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Sunday, April 14, 2019 Vol. 14 No. 186
2018 EJAP JOURNALISM AWARDS
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BANANAS IN LIMBO Presence of chemical residue in excess of allowable limit imperils PHL’s prime fruit export to Japan
BANANAS are loaded into the hold of a ferry boat in Cebu. HUGO MAES | DREAMSTIME.COM
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By Manuel T. Cayon
AVAO CITY—The Japanese government has yet to receive a satisfactory assurance from the Department of Agriculture (DA) on how the latter intends to comply with the minimum residue limit (MRL) for banana exports after Tokyo red-flagged a shipment of the home-grown fruit last year allegedly found containing an excess amount of a certain chemical.
This was the latest information relayed by the Philippine embassy in Tokyo and the country’s agriculture attaché in Japan. Japan reportedly “reacted strongly” to the presence of the insecticide called fipronil in the red-flagged shipment, the residue of which exceeded that of Japan’s MRL. Japan, meanwhile, has further reduced and tightened its MRL on fipronil, from 0.01 parts per million (ppm) to 0.005 ppm. The incident happened in August last year, and while the Pilipino Banana Growers and Exporters Association (PBGEA) said it appreciated the response of the DA
“to mitigate further violation of Japan’s MRL on fipronil and other active chemical ingredients, it baffles us why the issue has not been resolved yet after seven months since the first detection in August.”
Inaction?
A PBGEA letter sent to Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez on March 22 suspected that the DA “sat” on the documents required by Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare. Stephen A. Antig, PBGEA executive director, said Japan has required the 100-percent mandatory testing of Philippine ba-
nanas since the August incident, consequently delaying the release of the Philippine bananas to the markets in Japan. Japan’s health ministry has required the Philippine government, specifically the DA, to submit the protocol for export to Japan. The DA’s Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI) and the Plant Quarantine Services (PQS) were assigned to submit the protocol. Antig said the protocol was already completed by the agencies and with the collaboration of the PBGEA “four weeks ago,” or sometime in early March. “At this point in time, we are
kept in limbo due to the inaction of the DA,” the PBGEA said in its letter to Dominguez. On March 20, or two days before the PBGEA wrote Dominguez, the organization also wrote Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel F. Piñol enumerating the four comments of Japan’s health ministry as to the issue of the nonsubmission of the protocol. The PBGEA said the Japanese ministry has received the reports and results of the BPI’s audit “on certain companies,” but it said the ministry officials would like to have the “formatted report that Continued on A2
The list of ways China keeps tabs on citizens is getting longer
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HINA’S ambitious plan to assign lifelong scores to citizens based on their behavior has stoked international concern, even as the project remains nascent and numerous hurdles must be overcome before the experiment can be implemented nationwide. In fact, the so-called social credit system is merely an extension of the myriad ways the government already rates its citizens. Here’s a breakdown of the systems China has in place. PESO EXCHANGE RATES n US 51.8500
Supreme Court blacklist
A MAN stands next to a Chinese flag during a boat tour in Zhuhai, China, on October 22, 2018. QILAI SHEN/BLOOMBERG
PEOPLE who defy court orders are barred from numerous privileges, including getting loans, buying houses and sending their kids to private schools. Judges decide who’s blacklisted, and individuals can appeal to be removed once their issue has been rectified. The Supreme Court maintains a public database with full names and identification numbers of those on the list. By the end of 2018, people with bad debt had been prevented from taking more than 17 million flights, 5 million train trips and blocked from acting as executives or legal business representatives 290,000 times, according to the court.
Personal credit rating
CHINA’S central bank sits atop a vast pool of credit profiles for nearly 1 billion people and 26 million enterprises. Its database includes information on bank loans, social security, housing pension, tax evasion and even court rulings. Financial institutions ranging from the nation’s five biggest banks to small loan companies are able to use it to check citizens’ credit scores—preventing those with bad credit from taking on more debt. Records are automatically refreshed after several years and infractions can be expunged, with the frequency of those updates linked to the seriousness of Continued on A2
n JAPAN 0.4644 n UK 67.7057 n HK 6.6114 n CHINA 7.7169 n SINGAPORE 38.2403 n AUSTRALIA 36.9328 n EU 58.3572 n SAUDI ARABIA 13.8255
Source: BSP (April 12, 2019 )
NewsSunday A2 Sunday, April 14, 2019
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The list of ways China keeps tabs on citizens is getting longer Continued from A1
what the person did wrong. The system is similar to credit ratings used in many other countries.
sweeping holiday, the state-run Global Times reported.
National blacklist
Sesame credit
THE National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC)— which is spearheading the social credit plan—set up a branch in 2017 to promote information sharing between government departments and China’s vast regions. In its 2018 annual report, the NDRC said it had added some 14.2 million incidents to a list of “dishonest” activities—but that more than 2 million people had also successfully been removed from the blacklist.
ANT Financial, an affiliate of ecommerce giant Alibaba Group Holding, uses the scoring system to track its customers’ creditworthiness. The company suffered some backlash when users discovered they were automatically signed up for it without being notified. This score can affect a range of things, including whether customers need to put down a deposit to rent a bicycle and whether they can obtain loans. Ant argues that its system is needed because so many people— especially those living in rural areas of China—don’t have credit scores (or even bank accounts).
Social credit system
ALL these systems could ultimately feed into or influence the establishment of the nationwide Social Credit System the government wants in place by 2020 to determine whether its citizens are well behaved and punish or reward them accordingly. A number of cities have been experimenting with the concept for years, and 12 were selected as pilots on January 1, 2018. People have points added or deducted depending on everyday social behavior, including recycling, keeping their dogs leashed and parking cars where they’re supposed to. Local governments have also adapted their own systems to focus on particular behaviors they want to address. Ultimately, data collected from various blacklists and rating systems already in use could feed into the overarching national program. Bloomberg News
Tourism blacklist
A CHINESE flag flies on a boat as the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge stands in the distance in Zhuhai, China, on October 22, 2018. QILAI SHEN/BLOOMBERG
Bananas in limbo
ILUVATAR | DREAMSTIME.COM
THE Ministry of Culture and Tourism names and shames citizens who behave in an “uncivilized” manner overseas, and bans them from traveling. Offenses include fighting, stealing—even climbing on public statues. The country’s Civil Aviation Administration has imposed flying bans on those who flout airline safety rules, after a string of incidents involving Chinese travelers accidentally opening emergency exits. Most recently, Beijing park authorities proposed using artificial intelligence and facial recognition to identify and bar tourists who exhibit bad behavior from its parks during the Qingming Festival, or national tomb-
Continued from A1
outlines the investigations of the violations and the countermeasures taken/to be taken by both the concerned exporters and the BPI.” It also noted the monitoring system for exporting bananas conducted by BPI, but it said the system “is unclear” to the ministry. “They received the list of audited companies that are compliant exporters to Japan, but they have not received any report on the process how the companies were audited and selected to be on the list,” PBGEA said. “[Japan’s] MHLW [Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare] seems to be confused on the multiple updated versions of the protocol presented to them. They want to receive the latest/final and the approved version of the protocol. MHLW would like to know the official contact person from the Philippine government,” PBGEA said, enumerating Japan’s ministry’s concern. Antig said the PBGEA has arranged for a study tour and discussion with different research and development and quality assurance officers of PBGEA’s member companies with the ministry’s officials. “However, the reply of the MHLW was that although they appreciate the extra effort, they prefer not to entertain any meetings with the PBGEA until the Philippine government, particularly the Department of Agriculture, shows concrete steps to address the MRL problem, not only with the submis-
sion of a revised protocol for export of bananas to Japan, but with the verifiable preventive measures like laboratory tests in the Philippines,” the PBGEA said.
DA’s reply
ON April 3, Acting BPI Director George Y. Culaste said the “answer to the latest comments of MHLW is ready for submission to the Japan Embassy in Manila.” He said his office already received 13 notifications from the Japanese ministry. “Although most detections are not from PBGEA members, it is very difficult to convince the MHLW that the corrective measures are deemed sufficient to lift the 100-percent mandatory MRL testing.” Culaste said the ministry has continued to raise questions on BPI’s report. “For this new banana export protocol, the reason for the several revisions is that we have been incorporating your comments and giving this due consideration,” he added. “It is with deep regret that you consider the BPI’s efforts as lacking in assisting the industry in dealing with the issue. We are very much aware that it had been seven months since the first detection in August and yet this issue has not been resolved,” he said. Culaste said the BPI, Plant Product Safety Services Division and the National Plant Quarantine Services Division instituted corrective measures with the issuance of the new banana export protocol, which now incorporated food safety. “However, our resources at BPI cannot meet up to the needs of the huge banana industry, hence, we rely heavily on monitoring and the premise that licensed exporters, packing facilities and registered growers are indeed compliant to the protocol,” Culaste added.
