Cup and received a first-round bye at Doha.

The tournament also lost its second-seeded player when Simona Halep, the 2014 champion, was beaten by Russian qualifier Elena Vesnina, 6-7 (1), 6-4, 6-1.

Zheng will play Eugenie Bouchard in the third round after the Canadian beat Denisa Allertova of the Czech Republic, 7-6 (0), 7-5.

Third-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska advanced after beating Ukraine’s Kateryna Bondarenko, 6-4, 6-4, while No. 4-seeded Garbine Muguruza beat Japan’s Nao Hibino, 6-2, 6-0.

Two-time Wimbledon champion and fifth-seeded Petra Kvitova defeated Barbora Strycova, 7-6 (2), 6-4, and former No. 1 Caroline Wozniacki beat Australia’s Daria Gavrilova, 6-3, 6-3.

Zheng, ranked 73rd, made just eight unforced errors, compared to 38 by Kerber, and needed only 28 minutes to win the second set.

“The feeling is amazing,” Zheng said. “For sure it wasn’t her [Kerber’s] best tennis today, but I’m happy I won that match.”

Kerber, who withdrew from last week’s Dubai Open with a right thigh injury, said “I was not feeling good from the beginning.”

“I think you have days like this sometimes,” Kerber added. “I don’t know how many mistakes I did today. This is not my game...that’s all I can say.”

Second-seeded Stan Wawrinka, meanwhile,

has finally won a match at the Dubai Tennis Championships after beating Sergiy Stakhovsky of Ukraine, 5-7, 6-3, 7-5, on Tuesday to advance to the second round.

Wawrinka played at the tournament in 2006 and 2008, and lost in the first round both times.

The fourth-ranked Swiss led 5-3 but couldn’t close out the first set with his serve. A frustrated Wawrinka crushed his racket at 15-40 in the 11th game of the same set, and received a racket abuse warning.

“It’s a good win, great win for me,” Wawrinka said. “Not playing well, still winning, still fighting, still finding a way.”

Earlier, third-seeded Tomas Berdych of the Czech Republic advanced with a 6-1, 6-4 win over Joao Sousa of Portugal.

“A first match, playing outside after a while, it’s a good test,” Berdych said. “Don’t make it more complicated than needed.”

The seventh-ranked Berdych is a two-time finalist in Dubai, in 2013 and 2014. He’s reached at least the semifinals four of the last five years.

Australian Nick Kyrgios beat seventh-seeded Martin Klizan of Slovakia, 3-6, 6-3, 6-2.

The 33rd-ranked Kyrgios arrived in Dubai on Monday, having captured his first career ATP title at Marseille without dropping a set.

“I thought that both of us were playing really average today,” Kyrgios said. “I wasn’t feeling great. So I’m just happy I got through.”

Also, eighth-seeded Philipp Kohlschreiber of Germany defeated wild-card entry Marsel Ilhan of Turkey, 6-1, 7-5, and Borna Coric of Croatia beat Czech Jiri Vesely, 6-4, 6-4.

Fourth-seeded Roberto Bautista Agut of Spain defeated Simone Bolelli of Italy, 6-2, 6-4.

ANGELIQUE KERBER (right) loses in first match at the Qatar Open as Ana Ivanovic takes the court on Wednesday. AP

PADRAIG’S BIG WORRY

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ALM BEACH GARDENS, Florida—For all the emotional stress of trying to win a golf tournament, Padraig Harrington can’t seem to live without it.

Consider the Honda Classic.

A year ago, Harrington charged his way into the lead with four straight birdies, only to dump a 5-iron into the water and make double bogey on the par-3 17th hole to fall one shot behind. Right when it looked as though he had thrown away the tournament, Harrington made a 15-foot birdie putt to get into a playoff. Two holes later on the 17th, he hit another 5-iron to three feet that sewed up the victory.

It was wild.

Apparently it wasn’t an aberration.

“If you actually knew my career,” Harrington said on Tuesday, “I don’t think I’ve ever made it easy for myself.

Ever. In my entire life.”

The Honda Classic is the most recent example. Another would be his first British Open title at Carnoustie in 2007, when Harrington

hit into the Barry Burn twice on the 18th hole and scrambled for a double bogey to lose the lead. And he still won the claret jug.

Sitting on the front row as Harrington spoke were 12-year-old Luke Clanton and 13-year-old Yae Eun Kim, who moments earlier posed with Harrington as a perk for winning the United State Kids Golf players of the year honors.

“I’ve been learning that lesson since I’m the age of the young ones here in front,” he said. “I like a bit of adversity. I seem to bring it on myself. I’ve won plenty of tournaments where I’ve hit it out-of-bounds in the last round, plenty of tournaments where I’ve hit it in the water in the last round.

So I know it’s never over until the end.”

From there, he took his audience halfway around the world to his victory at the end of 2014 in the Indonesian Open.

“I was tied going down the last and I hit it in the water,” Harrington said. “I still won.”

Then, he turned to the boy and girl on the front row and said, “Just remember that. I hit it in the water on the last and I still won.... You never know what’s going to happen.”

He must wonder what would have happened

without the Irish Youths at Dundalk Golf Club when he was 18. Harrington calls it the hardest tournament he ever lost. He was two shots ahead with three to play and, while there were no leaderboards on the course, someone told him the score.

“And I relaxed and I thought I had it won,” he said.

“And I bogeyed the last three holes.”

He heard about it from the other kids, and he was devastated. That was about the time he started working with a sports psychologist, and he realized in his mind he didn’t blow the tournament because of the pressure.

He blew it because there was none.

That’s his story, anyway.

“That particular week is when I realized— fortunately or unfortunately—I needed pressure or stress in order to play my best golf,” he said. “I’m very good in that situation. When I mess up, I actually play better. I’ve spent years working with Bob Rotella trying to figure out how not to get defensive when I get ahead.”

Seems it hasn’t caught on.

“That’s just the person I am,” he said. “And I don’t seem to be able to change it.”

It has worked out fairly well for him. He has three majors, and only in one of them—a four-shot victory at Royal Birkdale in 2008—was he able to walk comfortably up the 18th. He beat Garcia in a four-hole

playoff at Carnoustie, and a year later he one-putted the last three holes to overtake Garcia at Oakland Hills in the Professional Golfers’ Association Championship.

Harrington has 20 victories around the world. He is nearly as proud of his 32 runner-up finishes, because he learned something from each of them. In fact, he’s not sure he would have won at Carnoustie without that memory of the loss in the Irish Youths.

Harrington recalls standing over an 8-foot putt that would have put him three shots ahead of Garcia going to the 18th in the four-hole playoff. He missed badly.

“It was amazing the lack of focus I had in that putt,” he said. “I realized it was the exact same feeling as Dundalk. I thought I had done it. I thought I had finished.

‘Wow, I’m going three shots ahead.’ And I didn’t have any focus whatsoever on it. It’s a long walk from 17 tee to 18 green. All I was telling myself was I haven’t won it and all I was trying to do was put myself under pressure.

“So that loss in Dundalk possibly won me the Open in 2007, purely because I realized I don’t perform well when I start relaxing. I’m always better when I’m fearful and nervous and got that stress in me.” AP

SPORTS

“If telecommunications and the Internet are such lucrative industries, how come there are not enough investors coming in?” asked Mary Grace MirandillaSantos, independent information and communications technology (ICT) policy researcher and national ICT research consultant at the Asian Development Bank, who authored the PBG-JFC broadband policy brief.

“The answer,” she said, “is because there are legal constraints, such as the foreign-ownership cap, which only allows 40-percent equity if you’re a foreign player who

$.35-$2 The price per megabits per second (Mbps) in the US compared to $18-$45 per Mbps in the Philippines

wants to come in.” The Commonwealth Act (CA) 146, or the Public Service Act of 1936, classified telecommunications as a public C  A

Craft concrete plan for agri, groups tell presidential bets

DISSAPOINTING RETURNS

Sports

B C N. P

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Because many snowboarding and freeskiing events are run by organizations other than the ski federation that oversees the Olympics, the X Games aren’t the only event subject to different anti-doping standards.

P.  |     | 7 DAYS A WEEK

HE country’s outdated telecommunications laws continue to hamper innovation and restrict the inflow of investments needed to improve the sector’s competitiveness and cut Internet cost, stakeholders said on Wednesday at the launching of a policy brief on the country’s broadband services by the Philippine Business Groups and Joint Foreign Chambers (PBG-JFC).

DANUBE CRUISE LETS CYCLISTS EXPLORE

WORKOUT

Thursday, February 25, 2016 Vol. 11 No. 140

High Internet cost in PHL blamed on outdated laws

INSIDE

Houston Astros Manager AJ Hinch (left) chats with Jose Altuve (center) and Carlos Correa during the first full-squad workouts at the Astros spring training in Kissimmee, Florida, on Tuesday. AP

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HARRINGTON: I don’t think I’ve ever madePADRAIG it easy for myself.

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IVE agriculture coalitions on Wednesday called on the five presidential candidates in the May 2016 elections to come up with concrete action plans to improve the country’s agriculture sector.

The five coalitions—Alyansa Agrikultura (AA), Philippine Chamber of Agriculture and Food Inc., Coalition for Agriculture Modernization in the Philippines, Pambansang Koalisyon ng Kababaihan sa Kanayunan and the Agriculture C  A

Agriculture remains our most neglected sector, even as it employs millions of Filipinos across the country.”

—Ordoñez

DENGUE VACCINE Sanofi Pasteur Country Manager Ching R. Santos (left) and Department of Health Spokesman Lyndon L. Lee Suy, MD, MPH, brief the media regarding the National Launch for Doctors of the dengue vaccine, which is now available in the Philippines. The launch, held at the Marriott Grand Ballroom, was attended by thousands of doctors nationwide. ALYSA SALEN

P1B M&A DEALS REQUIRED DISCLOSED B D C

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ANS implementing rules and regulations (IRR) for its operations, the newly organized Philippine Compet it ion Com m i ssion (PCC) ordered companies to report mergers and acquisition (M&A) deals amounting to at least P1 billion.

The order contained in Memorandum Circular 16-002 by PCC Chairman Arsenio M. Balisacan also requires disclosure of M&A deals if one or both firms involved is listed at the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE).

This reporting requirement will be imposed during the interim period until the PCC is able to come up with its IRR, which is expected to be completed before the end of the

year. The members of the newly constituted PCC, a quasi-judicial body that will look into anticompetitive practices, will not be affected by the end of the Aquino administration because they were appointed with fixed terms.

Otherwise, such covered deal, which would affect the merger or acquisition, shall be considered void. Also, this will subject the parties to an administrative fine of 1 percent to 5 percent of the value of the transaction.

Even those transactions that were not previously required to be reported to the PSE or the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) would now have to be reported to the PCC within one working day after the transaction occurred.

“Parties to a covered transaction, which is not required to be disclosed or notified to the PSE

prior to being consummated under the Securities Regulation Code and its implementing rules and regulations, and is to be consummated within the covered period shall notify the PCC before the close of business of the first working day after that in which the covered transaction occurred through a letter addressed to the PCC,” Balisacan’s circular said in Paragraph 2.

The circular said the transactions over, which the PCC had been notified, would be “deemed approved” and, thus, shall enjoy a disputable presumption that those transactions were not violating Republic Act 10667, or the new competition law. Previously, listed corporations are required only to C  A

Oil extends decline as Iran calls freeze proposal ‘ridiculous’

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HEALTH&FITNESS

IL extended declines after Iran said a proposal by Saudi Arabia and Russia for producers to freeze output was “ridiculous,” as the Persian Gulf nation seeks to boost exports after years of sanctions.

Futures slid as much as 2.4

PESO EXCHANGE RATES n US 47.6230

percent in New York. The proposal to cap output at January levels puts “unrealistic demands” on Iran, Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh said on Tuesday, according to the ministry’s news agency Shana. Ali al-Naimi, his counterpart from Saudi Arabia, said at a conference

in Houston high-cost producers should bear the burden of reducing the current surplus and reaffirmed the kingdom’s commitment to last week’s accord.

“There won’t be a pact on output.

There’s no possibility of that occurring because there are insufficient

levels of trust,” Michael McCarthy, a chief strategist at CMC Markets in Sydney, said by phone. “The market is still in surplus and will remain that way for some time.”

Crude is down 16 percent this year on speculation a global glut will persist amid the outlook for

increased shipments from Iran and brimming US supplies, which are at the highest level in more than eight decades. The nation’s stockpiles expanded by 7.1 million barrels last week, the industry-funded American Petroleum Institute was said to

n JAPAN 0.4249 n UK 66.7389 n HK 6.1293 n CHINA 7.2970 n SINGAPORE 33.8833 n AUSTRALIA 34.3303 n EU 52.4710 n SAUDI ARABIA 12.7011

S “O,” A

Source: BSP (24 February 2016 )

A2 Thursday, February 25, 2016

BMReports BusinessMirror

news@businessmirror.com.ph

US seeks to deploy mobile artillery near South China Sea

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ITH tensions escalating in the South China Sea (SCS), the US Army is discussing the possibility of sending mobile artillery units to the region.

Over the weekend, US President Barack Obama stated that his administration would continue to challenge Beijing’s territorial claims in the South China Sea. “We think China is resorting to the old style of might makes right, as opposed to working through international law and international norms to establish claims and to resolve disputes,” Obama said in an interview with Channel News Asia.

The US and its Pacific allies have accused China of building artificial islands on top of sensitive marine habitats to establish an air-defense zone in the highly contested waterway. China maintains it has every right to build within what it considers to be its own territory, and has stated that the islands will be used primarily for humanitarian purposes.

Beijing has accused Washington of stirring unrest in the region, and new pieces of information of additional behind-the-scenes machinations have come to light.

According to a senior US Army

We think China is resorting to the old style of might makes right.”

—Obama official, speaking to Scout Warrior on condition of anonymity, the US may soon deploy mobile artillery, the kind traditionally used in land-based offensives, to the SCS as defensive units.

“We could use existing howitzers and that type of munition to knock out incoming threats when people try to hit us from the air at long ranges using rockets and cruise missiles,” the official said.

Such a plan would require the cooperation of regional allies, who would have to approve the placement of the guns.

“A howitzer can go where it has to go. It is a way of changing

Imports to pick up on rising demand, investment this year C  A

39.8 percent; feeding stuff for animals not including unmilled cereals fell by 33.1 percent. Imports of almost all intermediate inputs fell at varying degrees,” Diokno said.

Meanwhile, data showed the commodities that posted the largest declines last December were Other Food and Live Animals, with a contraction of 47.9 percent; Feeding Stuff for Cereals (not including unmilled cereals), 33.1 percent; and electronic products, 30.3 percent.

The list also includes miscellaneous manufactured articles, which posted a contraction of 18.1 percent, and mineral fuels, lubricants and related materials, 14 percent.

In 2015 the largest declines were noted in chemical compounds, which posted a contraction of 55.1 percent, and mineral fuels, lubricants and related materials, which posted a contraction of 40.1 percent.

In terms of import sources in December 2015, the top 3 were China, Japan and the US, which accounted for 17 percent, 11.9 percent and 10.3 percent of total imports, respectively.

These are also the Philippines’s

Oil. . .

largest import sources for the whole of 2015. China, the US and Japan accounted for 16.2 percent, 10.8 percent and 9.6 percent of total imports last year, respectively.

December imports from China amounted to $687.75 million, a decrease of 13.7 percent, from $796.51 million in December 2014.

In 2015 shipments reached $10.83 billion, a 9.7-percent growth from $9.87 billion.

Shipments from Japan amounted to $481.57 million in December 2015. This represented a 4.9-percent growth, from $459.16 million in December 2014.

The Philippines’s total imports from Japan amounted to $6.38 billion in 2015. This was a 21.5-percent growth, from the $5.25 billion recorded in 2014.

Payments to the US for merchandise imports reached $417.05 million in December 2015. This, however, was a 20.6-percent decline from the $525.58 million posted in December 2014.

For the January-to-December period in 2015, the country’s imports from the US amounted to $7.22 billion. This was a 25.8-percent growth from $5.73 billion in the same period in 2014.

C  A

report on Tuesday. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) for April delivery fell as much as 77 cents to $31.10 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange and was at $31.11 at 12:02 p.m. Hong Kong time. The contract for that month lost $1.52, or 4.6 percent, to $31.87 on Tuesday. Total volume traded was about 33 percent above the 100-day average. Prices lost 30 percent last year.

Brent for April settlement slid as much as 49 cents, or 1.5 percent, to $32.78 a barrel on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange. Prices fell $1.42 to $33.27 on Tuesday. The European benchmark crude traded at a premium of $1.67 to WTI. “We are in the situation where we will continue to have an oversupplied market,” Victor Shum, a vice president for Asia Pacific at

IHS Inc., said in a Bloomberg Television interview on Wednesday. “In the coming weeks and months, oil prices will likely be low.”

Saudi Arabia, Russia, Venezuela and Qatar reached a preliminary agreement in Doha to freeze output if other states join them. The accord marks “the beginning of a process” that will continue with further talks between producing countries in March, according to al-Naimi. Iran is seeking to boost production by 1 million barrels a day this year after sanctions were lifted last month.

Saudi Arabia won’t reduce production because it doesn’t trust other countries to join in, al-Naimi said in Houston. Cutting low cost output to subsidize higher cost supplies only delays an “inevitable reckoning,” he said. Bloomberg News

PROTESTERS display placards during a rally near the Chinese Consulate in the financial district of Makati City to denounce the alleged deployment of surface-to-air missiles by China on the disputed islands off South China Sea on Friday. The protesters are calling on China to halt its island-building on some of the disputed islands and its alleged increasing militarization. AP

an offensive weapon and using it in dual capacity,” the anonymous military official said. “This opens the door to opportunities and options we have not had before with mobile-defensive platforms and offensive capabilities.”

If approved, Washing ton’s weapon deployment would continue a pattern of US aggression in the SCS. Washington has conducted a number of joint military exercises with regional allies as a show of force against China. Over

the past few months, the Pentagon has also begun conducting “freedom of navigation” exercises near Beijing’s artificial islands.

But if mobile-offensive units are seen as an effective, cheaper alternative to shooting down missiles

or aircraft, they could also be used beyond the Pacific. Military officials suggest that M777 Howitzers and M109 Paladins could also be used in Eastern Europe, to counter Russian “aggression.”

Meanwhile, China has deployed fighter jets to a contested island in the SCS amid territorial tensions in the region, the media reported.

According to the Fox news television channel’s Tuesday report, US intelligence spotted China’s Shenyang J-11 and Xian JH-7s aircraft (North Atlantic Treaty Organization reporting names Flanker B+ and Flounder, respectively) on Woody Island in the past few days.

Beijing had previously deployed two batteries of HQ-9 surface-toair missiles on the same island, the media outlet said.

In recent weeks, the US and Taiwan have warned that China has deployed surface-to-air missiles on Woody Island in the Parcel chain in the SCS. The deployment marked the latest step in China’s military buildup in the Parcel and Spratly archipelagos, where at least six nations have overlapping territorial claims.

China, however, argues that both archipelagos are its sovereign territory, a claim that Washington has aggressively challenged by conducting so-called freedom of navigation exercises in which US warships deliberately pass within 12 miles of Chinese held islands. PNA

Craft concrete plan for agri, groups tell presidential bets…

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The five coalitions said the Philippines remains an agricultural country, with the sector employing 12 million people, or nearly a third of the country’s work force.

“Despite an increase in the DA budget from P30 billion in 2011 to P89 billion in 2015, growth in the sector has averaged an anemic 1.5 percent, a far cry from the government target of 4 percent,” a joint statement from the five coalitions read.

They added that the agriculture sector have the highest poverty incidence among all basic sectors.

Filipinos facing poverty are often left with three options: insurgency, crime and overseas work, according to the groups.

“With clear links between ag-

P1-B M&A deals required disclosed

High Internet cost in PHL blamed on outdated laws …

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disclose such covered transactions to the PSE and the SEC. But with the new competition law in place, the PCC is required to be notified of those covered transactions to ensure that no anticompetitive mergers and acquisitions will be consummated.

Some practices that the PCC seeks to prevent are the creation of monopolies, duopolies and cartels. These entities will ultimately prejudice consumers in terms of peddling poor quality of goods or services, like Internet access, as well as high prices on these goods and services.

The PCC also seeks to stop, upon a verified petition, other anticompetitive practices. Some of these practices include a corporation’s abuse of dominant position in the market, bid manipulations, undermining competitors by artificially setting prices below the production cost and imposing low purchase prices over goods offered by marginalized agricultural producers and+ micro-, small-, and medium-scale enterprises.

riculture and food security, social and economic stability, and peace and order, Filipino farmers are now looking for clearly defined programs to uplift agriculture after the next administration assumes office,” they said. Although the candidates acknowledged the role of agriculture in fighting poverty, Ordoñez said time constraints in the presidential debate on February 21 did not allow them to present concrete platforms for the sector.

With this, the coalitions are asking the aspirants to present their plans for the sector in a public forum scheduled next month.

Earlier, economists from the Ateneo de Manila University said

Filipinos should elect a president who is pro-agriculture to achieve inclusive growth and enable farmers to compete in the global marketplace.