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Hackers try smaller amounts three years after $100-M heist
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HREE years after hackers managed to siphon off more than $100 million from the Bangladeshi central bank’s account in the US Federal Reserve, cyber criminals are going smaller. In 2018, attempted fraudulent transactions ranged from $250,000 and $2 million, down from tens of millions of dollars in the previous two years, interbank messaging system Swift said in a report on Wednesday. Almost all fraudulent transactions—83 percent—were sent to banks in the Asia-Pacific region, while the targeted lenders were mostly located in countries rated highly corrupt by international regulators, Swift said. Tajikistan, Mozambique and Afghanistan topped those rankings in 2018. “The higher the value of the instruction, the higher the risk of triggering frauddetection systems,” Swift said in the study. “Since the cyber incident in Bangladesh, the amounts sent in individual
fraudulent transactions has evolved, making them harder to detect.” Sw if t, whic h has more than 11,000 members globally, introduced a set of cybersecurity measures after the electronic heists of 2016 with targets that included the central bank of Bangladesh. It’s also provided new services that member-banks can use to catch anomalies in their wire-transfer orders. As the attempted transfer amounts fell, hackers also started sending their fraudulent orders during business hours, hoping they’d blend in with legitimate Swift messages. In the past, such orders were typically sent during holidays or outside regular hours to bypass human detection, Swift said. It didn’t disclose the total amount cyber criminals tried to steal through fraudulent messages last year or what percentage of attempts were successful. Bloomberg News
Sunday, April 14, 2019
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Currency crisis claims another strongman as Sudan’s Bashir falls
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OR autocratic leaders seeking lessons from the toppling of Sudanese President Omar alBashir, avoiding a currency crisis may be the key to survival. It’s the same problem that did for long-standing rulers from Angola to Zimbabwe and may yet claim Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro. Al-Bashir, who the military ousted on Thursday to end more than 30 years of r u le, faced months of protests against the government’s economic mismanagement, repression and corruption. One of the root causes of the 75-year-old ’s downfall was his inability to manage a shortage of foreign exchange that sent inflation soaring and hammered living standards. Sudan’s woes can be traced back to the secession of South
Sudan in 2011, which saw it lose almost all its oil fields and 60 percent of fiscal revenue, according to the Institute of International Finance. But the government’s decision to ramp up spending while pegging its currency only exacerbated the situation. “With the loss of oil revenue, the government monetized the deficit, causing inflation to spiral and reserves to dwindle as the central bank maintained an overvalued exchange rate,” Jonah Rosenthal and Garbis Iradian, economists at the Washington-based IIF, said in a note on Thursday. The central bank devalued the
pound almost 40 percent to 47.5 per dollar in October. But it was too little, too late. The currency’s black-market rate tumbled again and now stands at around 75 against the greenback. Inflation is almost 120 percent, according to Steve H. Hanke, a professor of applied economics at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. Al-Bashir is far from the only strongman to come unstuck in recent years, thanks to a balance-ofpayments crisis. Robert Mugabe was pushed out by Zimbabwe’s army in 2017 as a dollar squeeze caused havoc in the southern African nation, while the ruling party in Angola pressured President Jose Eduardo dos Santos to resign earlier than he wanted in the same year. Tellingly, one of the first things his successor, Joao Lourenco, did was devalue the kwanza to try and end a dire scarcity of hard currency. And Algeria’s Abdelaziz Bouteflika, who was forced out of power
this month, faced his own currency problems. The 2014 crash in oil and gas prices crimped the Arab nation’s dollar earnings. While it avoided the kind of economic pain seen in Sudan, it spent more than $100 billion of reserves to prop up the dinar and avoid tough measures such as a devaluation or turning to the International Monetary Fund for a bailout. In Venezuela, where inflation is more than 1 million percent, making the bolivar all but worthless, Maduro has managed to hold on thanks to continued support from the military and outside powers such as Russia. But if Sudan and Zimbabwe are a guide, he’ll also need to solve the currency chaos. “Nobody survives hyperinflation,” Daniel Osorio, president of New York-based Andean Capital Advisors, which advises money managers on Latin America, said on Thursday at a debt conference in Washington. “Sooner or later it pushes you out.” Bloomberg News
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Sunday, April 14, 2019
The World BusinessMirror
Editor: Angel R. Calso
AS CHINA TRADE WAR COOLS, JAPAN BRACES FOR ITS CLASH WITH TRUMP
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APAN is finally stepping into the ring for a fight it had managed to dodge for more than two years: Bilateral trade talks with US President Donald J. Trump. The world’s third-biggest economy has a lot at stake in the talks, which are expected to start this week in Washington, just as the US’s negotiations with China appear to be winding down. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is desperate to avoid tariffs or quotas on lucrative auto exports, while Trump wants to crack open Japan’s
agricultural market and reduce a $60-billion trade deficit. Abe has poured energy into courting Trump to maintain a strategic relationship that secures his country against potential threats from North Korea and China. But that doesn’t mean Japan will roll over on trade: Abe’s government is determined to avoid giving the US a better two-way deal than the multilateral pacts he’s negotiated with Europe and Pacific Rim nations. “It’s the US who asked for these bilateral
negotiations,” said Ichiro Fujisaki, a former Japanese ambassador to the US, who’s now president of the Nakasone Peace Institute. “So, it’s the US who should put to us what they want, rather than us offering this and that before being asked.” The talks add to worries among investors as Trump turns his gaze from China to trade grudges elsewhere. The US leader, who will face questions on his success in rebalancing America’s trade relationships in next year’s presidential campaign, has signaled a willingness
to continue market-disrupting tariff threats despite growing economic concerns. Abe only agreed to bilateral talks after Trump hit Japan’s steel and aluminum exports with punitive tariffs last year and later threatened to impose levies of as much as 25 percent on all imported cars, including those made in Japan. Trump faces a decision in May on how to proceed with the auto tariffs. “Japan is now negotiating,” Trump told reporters last month. “They haven’t wanted to negotiate for many
years, but now they’re negotiating. It’s called ‘tariffs.’” Still, Abe’s economy minister, Toshimitsu Motegi, has been able to observe the Trump administration’s previous battles with South Korea, Canada, Mexico and China before sitting down next week with US. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer. In each fight, the US adopted extreme positions that threatened to upend economic ties only to drift toward more modest changes. Abe has also fortified Japan’s position by sealing trade pacts with the European Union and 10 other partners jilted by Trump when he abandoned the Trans-Pacific Partnership shortly after taking office. Those deals have left US farmers, including beef and pork producers, at risk of losing their 22-percent share of Japan’s food import market to rivals with lower tariffs. “For Japan, the government has no reason to hasten, to quickly wrap up the negotiations,” said Junji Nakagawa, a professor who researches trade issues at Chuogakuin University in Chiba prefecture near Tokyo. “The impetus for wrapping up negotiations quickly comes from the US side, especially agricultural lobbyists.” The scope of talks will be key. If the US can accept parity with Europe and TPP nations on agriculture—as the two sides suggested in a September 26 joint statement—Abe might settle quickly. Trump is expected to visit Tokyo next month for a state visit with the incoming emperor, Crown Prince Naruhito, and Japan doesn’t want trade disputes marring the pageantry. “We will further expand trade and investment between Japan and the United States in a mutually beneficial manner,” Japanese Finance Minister Taro Aso told the US Chamber of Commerce on Thursday in Washington, citing the September statement. Problem is, the same joint statement
also called for reducing Japan’s trade surplus—and agriculture parity may not be enough for Trump. Abe could dig in to avoid a one-sided deal, especially with his ruling Liberal Democratic Party facing an upper house election in July. “Trump has this illusion that somehow there is this unfairness because there are Toyotas lined up on the docks of Los Angeles and there aren’t any Fords or GMs on the streets of Tokyo,”said Matthew Goodman, who held National Security Council roles under presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush. “There’s really very few other people in town who believe that this should be a central focus of US-Japan negotiations. But the president wants it. So it’s probably going to happen.” Japan, which continues to hold out hope for the US’s return to the TPP, could insist on the market access it received under that pact. That means eliminating tariffs on the country’s auto parts, which comprised 6 percent of its exports to the US. One scenario hinted at in last year’s joint statement is a swift agreement on easier issues, followed by a second, more comprehensive round. That would give Trump a win and allow Abe—who will visit Washington later this month—to focus on a rare series of historic events, including Emperor Akihito’s planned April 30 abdication and the Group-of-20 summit in Osaka. Wendy Cutler, who led the Obama administration’s final TPP push with Japan, said it was unclear whether Trump would adopt the same aggressive approach he was signaling with the European Union, which he called a “brutal trading partner” this week. “That’s the key question,” Cutler said. “But there are different dynamics here that could lead the administration to recognize that the tactics it has used with other countries may not quite be in its interest this time around.” Bloomberg News
For Libyan warlord Khalifa Haftar, Tripoli campaign is a life’s work
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OR a man who this time last year was lying in a French hospital gravely ill, Khalifa Haftar has made a startling comeback. The Libyan warlord, 75, has moved his forces to the gates of Tripoli when he was supposed to be preparing for an international peace conference aimed at ending eight years of turmoil. Dismissed at first as a feint to win an advantage in those talks, Haftar’s offensive now looks all too serious, even to his own foreign allies. There are few signs he’s listening to international calls to stand down his troops. Dozens have died and many more have been wounded, the international airport was briefly shuttered after airstrikes, and Libya has again convulsed oil markets. Mohammed Eljarh, a cofounder of the Libya Outlook for Research and Consulting in Tobruk, a city at the heart of Haftar’s eastern fiefdom, isn’t a bit surprised. “Everything Haftar has done since 2014 has been to get to Tripoli,” he said. “It would have been naive on anyone’s part to think that he wasn’t going to Tripoli.” For Haftar, assuming control over the capital is more than a matter of pride. His previous advances left him holding most of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries state’s oil fields and terminals, but all the country’s key institutions are in the capital, including the central bank and the National Oil Corp., a source of funds that could propel his push for overall power. “Today we shake the ground under the oppressors. We hear your call, Tripoli. Now is the time for the Great Victory,” the strongman said in a speech as his army approached the capital. The choice of words, redolent of the Koranic phrase used to describe a victory by Muslim Prophet Mohammad who conquered Mecca after years of exile, was not lost on his audience. Haftar is variously said to have been born in Tarhouna, not far from Tripoli, or in the eastern city of Ajdabiya. He began his army career under King Idris before helping to oust the monarch and install a young military officer called Moammar
Al Qaddafi in 1969. He received training in the Soviet Union in the late 1970s, and led Qaddafi’s forces in an ill-fated mission in Chad as the two countries fought over a strip of territory rich in uranium and minerals, according to a 2014 profile. Along with scores of his soldiers, Haftar was captured as a prisoner of war in 1987 and apparently abandoned by Qaddafi. That spurred a fallout between the two men that lasted through his release and a two-decade exile in the US, much of it in Langley, Virginia, home to the Central Intelligence Agency. Claims by his opponents that Haftar was recruited as a spy haven’t been substantiated. He returned to Libya after the start of the NATO-backed uprising against Qaddafi in 2011 but remained a marginal figure in the revolution. In 2014, he spied what he believed was his chance to grab power. Qaddafi had been dead for three years and governance in Libya had disintegrated. There were two dueling administrations, one based in Tripoli in the west and the other in the eastern town of Bayda, with dozens of militias of various strengths controlling their own fiefdoms across the country. Appearing on television, Haftar announced a coup and called for an uprising against the Islamist-controlled parliament in far-off Tripoli. His attempt fell flat, prompting ridicule. So instead, Haftar amassed what forces he could find and launched his assault on Benghazi, the largest city in the east. Islamist militants had taken root in the city and the ageing commander vowed to oust them. Branding himself as a Libyan answer to field marshal-turned-President AbdelFattah El-Sisi in Egypt, he repeatedly oversimplified the country’s struggle as one between jihadist militants and nonIslamists rather than the more complex reality of a nation fractured politically and dotted with militias with competing loyalties and political agendas.