Ateneo Center for Economic Research and Development Director Leonardo A. Lanzona Jr. said a pro-agriculture president can look at the sector as a means to lift millions of people from poverty and to improve competitiveness.

Lanzona added that a pro-agriculture president can also address problems in agrarian reform.

While the government has been able to distribute lands, he said farmers have encountered problems in terms of the lack of financing and machinery to maximize the land granted to them.

Fisheries 2025 (AF2025)—said the action plan should address six priority issues. These priority issues are strengthening the bureaucracy of the Department of Agriculture (DA), ensuring stakeholder participation, agriculture extension, credit and insurance, agriculture global positioning and agriculture structural reform.

“Agriculture remains our most neglected sector, even as it employs millions of Filipinos across the country. Millions of Filipino farmers go hungry each day, locked out from formal credit, set back by unfair trade and unable to compete in an increasingly import dependent economy,” AA Chairman and coalition convener Ernesto Ordoñez said.

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service offered by a public utility, thus, including the sector under the constitutional provision on 40-percent foreign-ownership cap.

“There are actually a lot of foreign players operating here but they sell only bandwidth to clients, and they can’t sell these at a cheap price because of the requirement by law to partner with a local telco and enter into a commercial arrangement,” she explained.

According to the policy brief, telecommunications is a capitalintensive and innovation-driven sector. Because of the restrictions, foreign players cannot fully participate in the wholesale market segment—now occupied by Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. and Globe—thus, limiting the number of players that can infuse capital and allow the transfer of technology.

The wholesale market is dominated by the two telcos because they have full control of the landing stations and the backhaul networks from which bandwidth capacity can be sourced from, according to the policy brief.

The two telecoms’ dictation of

the wholesale price limits the number of downstream, small Internet service providers (ISPs) or retailers that can distribute Internet services in far-flung areas, like Mindanao, where the telecom giants have deemed not profitable to enter.

Smaller ISPS and end-users are ultimately saddled with high wholesale and retail costs.

According to Winthrop Yu, chairman of Internet Society of the Philippines, the wholesale price of business-grade bandwidth that is around 1 gigabits per second is much more affordable in other countries because of their competitive telecom environment: In the US the price per megabits per second (Mbps) is at $.35 to $2; Hong Kong is at $1.50 to $6 per Mbps; Australia offers a rate of $6 to $9 per Mbps; Manila charges $18 to $45 per Mbps, while Cebu is at $25 to $40 per Mbps.

Another restrictive legislation, Yu said, is RA 7925, or the Public Telecommunications Policy Act, that requires congressional approval for a telecommunications franchise.

“Similar to how the Electric

Power Industry Reform Act amended CA 146 to make power generation not to be considered as a public-utility operation, amendments can be made to exempt certain segments of the Internet infrastructure as a public service, particularly those that do not serve the public directly,” the policy paper recommends.

Perry Lim Pe, Management of the Philippines’s newly elected president, backed this specific recommendation, as he pushed for the creation of a Department of Information and Communications Technology.

The Broadband Policy Brief is the fourth of a series of policy briefs released by the Arangkada Philippines Project, a United States Agency for International Development-American Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines and JFC project meant to advance the 470 recommendations in Arangkada Philippines 2010.

The Arangkada Philippines 2010 is a document with recommendations meant to generate $75 billion in foreign investment, 10 million jobs and over P1 trillion in revenue for the Philippine economy within this decade.

BMReports BusinessMirror

news@businessmirror.com.ph

Thursday, February 25, 2016 A3

ERC limits NGCP’s 2016 projects to ‘essentials’

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HE Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) has slashed the planned capital expenditure (capex) of the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) for 2016, effectively limiting the number of projects that it can undertake this year.

ERC Commissioner Gloria Victoria Yap-Taruc said the commission has deliberated on NGCP’s application filed in December last year.

“NGCP has 38 projects, but only seven were approved. They should implement first the projects that are of priority,” Taruc said.

The grid operator sought the ap-

proval of 38 projects with a total amount of P8.05 billion. It asked the regulator to issue a provisional authority to implement the proposed capex program for 2016.

The new projects that the NGCP plans to undertake are the Tiwi Substation upgrading project, the Naga Substation upgrading project, the Clark-Mabiga 69-kiloVolt

₧1.1B

Value of NGCP projects approved by the ERC for the year, way below the P8.05 billion sought by the grid operator (kV) transmission-line project, the Bataan 230-kV grid reinforcement project and the HermosaSan Jose 500-kV transmissionline project.

The proposed capex also includes the acquisition of the following transmission-line assets: CEDC-Veco’s Colon 138-kV line; Calung-Calung 138-kV line; New Salong 230-kV substation and Salong Calaca 230-kV line; Ingore CTS; Ingore-Sawang 138-kV submarine cable; Sawang CTS; Sawang Zaldivar substation; CIP II substation; Bacnotam-Mabanengneng lines 1 and 2; and

NGCP has 38 projects, but only seven were approved.

They should implement first the projects that are of priority.”—Taruc Mabanengneng-Holcim 69-kV line.

However, the ERC only approved the implementation of seven projects amounting to P1.1 billon, according to ERC Chairman Jose Vicente Salazar.

“The commission, after its initial evaluation, decided to authorize the implementation of seven projects for a total amount of P1.1 billion. These projects were found to be necessary for NGCP to be compliant with existing rules and address issues on grid capacity, reliability, safety and protection,” Salazar said in a text message when sought for comment.

These projects, according to Salazar’s text message, include: the Tiwi and Naga Substation up-

grading, the Clark-Mabiga 69-kV transmission line, the Bataan 230kV grid reinforcement, the Hermosa-San Jose transmission line, revenue-metering expansion and security-infrastructure project.

NGCP is required to seek prior approval from the ERC for its expansion plans or improvement of facilities. Aside from its authority and responsibility for the planning, construction and centralized operation and maintenance of its high-voltage transmission facilities, it is indispensible for NGCP to ensure a reliable and high-performance operation of the transmission system.

“One of the core mandates of NGCP is to implement upgrading

and expansion programs to ensure that the system adequately and reliably meets forecast demand, system reliability, demand market requirements and capacity of new generators,” NGCP said in its application.

Likewise, NGCP is also required to ensure a reliable and efficient operation of existing transmission lines and substation equipment; and to guarantee a safe and reliable energy supply to the distribution utility. To comply with this mandate, NGCP needs to implement, among others, rehabilitation, refurbishment, testing activities to the existing transmission line and substation assets.

“Thus, to avoid disruption of operation and noncompliance with its mandate under the Epira [Eletric Power Industry Reform Act] as the transmission operator, it is imperative that the implementation of the proposed capex projects be immediately approved,” NGCP said.

Beijing, Washington near UN accord on N. Korea as missile divide remains U

.S. and Chinese officials cited “significant” progress on a new United Nations resolution targeting North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, while laying out continued differences over the contested South China Sea. Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Secretary of State John F. Kerry wouldn’t give details of any draft proposal, which would punish North Korea for its recent nuclear test and long-range rocket launch that violated UN Security Council resolutions.

The launch prompted South Korea’s government to say it would be willing to discuss installing a US missile-defense system on its territory, a move long opposed

by China.

“The resolution is being evaluated by our teams in both Beijing and Washington, but the fact that it is being evaluated is significant,” Kerry said at a briefing with Wang on Tuesday in Washington. “There is no question that if the resolution is approved, it will go beyond

anything previously passed.”

Kerry added that there would be no need to deploy the missile defense system, known as Thaad, if North Korea agrees to abandon its nuclear-weapons program. The United States maintains about 28,500 troops in South Korea and China sees any additional troops or weapons systems as a threat to its security interests in Asia.

Tougher sanctions

CHINA’S participation in any new sanctions is essential, as it is by far North Korea’s leading trade partner, providing most of the isolated country’s energy and food. That relationship has been strained as Kim Jong Un ramps up his nuclearweapons program.

So far, China has been cautious about tougher penalties focused on oil shipments to the regime in Pyongyang, concerned about sparking instability in a country with whom it shares a long border.

The US and China have tentatively reached an agreement on North Korea that includes a ban

on exporting jet fuel that the air force uses, South Korea’s Dong-A Ilbo newspaper reported, citing people it did not identify.

It was the third meeting between Kerry and Wang in a month, and came after China deployed missiles on Woody Island in the disputed South China Sea, an area contested by China and a number of Southeast Asian nations.

Kerry said the US seeks to halt the “militarization” of the region and governments should avoid unilateral actions to exercise their claims, singling out China and Vietnam.

‘Historic’ claims

WANG countered by saying China has “historic” claims in the sea and is criticizing actions by the Philippines, which China says has broken earlier accords over the area. Wang also called for a halt to “close up” military reconnaissance in the waterway, where the US often patrols with airplanes and warships.

Hours before the Wang-Kerry

Saudis to provide Naia with x-ray machines B R M

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HE Manila International Airport Authority (Miaa) approved on Wednesday the request of the Saudi government to put up x-ray machines at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (Naia) Terminal 1 for the Saudis’ own protection against possible threat.

Miaa Assistant General Manager for Security and Emergency Services Jesus Gordon Descanzo said the x-ray machines are expected to arrive from Riyadh next month.

The machines will be flown onboard a Saudia Airlines plane.

The Saudi Embassy in Manila earlier notified the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) that the Saudi government “received from concerned authorities that the Iranian Revolutionary Guards are allegedly initiating and supervising a plan to hijack or bomb a Saudi Arabian aircraft, and the said plan is alleged to have reached to an advanced stage.”

Meanwhile, Office of Transportation Security (OTS) personnel who man the initial and final security checks at the Naia terminals started to use the EQO body scanners that can detect even small amounts of explosives in response to the call of the Saudi government to intensify body and luggage inspection.

Also in response to the request of the

Saudi government, Descanzo called the attention of the OTS to intensify its body and luggage inspection of all departing passengers at the airport, especially Saudi-bound passengers.

The OTS already require all departing passengers to empty their pockets, remove their watches, shoes, wallet and belts and place these in a plastic tray for scanning.

The passengers, on the other hand, are subjected to a body scan that requires 30 seconds to 40 seconds per passenger. In addition, passengers are made to pass a walk-through metal detector before being allowed to the departure area.

Smith Detection of Singapore, supplier of the said scanner, has trained several OTS personnel, airport police and other technical staff on how to operate the detectors, but OTS personnel are the only ones authorized to operate scanners.

The Miaa bought 14 body scanners for P12 million each and installed them in July 2015 in the four Naia terminals.

Screeners from the OTS said they have been using the body scanners since last week.

“These new scanners will greatly help us in detecting explosive materials even in small amounts and even when planted inside the body,” an OTS employee said.

SECRETARY of State John Kerry (right) listens as Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi speaks during a media availability at the State Department in Washington on Tuesday. AP

meeting, the top US commander in the Pacific said his fleet would continue “freedom of navigation operations” in the sea, citing its importance to global trade.

“China is clearly militarizing the South China Sea and you’d have to believe in the flat Earth to

think otherwise,” Admiral Harry Harris said at a Senate committee hearing in Washington. “I believe China seeks hegemony in East Asia. Simple as that.”

Kerry and Wang did seek to highlight areas of cooperation, including recent accords on cli-

mate change and efforts to halt Iran’s nuclear program.

“We need to take a telescope to visualize the future rather than a microscope to amplify the problems,” Wang said.

“We should make the pie of cooperation bigger.” Bloomberg News

Asean

BusinessMirror www.businessmirror.com.ph

A4 Thursday, February 25, 2016 • Editor: Max V. de Leon

AEC–Are we a community?

Asean-EU Perspective

HENRY J. SCHUMACHER

A

SEAN has achieved world-wide recognition for being one of the most dynamic and integrated regions. The growing purchasing power of the 600 million consumer market and the ongoing progress of the regional community offer an integrated market and production base for both business and consumers.

Foreign direct investment (FDI) is a key component of resource flows to Asean countries. Over the last decade, FDI flows into Asean members grew at an annual average rate of 19 percent.

Within the overall framework, each Asean country has adopted its own strategy to attract FDI. As in the European Union, efforts to create a “level playing field” between the countries in the single market leaves national governments with freedom to provide their own tax and other incentives to investors.

Brunei Darussalam moves to enhance local competitiveness, as it seeks to diversify its oil-dependent economy. But the Asean Economic Community’s (AEC) gains will only be realized if Brunei implements policy reforms that will make its businesses competitive.

As with all 10 member-states, Cambodia looks forward to both opportunities and challenges; following the official integration. Among the benefits, Cambodia sees the facilitation of trade, capital, investment, goods and services, capacity-building opportunities, reform, welfare, connectivity, as well as infrastructure development. The challenges will be to compensate for the loss of revenue from customs, to address the free flow of goods given its limited production chains, lacking technology to compete with its neighbors, lack of skilled labor and the language issue.

As the largest economy in Asean, Indonesia has a lot of stake in the full implementation. The biggest concern in welcoming the AEC remains in the services and small and medium enterprise (SME) sectors. A Herculean task lingers in Indonesia to solve its human-capital issues, as evidence by the slow progress made in professional certification systems and the low ratio of certified professionals to population. Meanwhile, many SMEs are still in the dark when it comes to benefits and threats of the AEC. Although Lao PDR has achieved major successes in its preparation for the AEC, the country is not 100-percent ready to implement all of its trade agreements, which aim to turn the Asean bloc into a single market and production base where goods, investment capital and skilled labor can flow freely.

While Malaysia is better prepared for AEC integration than most of its neighbors, doubts remain as to the impact on domestic SMEs. The low productivity of SMEs must be attended to ensure that they are not to be swept aside by incoming competitors.

Despite weaknesses in the local economy, Myanmar’s business sector is upbeat about the benefits AEC brings. Local businesses need to increase productivity and improve quality by seeking ways to gain much-needed capital, technology and human resources, conducting market surveys and research, cooperating with other businesses and by forming joint ventures with foreign firms.

The food news for the Philippines is that at the top-tier corporate level, awareness appears to be much higher compared to most of its neighbors. Most of the country’s top conglomerates have long prepared for regional competition. The Philippine government acknowledges the need for the country to boost investment in infrastructure and to deepen financial markets. Asean integration is also seen requiring huge investments in human capital. Meanwhile, a lot still needs to be done to open up the domestic economy. One reason the Philippines is getting a smaller share of FDI compared to its neighbors is that there are so many restrictions prescribed by the basic law of the land.

Benefits of AEC are still far off for Singapore business; for many Singapore businesses, unhindered trade across the Asean region still seems a distant reality. The AEC implementation deadline of January 31, 2015, is more commonly flagged as a milestone rather than a destination. For firms in the services sector, the relevance of the AEC is faint.

Thailand moves full steam toward regional integration; Thailand’s big players are prepared to reap the rewards of integration. Regulation-wise, Thailand is at the forefront in complying with the AEC Blueprint. Thailand lies at the center of the East-West Economic Corridor; the road and rail links are expected to boost trade among the Asean members and other neighboring countries. To cash in on the connectivity, the Thai government approved the establishment of special economic zones in six border provinces, aiming to draw foreign investors that hope to benefit from the integration.

While larger companies are optimistic about the opportunities of AEC integration, Vietnam’s SME still have much to do to take advantage. SMEs have paid little attention to the formation of the AEC, and they contribute 97 percent to the domestic economy. Stiffer AEC competition could well narrow production scales, and even force many SMEs out of business.

Cambodian navy to hold training exercise with Chinese counterpart

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AMBODIA is holding its biggestever joint naval training exercise with China this week, a senior Cambodian officer said on Tuesday.

Deputy navy chief Vice Admiral Vann Bunneang said 70 Cambodian sailors will join 737 Chinese counterparts on three Chinese warships that have already docked at Cambodia’s Sihanoukville port.

He said the exercises on Wednesday and Thursday will cover rescue activities and emergencies at sea.

China is eager to project its influence in Southeast Asia as it presses its extensive territorial claims in the South China Sea. Cambodia, which has close economic and political ties with Beijing, has offered little support for rival claims made by its Southeast Asian neighbors.

The Chinese naval visit follows by just a few days a goodwill visit by three ships

from Japan’s Maritime Self-Defense Force. Japan has maritime disputes of its own with China, with which it competes for influence throughout Asia.

“The arrival of the Chinese warships and the Japanese vessels was a matter of pride for Cambodia, and shows that our country has peaceful and good relations and cooperation with all countries,” Vann Bunneang said.

When asked whether China was making a show of strength to project its influence, he said it was not strange for powerful countries to show off their modern military equipment.

“It is like a clothing company: After they make a new product, they often advertise. So the presence of Chinese warships in Cambodia or other places is because China is a big country and wants to show off to the world their modern technology,” he said. AP

Singapore GDP grew faster than earlier estimated in Q4

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THIS file photo shows the luxury bungalows at Sentosa Cove in Singapore. BLOOMBERG

INGAPORE’S economy grew more than initially estimated last quarter as a gain in services outweighed weaker manufacturing and exports.

Singapore’s GDP rose an annualized 6.2 percent in the three months through December from the previous quarter, when it expanded a revised 2.3 percent, the trade ministry said in a statement on Wednesday. That compares with a January estimate of a 5.7-percent gain and the median forecast of 4.5 percent in a Bloomberg News survey of 11 economists.

Services have been a support for Singapore’s economy as slowing growth in China, one of its largest export destinations, has hurt demand for its goods. The city-state, among Asia’s most vulnerable to swings in global demand, saw nonoil domestic exports slide the most in almost three years in January as shipments to China slumped.

“Services will be a key growth pillar for 2016, given Singapore’s vulnerability to the global trade recession,” Weiwen Ng, an economist at Australia & New Zealand Banking

2%

Singapore’s GDP growth in 2015, the slowest pace in six years

Group Ltd. in Singapore, said before the report. “But with manufacturing in the doldrums, it’s hard to see services continue to outperform.

Low growth of around 1 percent to 2 percent will be the new normal for Singapore in the years ahead.”

The Singapore dollar erased declines after the data, trading little changed at S$1.4072 against the US currency as of 8:23 a.m. local time and reversing a drop of as much as 0.1 percent earlier.

Growth forecast THE government reiterated its forecast of 1 percent-to-3 percent expansion this year. Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat is set to unveil the budget for the 2016 fiscal year in Parliament in March.

“The global economic outlook has softened since the start of the year, alongside a sharp fall in oil prices and volatility in global financial markets,” the ministry said in the statement on Wednesday. “Growth for the year is expected to be supported by strengthening growth in the advanced economies, even as conditions in the emerging markets remain challenging.”

Singapore’s economy expanded 1.8 percent in the fourth quarter from a year earlier, compared with the previous estimate of 2 percent and matching the median estimate in a Bloomberg survey. Growth was 2 percent last year, the slowest pace in six years according to previously reported data compiled by Bloomberg.

Manufacturing fell an annualized 4.9 percent in the fourth quarter from the previous three months, the revised data showed. Construction gained 6 percent, while services jumped 7.7 percent in the same period.

Economic shift

PRIME Minister Lee Hsien Loong

is trying to transform the island into a global center for research and innovation as he seeks new drivers of growth while traditional ones like electronics exports falter.

The city-state is in the midst of a 10-year economic restructuring plan that includes reducing reliance on cheap foreign labor and boosting productivity.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) eased its exchange ratebased monetary policy twice in 2015, as it said weakening prospects for global growth will pose headwinds.

Singapore’s consumer prices fell for a 15th straight month in January from a year earlier, the longest streak of declines since 1977, prompting authorities to cut their inflation forecast for 2016.

“We expect a weaker 2016,” said Michael Wan, a Credit Suisse Group AG analyst in Singapore, who expects the MAS to keep policy on hold in April. “Even if we do get a weaker first-quarter GDP growth, what’s necessary for easing are either one of these three things: China having a hard landing, rising unemployment and core inflation is negative.”

The MAS said at a briefing on Wednesday its policy stance remains appropriate and unchanged.

Bloomberg News

Japanese businesses to expand operations in Vietnam

O

VER 60 percent of Japanese businesses operating in Vietnam plan to expand their operations, regarding the Southeast Asian nation as a crucial investment destination, according to a Japan External Trade Organization (Jetro) survey.

The finding, revealed at a seminar in Hanoi, was part of Jetro’s 2015 survey on the business operations of Japaneseaffiliated firms in 20 countries and regions in Asia and Oceania. The survey, conducted between October and November 2015, received valid responses from 4,635 Japanese companies, including 557 operating in Vietnam.

Speaking at the seminar, Atsusuke Kawada, Jetro chief representative in Vietnam, said the percentage of respondents in Vietnam planning to expand operations was rather high compared with other countries in the region such as Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, China and Malaysia, with percentages of 52, 49, 55, 38 and 45, respectively.

The survey said the main reason for business expansion was a rise in revenue with 85 percent of respondents choosing it as the most encouraging factor.

In 2015 nearly 60 percent of Japanese companies operating in Vietnam gained

$37.7B Total investment of Japanese firms in Vietnam

profits, down 3 percentage points yearon-year. However, in an absolute value, the number of firms reporting profits increased from 281 to 326.

Vietnam currently ranks third out of 15 countries in ease of recruitment, with respondents praising “market scale and growth ability” and the “stable socialpolitical situation” of the country, the survey said. It added Vietnam’s labor costs were relatively low in comparison to other countries. For example, labor costs in the manufacturing industry are less than a half of those costs in China, Thailand and Malaysia.