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Sunday, April 14, 2019
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MISSION: PHL ENVOYS&EXPATS AWARDS
UK, JICA RECOGNIZED FOR STI WORK IN PHL T HE Embassy of the United Kingdom (UK) in the Philippines and the Japan International Cooperation Agency (Jica) were recognized for their support to science, technology and innovation in the Philippines during the B usinessM irror ’s Mission: PHL Envoys&Expats Awards held at the SM Aura Premier in Taguig City on April 4. The UK Ambassador Daniel Pruce received the Embassy Science, Technology and Innovation Award, while Jica’s Senior Program Officer Kessy Reyes received the Development Aid Agency Partner for Science, Technology and Innovation Award. Their respective trophies were handed by Science Secretary Fortunato de la Peña. The UK Embassy was awarded in recognition of the UK government’s work with the Philippines on collaborative projects on science and technology, and the noteworthy contributions made to improve the lives and future of the Filipino people. Pruce said, “Science, technology and innovation play a crucial role in developing transformative solutions to address the concerns in health, environmental resilience, food security, and other challenges that affect the well-being of communities in the Philippines and the region.” He added: “Addressing these concerns is the main intent and ambition of the Newton Agham Programme, while also enabling deeper partnerships and collaboration among British and Filipino scientists and innovators.” Reyes, who received the award on behalf of Jica Philippines, said “Jica’s cooperation with the DOST through our Science and Technology Cooperation celebrates the win-win partnership between Japanese and Philippine research institutions in wide
THE team from Japan International Cooperation Agency received several Development Aid Agency Partner awards during the Mission: PHL Envoys&Expats Recognition Awards on April 4. They are (from left) Jica Philippines Senior Representative Kiyo Kawabuchi, Senior Program Officer Kessy Reyes (for Science, Technology and Innovation), Senior Program Officer Joan Salapare (for Trade and Investment), Chief Representative Yoshio Wada (Development Aid Partner of the Year), Section Chief Leah Peñarroyo (for Infrastructure Support) and Senior Program Officer Patrick San Juan (for Transportation Infrastructure). JICA PH0TO
areas, such as disaster management, marine and coastal protection, among others.” He acknowledged the DOST“for nominating us for this award,” the B usiness M irror for recognition and Jica’s “government partners for your continued trust and support to Jica.” Mission: PHL Envoys&Expats Awards was organized by the BusinessMirror to generate public understanding and appreciation for nations and development aid partners. It awarded several embassies, and bilateral and multilateral aid agencies in recognition of their contributions to the country’s economic growth, social progress, peace, security and stability through their partnerships with various government agencies.
BRITISH Ambassador Daniel Pruce (right) and Newton Agham Programme Strategic Manager Karen Hipol (left), receive the Science, Technology and Innovation Award from Science Secretary Fortunato de la Peña during the BusinessMirror’s Mission: PHL Envoys&Expats Awards. U.K. EMBASSY PH0TO
UK’s Newton Agham
THE UK government launched the Newton Fund in 2014, a £735-million fund to support science and innovation partnerships with a number of emerging knowledge economies. Locally known as the Newton Agham (Science) Programme, the UK government works collaboratively with the Department of Science and Technology (DOST), the Department of Agriculture and the Commission on Higher Education, to implement programs that strengthen science and innovation capacity. Philippine government partners provide co-funding and steer to the Philippine Newton activities.
The impact of one of the joint programs,
Newton Leaders in Innovation Fellowship (LIF), was also highlighted in an Impact Assessment report presentation and roundtable discussion held on April 4 in Pasay City. LIF provides focused training to Filipino researchers and technology transfer officers to promote entrepreneurship and help
translate their technology to benefit people and communities. Training is provided by UK and Philippine expert mentors to support the development of their various innovations aimed at addressing Philippine social and economic challenges, including promoting better health, food security and tackling water pollution. The report highlighted the impact on the Filipino innovator’s skills, the advancement of each individual-technology project, and the broader impacts on the entrepreneurship and innovation ecosystem in the Philippines. The LIF program is delivered by the UK Royal Academy of Engineering in partnership with the Philippine DOST and the Asian Institute of Management. The impact of the Newton projects will be further recognized through the Newton Prize 2019, a £1-million (P68 million) award which recognizes excellent science research and innovation in support of economic development and social welfare in Newton Fund partner countries. The Philippines, together with China and Indonesia, has been selected for the Newton Prize 2019. All current and past recipients of the Newton Grant may apply for a prize of between £50,000 and £200,000. The deadline for Part A applications is on April 19.
Jica in development cooperation
BESIDES its award for Science, Technology and Innovation, and the Development Aid Partner of the Year, Jica also received awards for being the Development Aid Agency in Trade and Investment; Infrastructure Support; and Transportation Infrastructure. In his acceptance speech for the Development Aid Partner of the Year Award,
Jica Chief Representative Yoshio Wada said, “What truly sets Jica’s development cooperation activities apart is how we also try to promote self-reliance among our partner countries like the Philippines by sharing Japanese know-how and expertise. Japan’s economic success as a nation did not happen overnight. We also learned from other nations, and adopted values and systems that could work in Japan. We are sharing the same with the Philippines and we are honored to work with our counterpart government agencies and local communities all these years. Jica is the executing agency of Japan’s Official Development Assistance (ODA) in the Philippines. Jica implements about 90 development cooperation projects nationwide anchored on three assistance pillars: achieving sustainable economic growth, overcoming vulnerability, and peace and development in Mindanao. Jica is one of the Philippines’s biggest development partners, with total commitment for ongoing ODA loan projects amounting to ¥897 billion. The Mission: PHL Awards recognized Jica and its projects as important contributors to economic growth, social progress, peace, security and stability. Jica has also provided many opportunities to Filipinos to further their learning and development through trainings or study opportunities in Japan. Its training program for young leaders benefited some 3,000 Filipinos over the years. “We truly value our relationship and friendship with the Philippines. We look forward to deepening our partnership with the Philippines in the years to come,” Wada added. Lyn Resurreccion
Faith A6 Sunday, April 14, 2019
Sunday
www.businessmirror.com.ph • Editor: Lyn Resurreccion
PALM SUNDAY OF THE LORD’S PASSION: ‘LUKE 22:14-23:56’
Love is paid back with love MSGR. JOSEFINO S. RAMIREZ SUNDAY GOSPEL IN OUR LIFE
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Holy Week in the Philippines
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Photos by Bernard Testa
ODAY starts the Holy Week, which is the reenactment of the Passion of Jesus Christ.
Palm Sunday, the entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem, is observed today in churches with the faithful waving their palm fronds as priests bless them with holy water. Other significant days of the week are Holy or Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Black Saturday and Easter Sunday. During the Holy Week, the Filipino faithful demonstrate their faith through traditional practices and colorful manner. From the start of the week, or even earlier, until the early morning of Good Friday, Filipino Catholics sing the book on the Passion of Christ in the pabasa. Holy Thursday is the observance of the Last Supper of Christ with his 12 apostles, where He also washes their feet. In parishes, this is done by priests among 12 selected parishioners. On this day, the Filipino faithful also go the rounds of churches for the Visita Iglesia. Good Friday is observed with the crucifixion, death and burial of Jesus Christ. Churches discuss Jesus’ Seven Last Words, which
are beamed in several TV and radio stations. The procession of the image of the dead Christ are also
held by parishes. Good Friday in the Philippines also has some penitents nailed on the cross in Pampanga province, while flagellants are observed in other areas. On Holy Saturday, the Sabbath on which Jesus rested in the grave, the faithful observe the Easter vigil in parishes. On Easter Sunday, besides the holding of the Mass, the salubong, or meeting of the Risen Jesus
Christ and his mother, the Virgin Mary, are seen in a tableau in front of the parish church. Other people take advantage of the week to take a rest or go out of town for their long-awaited rest and recreation. But many faithful observe the week in being closer to God by having confession, doing penance, reflecting on their faith, and doing good to others and to themselves. Lyn Resurreccion
ALM Sunday commemorates Jesus’ triumphal entry into the city of Jerusalem when He was publicly acclaimed by the crowds to be the promised Messiah. Yet it is ironic that a few days later, this same crowd, instigated by their leaders, would be clamoring for the blood of Christ and preferring a thief and murderer to Him. The Church, in her wisdom, makes us consider the events of the passion of Christ in today’s Gospel reading. Besides showing us the passing nature of human praise and glory, she also prepares us for the “holy three days” that will culminate in the real glory, the glory of the resurrection to a new life of grace. How will we spend Holy Week? Are we going merely to consider it as another vacation and spend the time playing mahjong or watching one movie after another? While there is nothing wrong with taking advantage of these days to rest a bit and also to engage in wholesome recreation, we should not lose this opportunity to consider more deeply the meaning of the salvific events in our life. The gospel narrates to us, in a straightforward and matter-offact manner, those bloody events that could perhaps have graced the pages of a story of terror. Yet it is not a question of simply getting awed at the sufferings Christ bore for us.
The Roman Catechism tells us that we should realize that Christ suffered all of that voluntarily. If someone were to endure suffering for our sake, but out of compulsion, we might be somehow grateful, but not very much. On the other hand, if He were to endure death freely and entirely for our sake, while having the power to avoid it, then we should feel a great debt of gratitude to that person. It would manifest that person’s great love for us, and it should move us to do whatever we can to reciprocate that person’s love. There is a Spanish proverb, Amor con amor se paga. Love is paid back with love. The passion of Christ is the great proof of God’s love for each one of us. All He wants is that we love Him in return. And Jesus said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” What a wonderful way of living up to the moral demands of the Christian life! To be honest, to be upright, to be humble, not to give vent to one’s passions or fury—but to love out of love, out of personal loyalty to that Man who suffered and gave His life for us. Through the passion, death and resurrection of Christ, we have been redeemed by Christ and saved from our sins. It is now a matter of corresponding to that salvific work, so that the redemption wrought by Christ can bear fruit in our lives.