However, roughly 80 percent of Japanese firms in Vietnam cited an “increase in employee wages,” the survey said.

In term of risks stemming from the investment environment, 60 percent of the survey respondents said that

administrative formalities, customs formalities, the tax system, laws and increasing wages in Vietnam posed the greatest risk to investors in the country, the survey said.

Vietnam’s localization rate, or the percent of supplies that can be sourced locally, has reached 32 percent, down 1 percent year-on-year. This rate is higher than the Philippines (26 percent) but much lower than China, Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia, which have 65 percent, 56 percent, 41 percent and 36 percent, respectively, the survey said.

Kawada said in order to increase competitiveness in costs, Vietnam should develop capacity for local parts suppliers helping Japanese firms increase the amount of locally produced parts.

According to the Ministry of Planning and Investment, as of June 2015, Japan is the second-largest investor in Vietnam, after South Korea, with nearly 2,700 in-effect investment projects with capital of $37.7 billion.

The annual survey has been conducted since 1987 by Jetro to understand the business activities of Japan-affiliated companies in Asia and Oceania, including Vietnam.

The surveyed firms operate in a wide

range of sectors, including automobiles, machinery, chemicals and pharmaceutical products, food, textiles, retail, transport, information and communications technology and finance.

Japanese firms to invest more JAPANESE enterprises wish to expand their investment cooperation with Vietnam as the country continues to enjoy strong growth, especially after the recent signing of a number of trade deals.

This statement was made by Kishimoto Yoshio, director general of Japan’s Kyushu region’s Bureau of Economy, Trade and Industry, who led a delegation of 30 Japanese businesses to visit Hiep Phuoc Industrial Park in HCM City on Monday.

At the reception for the delegation, head of the HCM City Export Processing and Industrial Zones Authority, Vu Van Hoa, said 17 industrial parks in the city have so far attracted about 1,300 projects with total investment capital of $9 billion.

Of the figure, 559 projects worth $5.4 billion are foreign investments.

Japan is the largest investor in the city’s industrial parks with 119 projects capitalized at $1.3 billion. PNA

The World BusinessMirror

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Too soon to know effects of market moves–Fed exec

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OUSTON—The vice chairman of the Federal Reserve (the Fed) said on Tuesday that the recent slump in financial markets could be a sign the global economy is slowing, which would affect US growth.

But Stanley Fischer said similar market gyrations have had little impact in the past on the overall economy, so it’s too early to tell at this point.

Fisher made the comments in a speech scheduled for delivery at a global energy conference in Houston. The Fed raised its benchmark interest rate from record lows in December and signaled the possibility of four more hikes in 2016.

But roiling financial markets and indications of global weakness have cast doubt on the outlook for more rate increases. Global markets have been volatile this year, moved by factors including concern about slowing economic growth in China and falling oil prices.

“If the recent financial market developments lead to a sustained tightening of financial conditions, they could signal a slowing in the global economy that could affect growth and inflation in the United States,” Fischer said. “But we have seen similar periods of volatility in recent years—including in the second half of 2011—that have

left little visible imprint on the economy, and it is still early to judge the ramifications of the increased market volatility of the first seven weeks of 2016.”

Fischer said data since the December rate hike suggest that the US labor market has kept improving although job gains slowed in January. Spending indicators for January “point to a pickup in economic growth this quarter,” he added.

His remarks echoed those of Fed Chairman Janet Yellen, who testified to Congress two weeks ago that global financial developments could cause the US economy to slow, but that the Fed would be careful not to jump to premature conclusions about the US economy or interest rates.

Falling oil prices have tamped down inflation for more than a year, but the Fed thinks those declines and the strengthening of the dollar will fade in coming months, pushing inflation back to around the central bank’s target rate of 2 percent.

Yellen said this month that cheaper oil prices might contribute to better-than-expected economic growth. She said they have helped support household spending but also caused oil companies to slash jobs and cut capital spending. AP

Thursday, February 25, 2016

More US reports of possible Zika spread through sex–CDC

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EW YORK—US health officials are investigating more than a dozen possible Zika infections that may have been spread through sex.

The 14 cases all involve men who visited areas with Zika outbreaks, and who may have infected their female sex partners, who had not traveled to those areas.

Zika virus is mainly spread by mosquito bites, and sexual transmission has been considered rare. There have been two reported cases, including a recent one in Texas, and at least two other reports of the Zika virus found in semen.

Mosqu ito -bor ne Zi k a outbreaks have erupted across most of Latin America and the Caribbean in the last year. So far, all the 82 Zika infections diagnosed in the US have involved people who traveled to outbreak regions. On Tuesday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said the 14 possible

82

The number of Zika infections diagnosed in the US involving people who traveled to outbreak regions

cases of sexual transmission in the US include two women whose infections have been confirmed.

Tests have not been completed for their male partners.

In four other cases, preliminary

tests indicate women were infected but confirmatory tests are pending. Eight other cases are still being investigated, according to a CDC statement. Several of the 14 are pregnant, but the CDC refused to be more specific.

The agency said there’s no evidence that women can spread the virus to their sex partners, but more research is needed.

In most people, Zika causes mild or no symptoms—fever, joint pain, rash and red eyes—that last about a week. But in Brazil, health officials are investigating a possible connection between the virus and babies born with brain defects and abnormally small heads.

T he l ink hasn’t been confirmed but the possibility has prompted hea lt h of f icia ls to take cautionary steps to protect fetuses from the virus. Research is also under way into a possible link between Zika infection and a paralyzing condition in adults called Guillain-Barre syndrome.

The CDC is advising men who have recently been to a Zika outbreak area to use a condom when they have sex with a pregnant

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On Monday both the New York Times and Le Monde newspapers ran editorials lambasting Modi’s government. The Times editorial board said the ongoing confrontation between Hindu nationalists and free-speech advocates “raises serious concerns about Modi’s governance and may further stall any progress in Parliament on economic reforms.”

Last week a group of 133 university professors from around the world—including linguist Noam Chomsky, Nobel-winning novelist Orphan Pamuk and economist James Galbraith—said the recent arrest of a student leader on sedition charges “is further evidence of the present government’s deeply authoritarian nature, intolerant of any dissent, setting aside India’s long-standing commitment to toleration and plurality of opinion.”

Modi and his government have remained largely unmoved by the criticism, saying little in response other than to denounce it as anti-government propaganda designed to distract from the government’s agenda. Meanwhile, Modi has insisted he is prime minister for all of India, and not just Hindus, and urged the nation to instead focus on growing the economy.

The Amnesty report also said that prisoner safety remained a serious concern, and that “over 282,000 prisoners—68 percent of the total prison population—were pretrial detainees.” Most prisons are badly overcrowded, while torture and abuse in police or judicial custody led the country’s Supreme Court last year to demand that state governments install closed-circuit television cameras within the next two years.

It questioned the Indian Parliament’s defeat of legislation to decriminalize same-sex relations, noting that the country was still adhering to a colonial-era law that makes homosexuality a crime punishable by up to a decade in prison. AP

woman, or to abstain from sex during the pregnancy. It also has recommended that pregnant women postpone trips to more than 30 destinations with outbreaks.

The CDC on Tuesday expanded its Zika travel advisory to two more places—the Marshall Islands, and Trinidad and Tobago.

There is no vaccine for Zika.

Researchers are scrambling to develop one, as well as better diagnostic tests.

T he Z i k a v i r u s i s mo s t ly spread by the same kind of mosquito that transmits other tropical diseases, including dengue and chikungunya. T hat same mosquito is found in the Southern US and officials expect they will eventually spread the virus, too. But they don’t expect to see major outbreaks.

The CDC recommends that all travelers use insect repellant while in Zika outbreak areas, and continue to use it for three weeks after travel in case they might be infected but not sick. That’s to prevent mosquitoes from biting them and possibly spreading Zika to others in the US. AP

US military leader says Okinawa base activities pushed back by two years

Amnesty criticizes India for intolerance of dissent EW DELHI—A mnesty International has joined a growing chorus accusing India of supporting a climate of intolerance by cracking down on dissent through arbitrary arrests, caste-based discrimination, extrajudicial killings and attacks on freedom of expression.

The rights group said in its annual global report, published on Wednesday, that India’s Hindu nationalist government, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, had failed to prevent hundreds of incidents of communal violence, usually involving members of the Hindu majority pitted against Muslims or other minorities.

Instead, ruling party lawmakers and politicians were fueling religious tensions with provocative speeches and justifications for the violence, it said.

A m nest y ’s re por t a l so highlights the government’s continued harassment of civil-society groups critical of official policies over the past year, as well as government legal action aimed at controlling foreign funds for nongovernmental organizations.

“Over 3,200 people were being held in January under administrative detention on executive orders without charge or trial,” the report said, adding that state authorities used “anti-terror” laws to illegally hold activists and protesters in custody.

The report is the latest criticism to be leveled at Modi’s government after a year fraught with communal tension, as members of India’s governing Bharatiya Janata Party try to impose their brand of hyper-nationalism. Dozens of Indian authors, scientists, historians and film industry workers have returned national awards to protest the trend, which has seen arrests of student protesters, the murder of three atheist scholars and mob killings over rumors of cow slaughter. Among India’s majority Hindu population, cows are considered sacred.

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PEOPLE walk past a branch of HSBC bank in Hong Kong on February 22. HSBC warned of a “bumpier” global financial outlook, thanks to China’s slowing economy.

Meanwhile, Financial Secretary John Tsang warned that rising political turmoil could hurt economic growth in the freewheeling southern Chinese business hub. AP

HK finance chief: Political turmoil to hurt economy H

ONG KONG —Hong Kong’s financial chief is warning that rising political turmoil could hurt economic growth in the freewheeling southern Chinese business hub.

Fi n a nc i a l S e c ret a r y Joh n Tsang’s comments in his annual budget speech highlight simmering tensions in Hong Kong, which has been increasingly polarized following the unsatisfactory resolution of pro-democracy protests at the end of 2014.

“Acute social conf licts will add uncertainties to the already adverse economic environment” in Hong Kong.

Tsang said he was “shocked” by a riot during the Lunar New Year holiday earlier this month, which left 130 people hurt, including 90 police officers.

There were 72 arrests from the confrontation with activists’ angry over authorities’ attempts to crack down on holiday food vendors selling fishballs and other local delicacies.

Protesters viewed the clampdown as an assault on local culture and evidence of Beijing’s tightening hold on the city.

Tsang said tensions would remain high as Hong Kong prepares for Legislative Council elections

later this year and a by-election in four days. “We anticipate that political disputes will only intensify over the coming months,” he said. “Politics and economics are closely intertwined. Political volatility will unavoidably impact on our economy.”