Longinus and the holy spear By Corazon Damo-Santiago
‘J
ESUS cried out in a loud voice. Father into your hands I commend my spirit” (Luke 23:46). “The veil of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom” (Mark 15:38). “One soldier thrust his lance to His [Jesus’] side and immediately blood and water flowed out” (John 19:34). From this fifth wound, some drops of blood fell on the dim-sighted eyes of the Roman centurion. He could now see clearly and said, “Truly this man was the son of God” (Mark 15:39).
Soldier to saint
THE Roman centurion, one of the four soldiers tasked to oversee Jesus’ crucifixion, is Longinus, derived from the Greek word longche, or lance. The name Longinus is found in the Gospel of Nicodemus that was added as supplement to the apocryphal Acts of Pilate. The story of Longinus in the crucifixion is also in the Vulgate, the fourth-century Latin translation of the Bible, which became the official Latin version of the Catholic Church. According to tradition, Longinus is Cassius of Anxanum (Lanciano) Village, now Obruzzo of Central Southern Italy. He was born during the first century. A convert to Christianity, he left the army, was baptized by the apostles and took lessons of faith from them. He became a monk in Cappadocia. According to Catholic.org, he was arrested and severely tortured on the orders of the governor. His “teeth were forced out and his tongue cut off.” Miraculously he continued to talk clearly. The governor was blinded by demons from idols. His vision was restored when drops of blood came in contact with his eyes. The
blood was from Longinus, whom he tortured, then beheaded. In a fourth-century Letter of Herod to Pilate, cited by Bart Ehrman in Forged Writing in The Name of God, Longinus was punished for piercing Jesus. He was imprisoned in a cave where a lion was released every night to maul him until dawn. Every morning, however, his body “ healed back to normal,” a pattern that was repeated until he died. Longinus was significantly associated with the Sacred Heart of Jesus. He did not only witness Jesus’ sacrificial death for love of mankind. He was also a recipient of His forgiveness and gift of sight. His statue occupies a prominent spot in Saint Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. It stands in one of the four niches beneath the dome of the basilica. A fragment of the spear he thrushed on the side of Jesus is conserved too in the basilica, although the Catholic Church makes no claim of its authenticity. Relics are also kept in the Church of San Agustin in Rome, and in Mantua, Italy, where he died. He is the patron saint of the city. In Jerusalem, Saint Longinus is highly esteemed as a soldier. He is, however, venerated as martyr by the Eastern Orthodox Church with October 10 as his feast day. In the Armenian Apostolic Church, he is honored on October 22, while in the Roman Catholic Calendar of Saints, his feast day is celebrated on March 15. Damo-Santiago is a former regional director of the Department of Education National Capital Region. She is currently a faculty member of Mater Redemptoris Collegium in Calauan, Laguna, and of Mater Redemptoris College in San Jose City, Nueva Ecija.
Tourism&Entertainment BusinessMirror
Editor: Carla Mortel-Baricaua
Sunday, April 14, 2019
A7
Stations of the Cruise
WHEN THE SMOKE CLEARS AT KAWAH IJEN H
Story & photos by Bernard L. Supetran
OLY Week is a unique season the faithful and travel bugs look forward to because of the long holidays where they can do religious traditions, bond with the family, or hide off to a destination on the bucket list. The good thing is, there are scores of Holy Week festivities across the country which enable you to both observe the ageold holy days and explore the idyllic archipelago without the sense of hedonistic guilt.
KAWAH Ijen’s slope of orange and gray stood in stark contrast to the vivid greens of the forest on the opposite side.
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Story & photos by Celine Murillo
HE comfort of the night seemed to flee as we descended. Cloaked by fumes that burned eyes and throat, Ijen before dawn looked like a witch’s vat. Our feet did not reassure us. The ground, strewn with rocks, was deceitful: firm, one moment; unsteady, the next. But after a few more steps, I gained more confidence. What was ahead reeled me in. In the gloomy haze was a spark of cobalt. Blue fire. Wheezing through my gas mask, I elbowed my way through the crowd, following my husband who was setting up his camera. We were now face-to-face with the spewing vents. Kawah Ijen, like most volcanoes, has an abundant deposit of sulfur. These gasses are routed by ceramic pipes across a sloping mound. At the foot of this mound, the gasses condense and harden into the yelloworange slabs. The gasses may ooze along the way from tiny punctures in the pipes, igniting when it makes contact with the air, and setting off brilliant blue flames. This phenomenon draws in tourists from all over the globe, us included. The day of our visit, however, the sapphire flames were diffident. There were only sputterings, blankets of smoke and the stench
A SULFUR miner taking stock of his day’s haul
IN the early morn, the sulfur vents spurt blue flames.
of brimstone, and the crowd’s commotion. I was disappointed. We came all the way for the famed electric blue flames only to be met with brief lashes of purple-blues, swallowed by the fumes almost as quickly as they light up. Almost as soon as I felt this, I chided myself. This was the risk that comes with wanting to experience natural phenomena. It’s all timing and luck. I shouldn’t take it personally. When dawn finally came, I was ready to leave, but our Indo travel guides ushered us farther right. And did I speak too soon. The early light came and revealed another aspect of Ijen. In all of its brightness, the crater’s landscape transformed right before my eyes. Just beside the sulfur vents, away from the throng of tourists and sulfur miners, was a lake. Calm and impossibly turquoise, the water glistened under a wispy veil. Jagged peaks bordered it. Smokes billowed, hovering on its surface. This was the largest acidic lake in the world. Just a drop of the
THE beautiful landscape leads to the ‘Devil’s Gold.’
lake’s water is enough to leave you with burns. The methane that had gathered beneath it also drives it into unpredictable geyser-like eruptions. Compared to the ever belching sulfur vents, the lake looked innocuous, but it was turning out to be as devious as the rest of the landscape. The trip to Bromo, and the takeaways from it, suddenly sprung into my consciousness, and our circumstance now only strengthened my point: Nature toys with us all. But it was one thing venturing into the crater for thrills, to go there daily to toil was another matter. Ijen yields a daily supply of about 14 tons of sulfur, exported across Asia for use in the production of rubber, sugar and cosmetics, among others. This lode is harvested by some 300 miners. Sulfur miners typically submit themselves to hazardous conditions six hours a day, five days a week. They start before midnight, when the toxic gasses are most tolerable, walking two hours across a steep road, and another half down the crater. Using metal rods, they hack the hardened sulfur that accumulated below the vents off the crater floor. They then stow the harvested slabs in a pair of wicker baskets attached to a beam of wood. Hauling this contraption across their backs, which could weigh between 70 to 100 kilograms when full, almost double their own weight, the miners trudge back up the way they came. Some have taxis, makeshift trolleys, waiting at the crater’s rim, making the rest of the descent slightly less difficult. But mostly, they still have to continue carrying the load manually. The closest thing to safety equipment these miners have is a wet towel, which they stuff in their mouths in an attempt to filter out the noxious fumes. The miners’ rotten teeth, leathery skin and rattling breaths are obvious reasons they need more than just a soggy rag. Not that they don’t have access to gas masks. On our trip to Ijen, one of our guides informed us that some tourists donate their masks to the miners. But the miners still choose to go without it, renting out the protective gear to other guests instead. Moreover, the masks are
considered hindrances. And in a treacherous workplace such as Ijen, one needs to be as unencumbered as one can get. Pay for hewing “Devil’s Gold” is considered good if you take into account the low cost of living in the area. A miner earns approximately $12 a day, more than some entrylevel office posts in the Philippines, but the risks are decidedly disproportionate. The backbreaking nature of their work had made miners “marked” men. As a tourist, I could easily spot them. Even our two guides showed telltale signs, I wasn’t surprised when they shared they were also miners. One of them had obvious bowed legs, bent from years of hauling heavy loads—it showed even in his branded hiking pants. Mid-sentence, both would suddenly burst into a barrage of dry coughing. I bet there are matching deep grooves on their backs where the wooden beam would fit perfectly. Like any traveler, I pondered about the workers’ conditions. I brooded upon them on the way back up the crater. It all seemed like a glaring form of injustice and, surely, something can be done. But as we reached the caldera’s rim, thoughts of contemporary ills slinked away from my mind. Like any traveler, I knew that worldly problems, however dire and right-in-the-face, were ultimately no match for the sublime. And here, on this spot, was transcendence. In the near-noon sun, Ijen came alive. The terrain looked alien, but marvelous. A cloven slope of orange and gray stood in stark contrast with the vivid greens of the forest on the opposite side. A ridge marched endlessly. The people looking more like soldiers, ants. Below, the crater tried to cover itself with its own miasma, but the patch of milky blue of the lake brazenly cut through the smog. I knew that behind that smoke, men were toiling, deliberately and repeatedly putting themselves in harm’s way. An act of defiance. A contest we all—them included— know we’ll always be on the losing side. We are stubborn that way.
Panaad. Loosely meaning “promise” in the Visayan language, this is a penance ritual for Catholics where they walk around the 64-kilometer road of this island-province of Camiguin. Getting there is a pilgrimage in itself with the multimodal mode of transportation involved. The most popular and least expensive manner is to fly to Cagayan de Oro City airport, take a bus or van to Balingoan port for a one-hour boat ride to Benoni port in Camiguin. From there, there are vans and jeeps bound for the capital town of Mambajao. Another way is to fly to Bohol, take a bus to Jagna port for a three-hour boat ride to Mambajao. The most convenient but costliest way is to take a flight from Cebu. Some 30,000 devotees set off before sunset on Maundy Thursday from Mambajao, and complete the penitential walk within 24 hours, making stops for prayer and personal needs. Devotees sleep at homestays where residents offer their homes for overnight stays for free or a minimal fee, while others put up makeshift sleeping quarters along the way. The sojourn culminates at the Stations of the Cross at the Vulcan Daan or “old volcano” which can be reached through a walkway of about 1,000 steps and pilgrims get to pause every few minutes for prayers at each of the 15 stations with life-size tableaus of the passion of Christ. Townsfolk have decided to add the 15th station, the resurrection of Jesus, to emphasize His victory over death. Along the slopes of the extinct volcano, you will be rewarded by the breathtaking vista of the sea, mountains and the giant cross of the Sunken Cemetery. Mount Vulcan erupted in 1871 and submerged the old town proper of Catarman, leaving behind ruins of a church and a belfry known as the Old Church Ruins, declared a National Cultural Treasure by the National Museum last year. After fulfilling the religious obligations, pilgrims cool off in the must-see attractions on Black Saturday, such as Ardent Hot Springs, Santo Niño Cold Springs, Taguines Lagoon, Soda Water Park, White Island Sandbar, and the waterfalls of Katibawasan, Tuasan and Binangawan. Camiguin Nightscapes in Mambajao is an alternative site for prayer vigils as the faithful anticipates Easter. Located at the Mount Timpoong-Hibok Hibok Natural Monument, it was declared a Natural Heritage Site of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations Centre for Biodiversity. Masked Romans. A most iconic image in the olden days is the moryon, a devotee in Marinduque dressed in the full-regalia of the Roman soldiers who crucified Jesus. Akin to an ancient version of a “cosplay” (costume play), this tradition has become known as the Moriones Festival, which has various versions in the town of Mogpog, Santa Cruz, Gasan and Boac, where the outfit is said to be
SUNKEN Cemetery
the most pompous. Far from just being a tourist spectacle, masked men who play the part consider it a religious devotion which they do with reverence, especially if they are playing the role of Longinus, the centurion who commanded the troops who carried out the crucifixion. According to legend, he was blind in one eye and was miraculously able to see after he got sprinkled by the blood of Christ when he speared Him as He was hanging on the cross. Longinus became a believer of Jesus as God’s Son, reason for him to be hunted and beheaded by his Roman comrades in arms in a ritual called Pugutan, the highlight of the event which takes place on Easter Sunday. Due to the migration of Marinduqueños to neighboring provinces, Moriones has evolved into the Centurion Festival of Pinamalayan, Oriental Mindoro, and General Luna, Quezon, each with a unique version in retelling the myth.
Pagtaltal. An enduring tradition in every nook in the country is the cenaculo or dramatization of Christ’s last few hours. In Guimaras province, they have infused splendid theater production values inspired by Germany’s epic Oberrammergau Passion Play to take it to the next level and called it Pagtaltal. The presentation begins on Good Friday at the Smallest Plaza in Jordan, and moves around key spots in the town, and concludes at the Balaan Bukid or “holy mountain” for the crucifixion scene. Along the climb is the Stations of the Cross, and on its summit is the Chapel of Ave Maria Purisima and a big white cross with a sweeping panorama of Guimaras and Iloilo. Prusisyon. While the Good Friday nighttime procession is a common sight even in cities, there are certain areas where the ritual seems to be more interesting than the others because of the many number of carroza or tableaus on wheels being taken out to the streets. History buffs and culture vultures can have a visual feast at the century-old carroza in Malolos, Bulakan and Baliuag in Bulacan, and the heritage cities of Vigan, Ilocos Sur and Carcar, Cebu, being taken around the población where old churches, ancestral houses and colonial-era monuments still proudly stand. Intramuros is another heady place to witness a prusisyon as antique carriages stored at San Agustin Church and Manila Cathedral are toured around the Walled City.
ANTIQUE carroza in Malolos, Bulacan
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A8 Sunday, April 14, 2019
Sports BusinessMirror
Editor: Jun Lomibao | mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph
FRANCE’S Clemence Calvin reacts as she addresses reporters during a media conference in Paris. AP
French marathoner Calvin suspended in doping case
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‘YOU CAN’T RUN AWAY FROM YOUR GENETICS!’
DAVE MCGILLIVRAY, race director of the Boston Marathon, runs past fans inside Fenway Park as he commemorates the last leg of his 80-day run in 1978 to benefit the Jimmy Fund, before a baseball game in Boston in August 2018. AP
By William J. Kole
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The Associated Press
OSTON—It was the death heard ‘round the running world. In July 1984, acclaimed author and running guru Jim Fixx died of a heart attack while trotting along a country road in Vermont. Overnight, a nascent global
movement of asphalt athletes got a gut check: Just because you run marathons doesn’t mean you’re safe from heart problems. Fast-forward 35 years, and Boston Marathon race director Dave McGillivray is amplifying that message for marathoners, especially those who have coronary artery disease or a family history of it. “Being fit and being healthy aren’t the same things,” McGillivray says.
He should know. Six months ago, the lifelong competitor underwent open-heart triple bypass surgery after suffering chest pain and shortness of breath while running. As marathons, ultramarathons, megamile trail races and swim-bike-run triathlons continue to explode in popularity, doctors are re-prescribing some long-standing advice: Get a checkup first and talk with your primary care
ARIS—European marathon silver medalist Clemence Calvin was provisionally suspended by the French anti-doping agency on Wednesday for allegedly obstructing a doping test last month in Morocco. Calvin denies any wrongdoing and claims she was brutalized by testers who pretended to be police officers when she was briefly stopped in the city of Marrakech on March 27. Calvin, who did not get tested after the altercation, has filed a lawsuit in Morocco against the testers for violence and threats. The French anti-doping agency’s secretary-general, Mathieu Teoran, denied Calvin’s allegations that the agents were violent and did not identify themselves as sample collectors. Calvin was in Morocco with her husband—the athlete Samir Dahmani—to train for this Sunday’s Paris Marathon. Her lawyers said they will ask the Council of State—France’s highest administrative court—for an urgent ruling to have the ban lifted. “It’s been 12 years that I have been a top-level athlete,” Calvin said during the news conference. “I never had any problem with the AFLD. What I went through on March 27 was everything but a test. It was very violent.” The 28-year-old athlete, who finished second in the marathon at the 2018 European championships in Berlin, said she had just retrieved her son at the kindergarten when the incident happened. “We had a walk in the neighborhood, my husband went to buy a cake for my son’s birthday,” she said. “I was in the street, playing with kids. Some people arrived and took me by the arm, saying: ‘French police, where is Dahmani?’” According to Calvin, she led them to Dahmani and one of the three persons hit her on the arm as she was handing her 2-year-old child over to her husband. “My little one fell on the floor and started to cry,” she said. “My husband started to argue with these people while I stepped back.”
physician or cardiologist about the risks and benefits before hitting the road. For McGillivray, 64, the writing was on his artery walls. Both of his grandfathers died of heart attacks; his father had multiple bypasses; his siblings have had heart surgery; and a brother recently suffered a stroke. Neither McGillivray’s marathon personal best of two hours, 29 minutes and 58 seconds, nor his decades of involvement in the sport could protect him. “I honestly thought that through exercise, cholesterol-lowering medicine, good sleep and the right diet, I’d be fine,” he says. “But you can’t run away from your genetics.” Aerobic exercise such as running, brisk walking, cycling and swimming is known to reduce the risk of heart disease, high blood pressure, stroke and certain types of cancer, and it’s been a key way to fight obesity, Type 2 diabetes, osteoporosis and more. Studies have shown those who exercise regularly are more likely to survive a heart attack and recover more quickly than couch potatoes. But new research is providing a more nuanced look at “extreme exercise” and the pros and cons of running long. In a study published in December in Circulation, the journal of the American Heart Association, researchers in Spain found signs suggesting that full marathons like Boston may strain the heart. They measured substances that can signal stress and found higher levels in runners who covered the classic 26.2-mile (42.2-kilometer) marathon distance compared with those who raced shorter
Calvin said the family then went to a pharmacy to have their son checked and went back to their place around midnight after dinner. She insisted that the people who stopped her in the street never identified themselves as testers. Lawyer Arnaud Pericard said Calvin—in addition to the obstruction that led to her provisional suspension—was also notified by the AFLD of a “no-show” for missing a doping test at her place after 8 p.m. the same day. Pericard said he has gathered testimonies from Calvin’s neighbors in Marrakech that people presenting themselves as French police officers knocked on their doors in the evening as they tried to locate the couple. Under the whereabouts rules, athletes must make themselves available for out-of-competition testing for one hour every day and face suspensions if they miss three tests over a period of 12 months. International Alliance of Athletics Federations (IAAF) President Sebastian Coe, meanwhile, has been cleared of misleading British lawmakers about his knowledge of a Russian doping scandal. The IAAF’s ethics board says it closed the investigation because no evidence showed “any realistic prospect that any disciplinary case could be established.” The case centered on how much Coe knew in 2014 when an athletics official e-mailed him about a formal complaint filed by marathon runner Liliya Shobukhova. Shobukhova was extorted by IAAF and Russian athletics officials to cover up her doping. A British parliamentary panel that questioned Coe reported last year “it stretches credibility” he was unaware of the detailed allegations. Coe’s claim his personal assistant read out his e-mail and forwarded it to IAAF investigators without him seeing attached details was supported by the track body’s independent inquiry. AP
distances such as a half-marathon or 10K. Only about one in 50,000 marathoners suffers cardiac arrest, the researchers said, but a high proportion of all exercise-induced cardiac events occur during marathons—especially in men ages 35 and older. The Boston Marathon and other major races place defibrillators along the course. “We typically assume that marathon runners are healthy individuals, without risk factors that might predispose them to a cardiac event during or after a race,” writes Dr. Juan del Coso, the study’s lead investigator, who runs the exercise physiology lab at Madrid’s Camilo José Cela University. Running shorter distances, he says, might reduce the strain, especially in runners who haven’t trained appropriately. Dr. Kevin Harris, a cardiologist at the Minneapolis Heart Institute at Abbott Northwestern Hospital, says he had a patient preparing for the Twin Cities Marathon who struggled to exceed 10 miles (16 kilometers) in training. The man’s family doctor insisted he get a stress test, and he wound up needing double bypass surgery to detour around dangerous blockages in his arteries. “Running is good, and we want people to be active. But your running doesn’t make you invincible,” Harris says. “The bottom line is that individuals with a family history—especially men who are older than 40 and those people who have symptoms they’re concerned about—should have an informed decision with their health-care provider before they run a marathon.” That family history is crucial. Fixx, whose 1977 best-seller The Complete Book of Running helped ignite America’s running boom, was 52 when he collapsed and died. An
autopsy showed he had blockages in two of his heart arteries. He had a mix of risk factors. His father died at 43 of a heart attack, and although Fixx quit smoking, changed his eating habits and dropped 60 pounds, it turned out he couldn’t outrun those risks. Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg’s late husband, tech entrepreneur Dave Goldberg, was 47 when he died while the couple was vacationing in Mexico in 2015. Goldberg had been running on a treadmill when he fell, and an autopsy revealed he had undiagnosed heart disease. Former US House Speaker Paul Ryan, who is 49, has said his own strong family history of heart disease is what motivates him to work out regularly and watch his diet. His father, grandfather and great-grandfather all died of heart attacks in their 50s. “If you’re going to take on strenuous exercise later in life, and especially if you have active heart disease, it’s clearly in your interest to be tested and make sure you can handle it,” says Dr. William Roberts, a fellow and past president of the American College of Sports Medicine. McGillivray says his doctor has cleared him for Monday’s 123rd running of the Boston Marathon, which he’ll run at night after the iconic race he supervises is in the books. It will be his 47th consecutive Boston, and this time, he’s trying to raise $100,000 for a foundation established in memory of a little boy who died of cardiomyopathy—an enlarging and thickening of the heart muscle. “Heartbreak Hill will have special meaning this year,” McGillivray says. “My new mission is to create awareness: If you feel something, do something,” he says. “You have to act. You might not get a second chance.”