Tsang said the city’s economy expanded 2.4 percent last year, its fourth straight year of belowaverage growth, weighed down by the weak global conditions and rocky financial markets.

He forecast that Hong Kong’s economy, a major hub for trade with China, would grow 1 percent to 2 percent in 2016. AP

OKYO—A controversial plan to move a US Marine Corps base within Okinawa in southern Japan has been pushed back by two years, America’s top military official in the Pacific said. Adm. Harry Harris, head of the US Pacific Command, said on Tuesday that the shift of the Futenma air station to a less congested part of Okinawa island would not happen until 2025 because work on a new facility has been delayed.

“It’s slowed,” he told a congressional committee in Washington. “It’s a little over two years late.... Now we’re looking at 2025 before that’s done.” The project faces stiff opposition from both protesters and the Okinawan prefectural government. The Japanese government is building the air station, which will extend over the water from another Marine Corps base near the town of Henoko.

Survey work for the new facility is underway, but Japan suspended it for about two months last year in an unsuccessful attempt to work out a compromise with the Okinawan government.

The US and Japan agreed to move the air station from crowded Ginowan city to reduce the burden of the heavy US military presence on Okinawa residents.

Opponents want the base moved off Okinawa entirely.

The US has agreed to shift 8,000 to 10,000 Marines off Okinawa in the 2020s, mainly to Guam and Hawaii, but Harris said that would happen as “a follow-on” to the move from Futenma to Henoko. “We have an obligation to defend Japan, and they have an obligation to provide us a place from which to defend them,” he said. “And Okinawa is one of those critical places where we must be in order to meet our treaty obligations to defend Japan.” AP

A6 Thursday, February 25, 2016 • Editor: Angel R. Calso

Opinion BusinessMirror

editorial

When the hospital bill kills the patient

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OVERTY kills people and robs them of human dignity. In the Philippines, poor people in direst need for health care are greatly underserved. This says a lot about our government’s ability to uphold a constitutional provision that says “the State shall protect and promote the right to health of the people and instill health consciousness among them.”

The inequity in health status and access to health-care services remain as the country’s most pressing health problem. Which is ironic, given the presence of a national health insurance program. The Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) is mandated to provide health-insurance coverage, and ensure affordable, acceptable, available and accessible health-care services for all citizens of the Philippines (Republic Act 7875).

PhilHealth is, likewise, mandated to provide health education to address our health-care information gap, especially among poor Filipinos. However, a study carried out by the agency in 2006 among its members is quite distressing. PhilHealth found that the major reasons for nonuse of health centers were lack of health-care information and inadequate service provision. The study said approximately 30 percent of respondents did not know what health-care services were available; another 41 percent did not know that PhilHealth membership was accepted in health centers, and 29 percent of respondents were unable to access the services they needed.

This kind of information gap could be deadly. Consider the case of Roger Benigno, a construction worker who had to undergo an appendectomy at a hospital in Echage, Isabela, on February 3. The 45-year-old Benigno committed suicide the following day after seeing the hospital bill. Before he locked himself in the bathroom of his hospital room, where he slashed his throat, relatives said Benigno confessed he has no money to settle the bill, which reached P181,592.

“What a waste of life,” commented a netizen who read the news online, adding that this kind of minor surgery should not cost that much.

“The blame lies in the country’s rotten health-care system,” volunteered another, hitting a raw nerve with a sledgehammer.

The quality of public health services in the Philippines remains a widespread concern. Over the years nominal health-care spending has been the norm. Experts say the inefficiency in government spending and low utilization rates of PhilHealth indicate that the problem is not only on the amount spent but also on optimizing the use of available services. There’s a pressing need to address concerns that government health-care spending has perennially been inefficient. This means the health-care burden falls mostly on citizens as out-ofpocket expense. Thus, poor households remain the most vulnerable, as they are more prone to illness. Compounding the problem is their lack of awareness and inability to access or maximize the use of social protection provided by the government, as in the case of Benigno. This happens because patient empowerment has remained more of a concept than a practice, especially in rural areas.

Clearly, the country’s health-care sector faces increasing challenges. For many Filipinos, health services have remained less than adequate. We hope the next administration will address the inequities and inefficiencies of our health system. Filipinos need a social health insurance program with a mandate to provide universal coverage.

Elections and Edsa I: Focus on poverty Ariel Nepomuceno

DECISION TIME

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URS is a country where highly skilled hardworking masons and carpenters have no decent homes. Chefs and servers are mostly deprived of enjoying great food on their own tables at home. Farmers and agricultural workers worry on what to have for their next meal. Teachers yearn for better education. And government workers hope that their children will join the private sector instead of continuing their noble sacrifice of serving the public.

Our economy breeds insecurity.

Its structure perpetuates deprivation of basic commodities to a growing number of indigents. Poverty is everywhere. Crime worsens as a result. Use and peddling of illegal drugs proliferate to no less than 80 percent of our barangays, according to official reports. Unemployment and underemployment continue to haunt our work force.

Alarming trend

ACCORDING to the most recent statistics, our unemployment rate is at 5.6 percent or equivalent to 2.4 million Filipinos. And 17.7 percent of our work force is underemployed.

Meaning, workers have to settle for a job below their educational qualification or training.

At present, there are at least 12

million Filipinos who live below the poverty threshold. This means they take only a meal a day and are not sure if they will have anything for the next day. They have no decent homes or access to education.

Yearly, at least 20,000 of our countrymen take the plunge and risk working in foreign and sometimes strange lands to join the more than 2.3 million overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) who pursue their dream to have better lives for their families.

The usual suspects

AS a nation, we must finally directly address the perennial causes of our poverty. We have known the reasons our country has suffered economically. Discussions and debates have clearly identified the culprits that plagued our nation.

First in the list is our country’s uncompetitiveness. Our industries could hardly compete because of their higher operating expense attributed to the cost of electricity.

We have one of the highest in Asia at $0.18 per kilowatt. Another main stumbling block is our constitution’s prohibition on corporate structure, which bans full ownership by foreign capital. This is an anathema, an ultimate vestige of our protectionist past, which only protects vested interests that push the majority’s welfare on the side. Land ownership by foreigners too is banned. This is a disincentive that our neighbors already got rid of years ago.

Next is the inefficiency of governance. Corruption is still prevalent.

Though, at least, the administration of President Aquino has given us hope that this cancer can still be reversed. He made a dent on the callous long culture of corruption in the government. Six years obviously is not enough. Still far from over, this must be stopped with a determined leadership.

Another problem is a demoralized bureaucracy because our government employees themselves struggle daily against the onslaught of poverty. A demoralized work force tends to become part of the problem rather than the solution.

continuously suffer from poverty is long. Some of which unfortunately even started the vicious cycle of poverty causing crime, and crime aggravating poverty by scaring businesses away and worsening the social conditions in our communities.

Election is just around the corner. The debates must focus on this main concern. Poverty must be at the center of the arena. The discourses must be designed to provide the specific steps to finally begin our journey to national survival. Edsa I commemoration must also hit our economic dilemma apart from celebrating the political freedom that we won in 1986.

Our candidates and present leaders must be encouraged or forced to answer specific questions on constitutional amendments affecting the economy, high cost of electricity, government inefficiencies, crime being a deterrent to investors, rice-importation policies, mining strategies, improvement of our tourism industry and support for our OFWs. There is still time. We must be able to clearly identify who can best answer and show that they have the capability to end our nation’s economic poverty to complement our hard-earned political freedom.

Begin solving the problem

For comments and suggestions, send to arielnepo.businessmirror@gmail.com.

THE l ist of t he reasons we

Beyond Paris, questionable efforts to combat climate change

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B M K | TNS

ERMANY has long been a leading advocate for confronting and ameliorating climate change. But actions speak louder than words—or signatures on an international accord. The recent Volkswagen scandal is only the latest case of climate-policy hypocrisy.

Meeting in Paris last December, countries around the globe finally recognized the generally accepted scientific evidence that climate change is real.

They also accepted some responsibility to do something about it. To much fanfare, 195 countries, including Germany and the United States, signed the Paris agreement pledging to hit targets to drop emissions, cut carbon and keep our aging earth from experiencing too many hot flashes and cold extremities.

Developed democratic countries, pushed by their citizens, led the charge for a comprehensive agreement to atone for past polluting and to prevent developing states from repeating their own sins. Canada, England, France—they all chimed in and tried to convince, coerce and cajole those developing countries to

be energy ascetics. That was a tough sell.

The developing world now wants its turn to crank out the carbon and catch up to the already rich, gas-burning and globalwarming recidivists. Looking beyond the narratives of the industrialized world’s planned sacrifice, however, some of the stories seem a little less noble or credible.

France, for example, is fine with less fossil fuel because it depends mostly on nuclear power for progress: Up to 78 percent of its electrical needs are met by the near zero-carbon emitting nuclear plants.

Future plans to cut its dependency on nuclear plants while also cutting carbon emissions will certainly be a challenge.

Germany laudably boasts that it is able to reduce the amount of carbon it emits and shut down its nuclear-power plants because it has developed enough

alternative wind and solar power to provide clean and nearly free energy for all. In fact, German statistics recently peaked when satisfying more than 50 percent of its electricity demand through solar power, and nearly 80 percent through all renewable resources.

In each case of selective carbon curtailment, it is expected that a nation seeks its self-interest while also acting simultaneously to protect its competitive advantages. But Germany recently went one step further by publicly advocating an anti-polluting stance, while, at the same time, a dominant corporation powering the German economic juggernaut acted surreptitiously to undermine environmental goals.

Volkswagen, Germany’s industrial behemoth, figured it could advocate for tougher rules for others, but cheat its way to success by developing a workaround to America’s basic Environmental Protection Agency auto-emission requirements. VW crafted an elegant, difficult-to-detect and fraudulent solution to the inconvenient pollution standards. It installed software in 11 million diesel vehicles worldwide that triggered

a clean-emissions setting calibrated for a laboratory—not actual road use.

Moreover, there is evidence that in the case of auto emissions the European Union was, if not complicit, suspiciously aware of autos failing emission tests years before the VW scandal, according to European tests done as early as 2007.

Denied military clout to build and project power, modern German governments have forged uniquely strong ties with industry. Business-friendly industrial policies and an export-focused foreign policy support and underwrite the economic powerhouse that is a 21stcentury Germany’s “Wirtschaftswunder”—economic miracle. Achieving that new modern miracle sometimes seems to take precedence over any other policy, principle, norm, standard or goal.

Economics have trumped global environmental and public health concerns in the past. In the 1980s, when the country was still divided, West Germany tried to export domestically unacceptable radioactively contaminated milk to developing countries, including Egypt.

Other European countries were complicit in the practice and caught.