Japan Olympic minister resigns over disaster gaffe
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OKYO—Japan’s Olympic minister resigned on Wednesday after making remarks deemed offensive to the people affected by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami, a gaffe that had questioned his credentials. Yoshitaka Sakurada said he submitted his resignation to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. He said he made comments that hurt the feelings those in the disaster-hit areas, and just retracting them would not be enough. Sakurada, at a party earlier on Wednesday for Hinako Takahashi—a ruling lawmaker from Iwate, one of the prefectures severely hit by the disaster—said Takahashi is more important than reconstruction. Sakurada was in charge of the 2020 Games, whose main theme is to promote reconstruction of the disaster-struck region. Abe was quick in his damage control. Soon after accepting Sakurada’s resignation, he apologized for the minister’s remark to the people in the disaster-hit region, reassuring them that his government has an unshakable policy to do the utmost for reconstruction while staying close to the
feelings of the people affected. “As prime minister, I offer an apology to everyone in the disaster-hit areas,” Abe said. “I have a responsibility for having appointed him.” Former Olympic minister Shunichi Suzuki is
expected to return to the post to replace Sakrada, Japanese media reports said. Sakurada joined Abe’s Cabinet as part of its reshuffle last year, quickly making a reputation as a gaffe-prone minister. AP
NO PHOTOS Minnesota Timberwolves center Karl-Anthony Towns wears a pair of
Air Jordan shoes with a message as he joins a huddle during a timeout in the second half of his team’s National Basketball Association game against the Denver Nuggets recently in Denver. The Nuggets won, 99-95. AP
RUSLAN KARAZBAYEV | DREAMSTIME.COM
Century-old movement banks on young blood to take cooperatives into new era By Rizal Raoul Reyes
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S a 100-year-old movement still relevant? “Cooperactivists,” or those who advocate for cooperatives, think so. They believe today’s public is just unaware of the benefits of cooperatives. Co-ops are, in fact, the biggest contributor in the communities they serve and oftentimes even earn more than their corporate counterparts, according to One Cooperative Insurance System of the Philippines (1CISP) President Roy S. Miclat. Cooperatives have some of the most competitive compensation and benefit schemes in the industry, he added. “The challenge is how to communicate these to encourage everyone to support cooperatives,” Miclat said. “Our aim for 2019 and beyond is to elevate cooperatives and make them known for what they really are—an important pillar in economic and social development.” Miclat and his colleagues believe the one important step is to attract young people to participate in the movement that began in Los Baños, Laguna, when the first cooperative was established in 1908.
1 COOPERATIVE Insurance System of the Philippines Life and General Insurance President and CEO Roy S. Miclat (left) speaks during a news conference for the launch of the 1Koop Leaders Academy, a nationwide training program for young cooperative professionals, held in partnership with Asia Select Inc. Asia Select President and CEO Gilbert Camasura (right) said the program also aims to “tech up” knowledge and skills of young people in cooperatives so they can become effective and principlecentered leaders. The program will have expert HR and marketing professionals as trainers and special lecturers. PHOTO COURTESY OF 1CISP
Lower attrition
Bed of roses
1CISP human resource (HR) head Jackelyn Podiotan-Ballena believes the first step to getting younger people to work with cooperatives is to hire them. “Our problem is getting people into cooperatives [like] 1CISP. Once they are inside, we had a very low attrition rate. Actually, our attrition rate for the last two years was quite low. The real causes of the recent resignations were one got engaged and the other one had to resign when he got married to a former colleague,” she said. To entice the youth to join 1CISP, Podiotan-Ballena said they are offering a competitive package. For an entry-level position, 1CISP offers a monthly salary way above the current minimum of P15,360. “We are getting to the P25,000 level, otherwise known as the living wage based on the current economic conditions in the country,” she said. “We’re trying to serve a different standard with cooperatives. When you say cooperatives, we want to erase the usual notion that it is a place for people who have not crafted their career path.” Podiotan-Ballena, 34, a graduate of University of the Philippines-Diliman, is a testament to that. She started as a training assistant but was promoted as head of HR in a span of three months. Furthermore, she also held a simultaneous job of handling the claims department for three years. She was promoted last year as vice president for operations.
PODIOTAN-BALLENA said her work in 1CISP was not a bed of roses. However, she adopted a positive attitude as she wanted to learn the foundations of operations. “My background as sales and insurance in [an insurance firm] was a big help in understanding the job,” she said. Podiotan-Ballena admitted that she did not have any knowledge on 1CISP until the day she was hired. When she was appointed to head the HR department, her immediate task was to transform the organization by engaging the employees to ensure they will work on longer terms for 1CISP. “We want to stay committed to the organization. For the past year, we had a low attrition rate compared to other big organizations.” Podiotan-Ballena said people she interacted with during external training sessions were surprised with the compensation offered by 1CISP. The company also offers travel opportunities such as team-building sessions in different countries. The recent team-building session was held in Hong Kong. She said the company provided her the opportunity to travel to Japan and the United Kingdom for training. To attract a bigger number of applicants from Generations Y and Z, Podiotan-Ballena believes a rebranding is needed to transform 1CISP into an employer of choice.
Repackaging, rebranding MICLAT shares Podiotan-Ballena’s view and
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emphasized that the country’s cooperative movement needs young blood to transform it into a more vibrant movement and become a catalyst in economic development. First, there is a need to pursue wide awareness to entice the millennials and Generation Z to join the movement and promote it as a place that can provide them career opportunities, new challenges, technology-friendly environment, sense of purpose and a youthful environment, he said. “Adults often say to the youth there is no future in cooperatives, which is not true at all,” Miclat said in a press briefing during the recently held HR Summit in Quezon City. The movement also needs young blood to take over the leadership mantle, which has lost major stalwarts, Miclat said, citing the late Horacio “Boy” Morales Jr. as an example. Morales was a former technocrat of the Marcos administration who defected to the underground movement during martial law. After he was released from detention in 1986, he led the Philippine Rural Reconstruction Movement and the Cooperative Foundation of the Philippines Inc. He served as secretary of the Department of Agrarian Reform under the Estrada presidency. Although cooperatives in the Philippines have been overachieving in terms of operational and financial performances, Miclat admitted that cooperatives are not popular choices for employment, particularly among the younger generation of graduates. He believes local cooperatives need to enhance and overhaul their HR development APRIL 14, 2019
programs to ensure the entry of skilled and passionate leaders in the cooperatives. “HR needs to focus on people who will stay with you,” Miclat explained. “It also has to embrace new technologies to remain dynamic in the fast-changing times.”
Going strong MICLAT believes cooperatives can be a major catalyst in economic development. To achieve this, however, he said they have to contribute about 10 percent to 15 percent to the country’s GDP. At present, the cooperatives’ share to the GDP is 2.1 percent. “In a five-year plan, we aim to contribute 5 to 8 percent to the GDP,” he said. “We need to strengthen our organization and be more competitive to get recognized.” “1CISP, in comparison to corporate insurance counterparts, is growing at a remarkable rate, and believe it or not, this is not an isolated phenomenon. It is a lot more common than previously thought, with a precedent since 2007,” Miclat said citing the International Cooperative and Mutual Insurance Federation’s 2018 rankings and industry trends. He added there’s also a need to adapt in an ever-changing technological environment. “Disruption in technology is happening in an unprecedented rate and if cooperatives [do] not adapt, they will [go] extinct,” he added. Miclat believes getting young people into cooperatives would help the movement avert this extinction.
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Earth Day Jam
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APRIL 14, 2019 | soundstrip.businessmirror@gmail.com
MUS
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TILL going strong after almost two decades, this year’s Earth Day Jam is set to unfold on April 26, as the annual environmental summer concert will adapt wildlife species protection as its main campaign theme.
LOU BONNEVIE
Earth Day Jam 2019 will take a “leap back” to its original Tomas Morato, Quezon City concert venue for this year’s campaign. It is a special treat to fans who followed Earth Day Jam when it first started in 2000. The “wildlife” theme essentially emphasizes on living species, their natural habitat, and efforts to protect them from the real threat of extinction. It also serves as a fitting prelude to Earth Day Jam’s 20th anniversary in 2020. “This year, the Earth Day Jam will be in-sync with the international theme of protecting the species. We chose to adapt such by focusing on the Philippines’s wildlife. It is a shift from Earth Day Jam’s ‘Save Mother Earth’ campaign that has been adopted in previous summer events,” clarified Earth Day Jam Foundation Founder and Chairman Lou Bonnevie. Earth Day Jam 2019, the annual summer outdoor concert for Mother Earth, is expected to
NOEL CABANGON
play a significant role in informing, educating and campaigning toward wildlife species protection and preservation. According to organizers, Earth Day Jam’s following has grown to more than 200,000 in the last three years, with them trailing Earth Day campaigns leading to the April 26th concert day. “Apart from tackling the international theme of protecting the species, we will also be tackling other crucial environmental issues on water, clean air and energy, solid waste management and other best environmental practices. We have invited resource speakers from the Pasig River Rehabilitation Commission, Earth Day Network Phils., Foundation For The Philippine Environment, Forest Foundation of the Phils. and Winner Foundation. We also have young poets who will deliver inspired pieces on this year’s Earth Day theme,” added Bonnevie. She went on to say, “Overall, the message we want share with
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019: MEANINGFUL
R THE ENVIRONMENT Kartunistas ng Pilipinas. We have so many activities for visitors. And everyone can learn so much more about the state of our environment. It will be a great experience for kids before they join the evening’s nonstop live concert which will feature some of the best OPM bands and sing-
KJWAN
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our very young audience is diverse, yet presented in a very interesting manner through activities such as games and Q-and-A segments, so we can relate to everyone.” Furthermore, the general public has a chance to get VIP passes by availing of the event T-shirt by registering at the web site of Earth Day Jam Foundation. It will also be on sale at the Earth Day Jam booths during the performance. Free water will be given to those who will purchase tumblers and other merchandising products by the foundation.
Star-studded gig
CONCERT attendees will have a field day enjoying best live performances from some of biggest A-list Philippine music artists. Joining this year’s roster of live performing bands and singers include ABRA, Autotelic, Chicosci, Gracenote, Itchy Worms, Kjwan,Mayonnaise, Moonstar88, Noel Cabangon, Nyoy Volante, PI Jazzfest, Rouge, Sandwich, Tanya Markova, The Joyrides and Bonn-
evie herself. Apart from regular speaker intervals, Earth Day Jam 2019 will feature surprise celebrity guests on concert day.
Interactive education
EARTH Day Jam 2019 will be a full-day event, according to organizers. For early birds, it will feature display booths from participating organizations, where concertgoers can check out and sign-in to various environmental activities and campaigns that are sure to suit everyone’s passion. Earth Day Jam’s Recyclable Trading Fair will also be open to the public to collect empty pet bottles. Every kilo will be traded for a free water jug. The Environmental Protection Management Bureau of the Quezon City local government unit will spearhead the activity. Bonnevie pitched for everyone to come over to the meaningful musical event for the environment: “We will have an afternoon interactive art session spearheaded by the
ers who will play their hearts out for Mother Earth.”
Partners for the ‘Jam’
EARTH Day Jam 2019 would not be Continued on page 6
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APRIL 14, 2019 | soundstrip.businessmirror@gmail.com
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Rising star sings from the heart by Rick Olivares
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HEN 24-year old JR Custodio takes the SM Skydome stage this coming April 26 as one of the opening acts for ‘80s pop crooner Dingdong Avanzado, his set will mean so much to his family in more ways than one... “I grew up in Gapan, Nueva Ecija listening to a lot of OPM, Dingdong included,” smiled Custodio. “I was a fan. My mom, Nancy, had [a] crush on him. So medyo surreal to be performing with an OPM legend.” Despite belonging to the millennial bracket, Custodio has “an old soul.”
The up-and-coming balladeer’s home was filled with films and music, as his parents played records and cassettes of Filipino artists, but also those of classic stars: from Frank Sinatra to Billy Joel, as well as Barry Manilow. “That is why the classics have become part of my repertoire. I sing them not only because they are good songs, but I also [perform] for my parents; [old songs] mean so much to them.” When Custodio—third of four children—was barely out of his teens, he became the breadwinner for his family, as patriarch Herminio was struck down by a heart problem. Everything that the young star earns goes to his family.
PHL to witness world-class ballet
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ORLD-renowned Moscow ballet La Classique, with Bolshoi ballet stars Nina Kaptsova and Alexander Volchkov, are in town accompanied by the Russian Symphony Orchestra for a resident show at the New Frontier Theater in Araneta Center, Quezon
City from June 14 to 22. La Classique will stage Swan Lake, a story of romance, betrayal and redemption regarded as the ultimate fairy-tale ballet. Tickets are now available at www.ticketnet.com.ph and all TicketNet outlets.
“Ganyan talaga. We take care of each other. Kaya nabigay itong talent [is for me] to perform, so I can help my parents,” said JR. Custodio was discovered in 2011 by the late German Moreno during a talent search in Cabanatuan. Moreno had him perform during intermission numbers for his shows on television, and that opened doors for musicales and film. He was the lead actor in the indie film Rendevouz with Gina Parreño, and also starred in Reflection by director Marvin Gabas, as well as Tres by director Carlo Alvares. Come the April 26 show, dubbed as “D’80s,” Custodio will also perform his debut single “Sabihin Mo Na,” among others. Though written by composers Arnie
Mendaros and Albert Tamayo,the lyrics all come from a personal experience about being suddenly cast out of one’s life. D’80s will feature rising indie ukulele rock band Esremborak, X-Factor UK contestant Maria Laroco, and Avanzado. “Maganda yung line-up for the evening,” noted Custodio of the roster of artists. “I hope to not only sing my best, but I hope the fans will also support the other artists.” He revealed his inspiration for that night: “While I am also doing a lot of freelance film [actiing] and commercial modeling, singing is what’s really close to my heart because of who I am, where I came from, and who I am supporting. And I will let the Skydome crowd know that when I sing from my heart, that is also for my father.”
Earth Day...
Manila Development Authority, Dept. of Public Works and Highways, Barangay South Triangle, Hive Hotel, Hop Inn, Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp., MiniStop, ChopChop Chicken, David’s Salon, 83k, BusinessMirror, MYX and ABS-CBN. For more info, check out the Facebook event page of Earth Day Jam Foundation or visit www.earthdayjamfoundation.com.
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possible without the Earth Day Jam Foundation’s long-term partners led by the Quezon City government through the Office of Vice Mayor Josefina “Joy” Belmonte, Dept. of Environment and Natural Resources, First Gen Corporation, Maynilad, PRRC, Tagbalay Foundation, Lifebank Foundation, Philippine Information Agency, Metro
Plants are the new pets as millennials rekindle demand for ferns A Before she knew it, Richardson was hooked. She now has about 30 plants— minus one that her cat ate—and follows dozens of plant-focused Instagram feeds. How much does she spend? “I don’t want to think about it,” she says. American millennials have been accused of dooming all sorts of things: beer, golf, cereal. But the cohort is credited with reviving the once-moribund market for houseplants. In the past three years, US sales have surged almost 50 percent to $1.7 billion, according to the National Gardening Association. With many millennials delaying parenthood, plants have become the new pets, fulfilling a desire to connect to nature and the blossoming “wellness” movement. For a group that embraces experiences and travel, moreover, plants give Gen Yers something to care for that won’t die—or soil the rug—when they’re not around. Most plants are still purchased at garden centers or big-box retailers like Home Depot and Walmart, which mainly carry inexpensive, hardy varieties tailored to novice buyers. But a host of upstarts are targeting millennials with strategies straight from the playbooks of Warby Parker and Glossier. The Sill, for example, sells most of its plants online and offers care advice, free returns and the newbie-friendly slogan: “Can’t Kill It. Just Try.” Small brick-andmortar plant shops with names like Tend, Tula and Soft Opening are also proliferating in Brooklyn and other hip precincts. “We are talking about an antiquated industry that hasn’t changed and a consumer that has,” says Eliza Blank, The Sill’s 33-year-old founder. “Millennials don’t want to go to Walmart to buy their plants.”
Growing business CULTIVATING indoor plants dates back to the ancient Chinese and the famed Hanging Gardens of Babylon. The development of home heating systems in the 1800s made growing indoors much easier, and the Kentia palm, a favorite of Queen Victoria’s, became the must-have plant to own. The houseplant business boomed in the 1970s, when hippies snapped up spider plants and crafted macrame hangers for them. Then sales wilted as a minimalist,
KATARZYNA BIALASIEWICZ PHOTOGRAPHEE.EU
ISHA RICHARDSON, a 34-yearold designer living in Brooklyn’s Bushwick neighborhood, started buying plants a few years ago to relieve job stress.
IKEA-inspired ethos took hold. Today, in the Age of Instagram, the Swiss-cheese-leafed monstera deliciosa and trendy fiddle-leaf fig have become such objects of affection among millennials, they’re half-jokingly considered children and given names. “I know what people who buy plants feel like,” says Darryl Cheng, whose House Plant Journal on Instagram has gained a following (and a book deal) by reassuring skittish owners that not every plant will look perfect and to accept whatever surprises Mother Nature throws their way. A Toronto native whose time-lapse video of his snake plant growing over 80 days has garnered more than two million views, Cheng has answered thousands of questions on plant care. Another popular hashtag, #plants ofinstagram, boasts as many posts—2.7 million—as one for the New York Yankees.
Social media SOCIAL media has fueled the current craze, sending buyers to e-commerce sites like Etsy Inc., better known for handcrafted items, and EBay Inc. Even Amazon.com Inc. jumped in last year with a dedicated site for plants. Instagram could be next, as it recently added a shopping feature to its app. Searches on Etsy for “live plants” increased 82 percent year over year. The supply chain for live plants hasn’t changed much in the last half-century, and the industry is ripe for disruption. Growers, mostly based in Florida with operations throughout Latin America, work with a vast network of wholesalers, brokers and retailers. They have no direct contact with consumers (some don’t even own a cell phone). As a result, it’s hard for them to detect new trends, and when word does trickle down about a hot new plant, it can take several years before it’s readily available.
Plant hunters
SOME of the most sought-after plants are
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difficult to grow commercially, like the variegated monstera, a mutation whose leaves are a blend of green and ghostly white. Some big growers like Costa Farms, whose plants are found everywhere from Amazon to Walmart, employ “plant hunters” who scour far-flung locales like Tanzania to find new varieties. But growers simply can’t chase every new plant fad that pops up on Instagram, breeding frustration among sellers. “It’s hard to convince a grower to do something new,” says Kay Kim, co-founder of Rooted, a plant company based in Brooklyn’s Greenpoint neighborhood. “It’s a chicken-and-egg problem.”