Opinion BusinessMirror

opinion@businessmirror.com.ph

New rules in securing tax clearance

The merciful Lord

TAX LAW FOR BUSINESS

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ONTRACTORS or bidders participating in government projects, as mandated under Executive Order 398, must be mindful of Revenue Regulations (RR) 3-2005 and its amendments, the latest of which is RR 01-2016. Discussed below are the salient features of RR 1-2016, compared vis-à-vis the relevant issuances preceding it.

Under this RR 1-2016, the meaning of tax clearance was expanded and clarified as referring to the clearance issued by the Accounts Receivable Monitoring Division (formerly Collection Enforcement Division) attesting that the taxpayer has no delinquent account and has satisfied all other criteria for the issuance of tax clearance.

Pursuant to Revenue Memorandum Circular (RMC) 16-2005, the tax clearance to be issued by the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) will have a validity period of one year from date of issuance. However, under RR 1-2016, a tax clearance valid for six months from the date of issuance shall be issued to any applicant who has satisfied the following criteria: a. No unpaid annual registration fee; b. No open valid “stop-filer” cases; c. A regular user of the BIR’s Electronic Filing and Payment System for at least two consecutive months prior to the application for tax clearance (new applicants only); d. No pending criminal charge with the Department of Justice or any competent court; and e. No delinquent account and/or judicially protested tax assessments with decision favorable to the BIR. Further, provisional tax clearances were previously allowed under RMC 58-13, except to the taxpayers who applied for compromise settlement of tax liabilities or abatement of penalties. Unlike RMC 58-2013 and RR 3-2005, this RR 1-2016 now specifies the instances when the tax clearance may be issued, as well as the limitations and qualifications, as laid down in item 4.

Most notable of which are as follows: a. Tax assessments timely protested administratively and/or

timely elevated to the Court of Tax Appeals or to higher court, and where the collection of the assessments are not yet considered final, executory and demandable, shall not be considered delinquent account. b. Applicants with tax assessments, which were timely judicially protested but already covered by an earlier court decision favorable to the BIR and the same are subject of appeals/motions for reconsideration timely filed by the taxpayers, shall be issued tax clearance, provided an escrow deposit shall be made with any authorized agent bank equivalent to the tax liabilities being protested. c. Applicants with delinquent accounts, but the tax liabilities involved were the subject of the applicant’s application for either abatement of penalties or compromise settlement, shall also be issued tax clearance, provided the applicant shall make an escrow deposit with any authorized agent bank equivalent to the tax liabilities, including the applicable delinquency penalties (net of the amount offered for payment upon application of the abatement or compromise settlement).

The above stringent but favorable revisions shall take effect after February 26.

The author is a senior associate of Du-Baladad and Associates Law Offices, a member-firm of World Tax Services.

The article is for general information only and is not intended, nor should be construed, as a substitute for tax, legal or financial advice on any specific matter. Applicability of this article to any actual or particular tax or legal issue should be supported, therefore, by a professional study or advice. If you have any comments or questions concerning the article, you may e-mail the author at filamer.miguel@bdblaw.com.ph, or call 4032001, local 360.

China’s credit conundrum B C B | Bloomberg View

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HINA has two very good reasons to slow the gusher of cheap money that continues to flood its economy. The first, obviously, is to prevent the kind of financial implosion that’s struck down similarly debt-burdened countries. The second is just as important: To clear out the deadwood in the world’s secondlargest economy.

For Chinese leaders, the need to prop up faltering GDP growth outweighs fears about a rapid buildup in debt.

In January alone, banks made a record $385 billion worth of new loans, more than 70 percent higher than the year before. Debt now tops 230 percent of GDP and could reach as high as 300 percent of GDP if current trends continue.

Billionaire investor Bill Gross has joined the chorus of voices calling this trajectory “unsustainable.” Even the Bank for International Settlements, a body not known for hyperbole, has warned that Chinese debt is reaching levels that typically trigger financial crises.

The recent surge in credit is merely an extension of policies put into place after the global financial crisis.

To fend off a downturn, China launched a massive 2009 fiscal-stimulus package focused on infrastructure and investment spending. Simultaneously, policy-makers ordered banks to open the credit spigot. Since January 2009, total loans in China have grown 202 percent, for an annualized growth rate of 34 percent.

Local governments and businesses alike have been only too happy to partake in the largesse. The problem is that most of this money has gone into the least efficient, most saturated parts of the economy. Nomura estimates that 40 percent of bank loans to companies go to state-owned enterprises, although they account for barely 10 percent of China’s output. The money is being used to prop up companies that probably shouldn’t survive: One Chinese securities firm suggests 45 percent of new debt is being used to pay interest on old debt, like using a new credit card to pay off an old one.

Cheap money is also continuing to expand capacity in sectors that already have too much. There are

the heavens; out of His covenant love for us, God has steadfast love for those who fear Him.

Msgr. Sabino A. Vengco Jr.

ALÁLAONG BAGÁ

Atty. Filamer D. Miguel

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HE Lord pardons, heals, redeems; abounding in kindness, He is merciful (Psalm 103:1-2, 3-4, 6-7, 8, 11). I have come in search of fruit on this tree, but have found none. Cultivate and fertilize it; it may bear fruit in the future (Luke 13:1-9).

The Lord is kind and merciful PSALM 103 is a hymn of praise that begins in a personal way: the psalmist calls upon himself (or his soul) to bless and thank the Lord for so much goodness already received. The Hebrew word for soul (nepesh) means life-breath, the living person: The psalmist in the totality of his person, in “all his being,” is summoned to bless the Lord in “His holy name.”

In the biblical world, a person’s name expresses the person’s unique identity. It is showing great reverence for God to pay homage to the divine name, rather than to God directly.

The benefits from God that the psalmist tells himself not to forget

are the divine pardon for his iniquities, the healing for his ills and his life’s redemption from destruction. God is to be praised for His protection and defense of those in need, as He did for Israel in their Egyptian bondage and during their desert sojourn. These acts of God flow from His loving-kindness (hesed) and tender compassion (rahamim), divine attributes associated with His holy name. Because of His graciousness and mercy, God is slow to anger and does not deal with us, as our sins deserve nor repay us according to our iniquities.

The extent of the divine kindness is compared to the vast expanse of

An agenda for humanity

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B B K- | United Nations Secretary-General

ORE people desperately need humanitarian assistance than at any time since the founding of the United Nations.

More warring parties are brazenly violating international humanitarian law. More resources than ever are needed to meet sharply escalating humanitarian needs. Yet we face the largest-ever funding shortfalls.

For these reasons and more, I am convening the first-ever World Humanitarian Summit on May 23 and 24 in Istanbul. I am urging global leaders, international organizations and others to commit to deliver more and better for those in greatest need.

There is no time to lose.

Climate change is affecting lives and livelihoods across our fragile planet. Brutal and seemingly intractable conflicts, violent extremism, transnational crime and growing inequality are devastating the lives of millions of men, women and children, and are destabilizing entire regions. More people have been forced to flee their homes than at any time since the Second World War. Around the world, more than 125 million people need humanitarian assistance. If they were all in one

currently about four-and-a-half years’ worth of residential real estate sales under construction. Coal plants, which are currently running at only 67 percent of capacity, are investing in an additional $9.4 billion worth of capacity in 2015, with a similar number expected in 2016. The government has pledged to slash capacity in the bloated steel sector, by as much as 13 percent by 2020. But given that the industry is already losing about $25 for every ton of steel produced, those small cuts, even excluding capacity additions, are hardly going to solve the problem.

The government isn’t blind to the dangers. Its 2016 economic plan lists “deleveraging” and capacity reduction as two major priorities for the year. The central bank has imposed limits on certain banks that had been a bit too liberal in their recent lending. But the fact remains that the state-owned giants drawing the bulk of new lending are also the most politically well-connected. Rather than shutting them down and throwing potentially millions of Chinese out of work, the government hopes to keep them afloat while they’re merged and overhauled.

There’s little reason to think this plan can succeed.

No country with a similarly rapid rise in debt levels has escaped either a financial crisis, or like Japan, a prolonged slowdown. Continuing to lend at this pace will only increase the ranks of zombie companies, alive because of government life support. Slowing lending will inevitably mean lower GDP growth, more corporate bankruptcies and higher unemployment. But it will also reduce the buildup of risks that are otherwise certain to come due.

At the same time, Chinese leaders have an opportunity to speed along the transition to a more dynamic economy focused more on services and consumption than old-line manufacturing and investment. Instead of spending money bailing out dud companies, the government should be diverting resources to start-ups, smalland medium-sized companies and other private-sector businesses with greater growth potential. Money should be spent on retraining workers to find new jobs in these industries, rather than more highways and apartment buildings. Companies that can’t survive without additional lending should be allowed to fail.

Thursday, February 25, 2016

country, it would be the eleventhlargest nation on Earth, and one of the fastest growing.

Today’s complex challenges cross borders. No single country or organization can address them alone. We need to restore trust in the ability of our national, regional and international institutions to confront these challenges.

A sense of shared humanity must shape our politics and drive financial decisions. In advance of the Summit, I have set out an Agenda for Humanity as a framework for action, change and mutual accountability. It has five core responsibilities.

First, leaders must intensify efforts to find political solutions to prevent and end conflict. The enormous human and economic cost makes conflict the biggest obstacle

Fruits expected, repentance needed

TWO violent incidents are referred to in the gospel narrative: The massacre of some unruly Galileans during their ritual sacrifice upon the order of Pilate and the collapse on a number of people of a tower on the southeast corner of the temple wall near the pool of Siloam. These two tragic events, one clearly an accident and the other sheer brutality, raise the question of culpability in the minds of the people. Presuming a direct correlation between a person’s moral character and the circumstances of his life, the public have probably wondered for what sins have those victims of tragedies suffered.

Jesus insists that those victims were not guilty of sin more than anybody else. He focuses, instead, on the suddenness of the tragedies and, therefore, on the possible unpreparedness of the victims. To avoid such double calamity, Jesus admonishes the people to repent.

They should be reconciled with God,

to human development. We must move from managing crises to preventing them.

Second, countries must uphold the norms that safeguard humanity.

This means complying with international humanitarian and humanrights law and stopping the bombing and shelling of civilian targets and areas. It also means committing to national and international justice and ending impunity.

Third, we must leave no one behind—and we must reach those who are furthest behind, first. This means transforming the lives of the most vulnerable, including those living in conflict and in chronic poverty, and those living with the risk of natural hazards and rising sea levels. We must reduce forced displacement, provide more regular and lawful opportunities for migration, empower women and girls and ensure quality education for all. We cannot meet the Sustainable Development Goals, agreed by world leaders last September, if we do not reach these people.

The fourth core responsibility is to move from delivering aid to ending need. We need to close the

so that anytime a disaster strikes, the misfortune will not furthermore be accompanied by divine judgment.