Monstera deliciosa WHEN a trend ignites, demand can quickly outstrip supply, pushing up prices. Variegated monsteras can go for $200 on Etsy (if you can find one); monstera deliciosa seeds, meanwhile, have more than doubled in price in the past year after only minimal increases over the past two decades, according to Florida grower Matt Metzler, who says he’s “never seen anything like this.” That’s convinced some plant parents to go into business themselves. Kristin McLaughlin, a former bartender from Oregon, once sold various items from local artisans along with a smattering of succulents from a Brooklyn storefront, but last year she decided to open a new location focused primarily on plants, called Soft Opening. She also charges $50 and up for on-site home or office consultations, fielding often-inane questions like “What plant will go in my bathroom?” (Answer: If there’s no window, none.)
Growing ardor
DESPITE millennials’ growing ardor for plants and well-known aversion to brick-andmortar stores, many plant merchants avoid the internet like a spider mite infestation. Some fear getting caught out of stock, or having fragile stems damaged during the shipAPRIL 14, 2019
ping process; others simply find the process too impersonal. Less than 10 percent of all lawn and garden sales happen online. This has created an opening for startups like The Sill. Flush with $7.5 million in venture funding, the New York-based company hopes to solve the supply problem by moving into the growing business itself eventually, much the way Warby Parker manufactures its own eyeglasses and Harry’s makes its razors. Also like those so-called digital natives, The Sill has started opening stores, with two in New York, one in Los Angeles and three more coming this year. In-store cocktail parties and “Plants 101” workshops help lure and educate new buyers but 70 percent of transactions happen online. Founder Blank says sales quadrupled last year.
Invisible identifiers JOE FERRARI opened his store, Tend, in April 2018, and before every weekend drives out to nearby nurseries to fill his Subaru Impreza with as many plants as it will hold. “If we don’t have a fiddle-leaf fig, it’s a missed sale,” he says. To distinguish their storefronts from generic garden centers, Ferrari and others build online communities of owners, who need a steady stream of advice on the correct amount of water and light for each plant. A plant store’s Instagram feed often requires as much cultivating as the plants on the shelves. Some companies are using technology to improve the plant-buying experience. Digimarc Corp., which makes invisible identifiers for a wide range of products that are more reliable and efficient than traditional bar codes, wants to embed its digital watermarks onto plant tags, labels and other types of packaging. Customers scan them with their phones and call up care advice, videos and additional information on the plant.
Good time SUCH innovations could help modernize a supply chain that Digimarc CEO Bruce Davis deems “archaic.” Still, things are improving: The Sill is redesigning its packaging to use less material, a common complaint among environmentally minded shoppers. Etsy and Amazon have provided growers with a window on what’s popular that they never had before. A few growers are even considering opening their own digital storefronts to sell directly to consumers, some of whom have moved on from fiddle-leafs to chase trendier items like the hoya compacta, known as the Hindu rope plant for its twisted, waxy leaves. Whatever happens, one thing is clear, says grower Maxwell Sherer: “It’s a good time to be in plants.” Bloomberg News
Investors’ guide to Gen Z: Weed, social justice and Kylie Jenner
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OVE aside, millennials. This is the year that Generation Z becomes the biggest consumer cohort globally, displacing millennials as a top obsession for investors trying to figure out how to cash in on their unique shopping, eating and media habits. While they might still be in school, they have spending power to the tune of $143 billion in the US alone, leaving fund managers salivating at the chance to harvest some of that potential alpha. “Gen Z has their finger on the pulse on the companies that speak to them, that they think are going to grow with them,” said Phil Bak, CEO of Exponential ETFs. “Therefore they’re probably better suited to pick those investments than some of the more seasoned financial professionals.” Investors have always been interested in young consumers and how their habits might open up new opportunities, but much of the long-held thinking on college kids and tweens—invest in beer stocks or TV networks or junk food—don’t hold up today. Gen Z, roughly between the ages of seven and 22, were born after the internet went mainstream and occupy a world where marijuana is going legal. Anything and everything can be delivered to their front door with a swipe of a finger and they grew up on platforms like Snapchat and Instagram, where the influencer culture has taken hold. For investors looking to factor Gen Z into their portfolios, here are some broad trends they may want to consider:
1. They can be influenced While older millennials graduated college before the rise of Facebook, or even mobile phones, these new consumers live on Instagram and other platforms. In fact, 52 percent said they primarily find out about new products from social media, a jump of 10 percentage points from millennials and double the rate for their Gen X parents, according to a recent survey by Bloomberg News and Morning Consult. That means influencers—celebrities or everyday people with big social media followings who are paid to promote products—can have an outsized impact with this cohort where nearly six out of 10 self-diagnose spending too much time on their phones. Take for instance Kylie Jenner, 21, who promoted her makeup line on Instagram and is now considered the youngest self-made billionaire. Her makeup line made its way over to Ulta Beauty Inc. last year and the company’s
shares are up more than 40 percent in 2019. She’s so influential, one tweet from her in February 2018 disparaging Snapchat wiped out $1.3 billion in market cap. Bloomberg recently constructed a hypothetical stock portfolio called The Influencer Economy ETF, or ticker GENZ. The fund is up about 15 percent since the start of 2018, outpacing the gain in the S&P 500 Index over the same period. GENZ’s holdings are weighted based on the rank of their associated influencer, per Forbes.com, which incorporates social media followers and rankings from other agencies. The top holdings include Electronic Arts Inc., Nike Inc., Adidas AG, Coca-Cola Co., T-Mobile US Inc. and Under Armour Inc. based off of partnerships with influencers such as Cristiano Ronaldo, Selena Gomez, Ariana Grande and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.
2. They have different vices Younger consumers are wary of nasty hangovers and eager to wake up on the weekends feeling fresh so they can get outdoors and capture selfies. Beer in particular is going through a slump as Americans cut back on alcohol. That’s bad news for AnheuserBusch InBev SA and Molson Coors Brewing Co., which make the mass-market brands like Bud Light and Coors Light that are getting hit the hardest. Marijuana, meanwhile, is going mainstream. It’s perceived as healthier than alcohol by many Gen Z consumers and is now legal for adult use in 10 US states. Gen Z consumers are coming of age in time when the decades of stigma around weed—think reefer madness—are fading away as more states legalize and stressed out, tired Americans look to cannabis compounds to alleviate insomnia and anxiety, or just unwind after a hard week of work. Investors have two main options for betting on weed. They can invest in Canadian companies—think Canopy Growth Corp. and Aurora Cannabis Inc.—which benefit from federal legislation there but also are operating in a country with a population smaller than California. There are also the so-called multi-state operators in the US, like Curaleaf Holdings Inc. and Green Thumb Industries Inc. The US legal market is already larger than
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all of Canada’s, but federal prohibition creates hurdles for the American companies—and leaves some money managers wary of advertising their bets.
3. They don’t have to go to stores Gen Z could be the first generation to truly embrace online grocery shopping—though maybe not yet. Just 83 percent of them said they primarily purchase groceries at a physical store, compared to 95 percent of baby boomers and 87 percent of millennials. Surveys have also indicated that Amazon is one of the favorite brands of Gen Z consumers, who’ve never lived in a time without the e-commerce giant. It’s worth noting that the oldest members of Gen Z are barely out of college by most measures, not exactly peak grocerybuying age. Still, they’ve grown up in a world where digital shopping is ubiquitous. As of now, a tiny percentage of groceries are purchased online, because most people still want to touch their tomatoes. But since Amazon.com Inc. announced a deal to buy Whole Foods almost two years ago, Kroger and Walmart, the largest sellers of groceries in the US, have spent billions investing in technology and keeping prices low as they brace for the digital invasion. Whoever figures out the equation for grocery delivery—human-delivered or self-driving cars—will have a lot to gain.
4. They choose their brand loyalties carefully The rise of Gen Z could be bad news for traditional clothing retailers like Gap Inc. and Macy’s Inc., already battered by the shift to buying clothing online. The next generation is also embracing second-hand apparel, which will be bigger than fast fashion within the decade, according to Thredup’s 2019 Resale Report. Thredup, fashion resale website, says more than one in three Gen Z shoppers will buy used clothing this year, versus less than one in five boomers or Gen X consumers. That seems to stem, in part, from the generation’s interest in environmental issues and ethical shopping. Apparel brands looking to connect with younger shoppers have tried embracing APRIL 14, 2019
edgier brand ambassadors, a departure from the days when consumer companies went to great pains to avoid politics. That’s because Gen Z actually wants corporations to take a stand on issues, with 40 percent saying they’d pay more for a product if they knew the company was promoting gender equality issues and 42 percent for racial justice initiatives. Nike understands. Last year, it released an ad featuring Colin Kaepernick, and while the inclusion of the controversial quarterback-turned-activist initially spooked investors, the shares have since rebounded. And there are indications that ads have helped boost sales. “A lot of times in this industry people want to overcomplicate the process of picking stocks,” Exponential ETFs’ Bak said. “We think that there’s a pretty high correlation between companies that from your personal experiences you think are good and high-growth companies.”
5. They eat (somewhat) differently Gen Z consumers are more likely to skip meat than the older US cohorts, the latest dining disruption with big implications for fast-food restaurants and packaged-food giants. Burger King this week announced a test of a plant-based Impossible Whopper, another sign that even the purveyors of indulgent onion rings and big burgers see a shift ahead. Just a few years ago, the narrative was that millennials were killing off traditional fast-food chains, opting instead for the so-called fast casual competitors like Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. and Panera Bread that were promising higher quality and cleaner ingredients with the same quick convenience. It’s true that eating habits have shifted, but old-school burger chains like McDonald’s Corp. and Burger King still dominate in the restaurant industry. McDonald’s has bounced back from a sales slump, thanks in large part of all-day breakfast, and recently invested $300 million in a technology company it says will help boost drive-thru sales. It turns out even today’s teens still want fries with that. It’s more Big Food that’s feeling the pain. Large packaged-food makers like Kraft Heinz Co. and Campbell Soup Co. have been battered in recent years by the shift away from traditional brands that dominated grocery stores for decades. They’ve tried to reshape their portfolios, but have struggled to resonate with younger consumers. So what does this all mean for savvy investors trying to tap into Gen Z’s buying habits? People in generational cohorts are never as uniform as marketers would like, and with the youngest still in elementary school, there’s still some time before the preferences of the wider generation shake out. But for some forward looking investors, now’s the time to start thinking about how to structure a portfolio for a postboomer economy. Bloomberg News