The parable Jesus adds underlines the mercy of God. The fig tree’s owner has the right to expect his tree to bear fruit. Concluding that the tree would never produce fruits and is only wasting the space it stands on, the order was to cut it down. Happily the tree is given more time to produce.

Alálaong bagá, in God’s mercy we are given the time necessary to repent of our offenses against God and to bear fruit. God, in His lovingkindness, has been always ready to forgive us our iniquities and to heal our ills. We should not forget all He has done for us, treating us not in anger, but in abounding kindness. Lent is the grace-filled season for us to do what we should do. This is the time for prayer and thankful reflection on the divine mercy for all those who fear Him and would do everything to maintain a fruitful relationship with Him. Join me in meditating on the Word of God every Sunday, 5 to 6 a.m. on dwIZ 882, or by audio-streaming on www.dwiz882.com.

humanitarian-development divide for good. We must also anticipate crises, not wait for them to happen.

We must strengthen local leadership and capacity, reduce vulnerability, and increase the resilience of people and communities, who will always be the first and last responders in crises.

Fifth, we must find smart and innovative ways of mobilizing funds.

This will require diversifying and expanding the resource base and using a wider variety of financing tools. I have proposed a new international financing platform with the World Bank to identify mechanisms to finance our response to protracted crises.

The Agenda for Humanity provides key actions and strategic shifts which the world requires to reduce humanitarian needs and contribute to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. I urge world leaders to come to the World Humanitarian Summit committed to promote sustainable human progress and a life of dignity and security for all.

The writer’s report “One Humanity: Shared Responsibility” was published on February 9.

Regular guy Jeb Bush lost to gladiators B L B Bloomberg View

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EB BUSH did everything wrong in this presidential campaign, but I’m sorry to see him go. He was, for want of a better word, the most human of the Republicans in the race.

I saw him campaign in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina. He was clearly undergoing a difficult learning process.

In Iowa, despite having sunk low in the polls, he was trying to sound confident, being a little more forceful than his quiet personality and coming off nervous, even a little scared of his audiences. He was also trying to talk as little as he could about his family, trying too hard to show he was his own man. Conservative talk-show hosts were laughing at his posters, which just said “Jeb!”: He was the only candidate without a last name, when everyone knew he had the most famous one. And then there were the debates, in which Donald Trump pummeled him with the ease of a champion boxer taking on a shy, bespectacled novice.

He overspent crazily on ads, clearly believing in the power of this old-time blunt instrument—but it just gave more ammunition to Trump, who kept telling his fans that pathetic Bush was just burning money without any visible result. In the end, Bush lost so badly in Iowa that each vote cost him $626, according to my calculations based on data from Kantar Media’s Campaign Media Analysis Group.

In New Hampshire, the attempts at aggressiveness were gone. Bush embraced his normcore style and he listened to voters more than he talked at them. He sounded concerned and compassionate as he gave

substantive answers to voters’ questions, whether they dealt with allowing women to be drafted into the military, specific plans for replacing Obamacare or his plans for education reform.

New Hampshire’s heroin epidemic was the biggest issue in that state’s campaign.

Melissa Crews, who runs a recovery center for addicts in Manchester, told me how Bush —whose daughter Noelle had struggled with substance abuse—showed up at the center without cameras or much of an entourage, made a donation and had an intelligent discussion of what could be done to help people trying to kick a drug habit.

It was in New Hampshire that Bush realized it was OK to bring his family into the campaign. He welcomed his mother, Barbara Bush, and started off his campaign appearances by talking at length about his love for his wife. He actually started sounding unashamed of his last name and the dynasty he represented. Before one town hall I attended, his son, George P. Bush, introduced him as a “grinder” who would stay in the race to the bitter end and never give up.

On February 6, Bush actually performed well against Trump in a debate. He scored some points against him on eminent domain, and when Trump tried to shush him, the audience booed—one of the most uncomfortable moments for Trump in the televised part of this campaign. When the vote count showed he had improved his performance —though a vote still cost him $293, second only to Chris Christie’s $295—it seemed to me well-deserved. His learning curve was so steep that if his performance curve matched it, he’d soon have a fighting chance.

What I saw in South Carolina was anticlimactic. Jeb brought in the heavy artillery

A7

—his brother George W. Bush, still well liked

by Republican voters—but he couldn’t match the ex-president’s charisma and warmth. By contrast, he sounded desperate, pleading.

He’d found out that Republicans weren’t allergic to the Bush name after all, but also that they doubted whether he was worthy of it.

He lacked the aura of victory, he was too soft, too easy to mock and dismiss. At a church service I attended on Saturday, as voting in South Carolina’s primary was winding down, the preacher was referring to King Nebuchadnezzar as “Neb Exclamation Point.” It didn’t even elicit many laughs: Bush was gone, performing worse than polls had predicted, failing even to get into the double digits as he had done in New Hampshire.

He lost out to candidates whose human frailties are far less obvious. Trump only pretends to be offended when someone—be it Ted Cruz or the pope himself—attacks him: He has the most fun when that happens.

Cruz still grinds out seven campaign stops per day, as he did in Iowa, without breaking a sweat or cutting corners on his oratory and he seems made of steel. Marco Rubio does his perfectly rehearsed charming boyish act and works feverishly behind the scenes, picking up endorsements and money that would have gone to Bush had he looked a winner.

They are gladiators of the highest caliber. Bush, despite his family history, is just a regular guy. He’s not necessarily weak— he’s normal, in the sense of being able to carry on a normal conversation where the others perform.

Clearly, Republican voters don’t want normality, though they flirted with it in New Hampshire. They want a show and a sword fight. They may not like it when the winner claims his spoils, though.

2nd Front Page BusinessMirror

A8 Thursday, February 25, 2016

Imports to pick up on rising demand, investment this year

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ESPITE registering the largest drop in six years in December 2015, import growth is seen to rebound this year due to the projected continued rise in domestic demand and investments in the country, National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) Officer in Charge and Deputy Director General Margarita R. Songco said.

Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) data showed the country’s payments for imported goods declined by 25.8 percent in December 2015, the steepest monthly yearon-year decline recorded since April 2009, when it fell by 37.1 percent.

“Despite this decline in December, strong domestic demand will prop up imports growth in the near term, as we expect continued expansion in inward shipments of power-generating machines, office and electronic data-processing machines and telecommunications equipment,” Songco said.

“Investor confidence in the country is still growing and is seen to

25.8%

The drop in merchandise imports in December 2015, steepest drop in six years increase investments. This will, in turn, boost demand for imports of capital goods, as well as raw materials and intermediate goods,” she added.

Merchandise import payments declined to $4.06 billion in December 2015, from $5.47 billion in 2014.

The Neda said the contraction of import payments halted the six consecutive months of positive growth in the shipment of imported merchandise. For the full year, imports posted a growth of only 2 percent to $66.69 billion in 2015, from $65.4 billion in 2014.

“We expect the weakening [to] help cushion [the] decline of current account if remittances weaken,” Ateneo de Manila University Eagle Watch senior fellow Alvin Ang said.

“It’s not a cause for worry but [we] must be cautious.”

Ang earlier said overseas Filipino worker (OFW) remittances are expected to see continued decline this year and in the medium term.

He added that remittances are only expected to grow 2.7 percent this year. This is not only due to the drop in oil prices, which cut OFW employment in the Middle East, but also due to the overall decline in deployment.

Most of the remittances now come from services workers and production workers. The share of remittances from higher-paid professional and technical workers has been on the decline in the past 15 years.

Ang said the sector that can take up the slack is the business-process outsourcing (BPO) sector. He added that in three to five years, dollars

earned by the BPO sector will equal the amount sent by OFWs. “Weak imports imply weak export production. External trade will still be weak this year, but both exports and imports will perform better than last year, due to base effects and drop in oil prices,” said Cid Terosa, economist from the University of Asia and the Pacific.

“The sharp plunge in imports in December 2015, the steepest monthly decline since April 2009, may be reflective of the growing pessimism among Filipino industrialist. They see a lower-than-previously-projected economic expansion of the domestic economy in 2016 partly due to the weakening global demand,” University of the Philippines economist Benjamin E. Diokno said.

The imports numbers, he added, reflect the deep drop in imports of mineral fuels, lubricants and related materials. This is not surprising given the sharp decline in the prices of oil and oil products.

“However, the sharp fall in the importation of other intermediate inputs should be a cause for concern for policy-makers. The importation of electronic components, which account for 31.6 percent of total imports—two-thirds before the Global Recession—contracted by C  A

www.businessmirror.com.ph

SODA TAXES CAN HELP PROTECT PUBLIC HEALTH IN PHL, ASIAN NATIONS T

HERE are many, many more Asians than there are Americans, but a far smaller share of them have enjoyed a refreshing cola lately. Global soft-drink makers view this as an opportunity to hook new customers. For Asian governments, it’s a public-health challenge—one they can meet by levying soda taxes.

Sugary drinks, along with the many other processed foods that contain added sugar, are a primary driver of the obesity epidemic: Some 41 million children under the age of 5 worldwide are overweight or obese, nearly half of them in Asia. Added sugar also contributes to the skyrocketing incidence of diabetes, as well as heart, liver and kidney diseases.

In more affluent countries, where people are increasingly aware of sugar’s ill effects, per-capita consumption is declining. But it’s rising fast in India, Indonesia and other developing countries, as big soda makers push for new customers.

Coca-Cola intends to invest more than $10 billion to grow its business in India, China and the Philippines alone. Big Tobacco once followed a similar strategy, seeking out customers among the rising middle and lower-middle classes of Asia as the developed world clamped down on smoking.

Asian countries can easily avoid falling into the same trap with sugar, and some of them already recognize it: the Philippines, India and

Indonesia are all considering substantial taxes on sugary drinks.

Such measures can drive down soft-drink consumption, as Mexico’s experience shows. Just one year after its soda tax was put in place, purchases of sugary drinks in the country fell substantially. Other measures—restrictions on advertising, bans in schools, front-of-pack labels highlighting the dangers of sugar— haven’t been evaluated consistently.

But given the scale of the publichealth threat involved, countries would be wise to experiment with a combination of them.

For the push against unhealthy sugar consumption to be most effective, China—where nearly half of all kids drink sugary beverages regularly and half of the population is either diabetic or prediabetic—will need to join in. And regulators in every country will need to be careful not to discriminate among brands: To target the fizzy beverages made by the likes of Coca-Cola and Pepsi risks ignoring locally made packaged juices, which can be just as unhealthy.

Soft-drink companies warn darkly that new taxes will force them to pull back from emerging markets, putting jobs at risk. Asian governments should keep in mind the much larger costs they’ll face —in chronic disease, lost productivity and mortality—if they fail to keep sugar consumption under control. Bloomberg News