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OIL FIRMS FIND WAYS TO KEEP SALES VOLUME HIGH AMID PRICE HIKES CAUSED BY TRAIN LAW

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By Lenie Lectura

month after pump prices surged as a result of the enactment of the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (TRAIN) law, oil companies said sales volume remains “normal” and they even expect demand to grow.

“Sales volume is normal after the TRAIN law implementation,” Phoenix Petroleum Philippines Inc. Vice President of Corporate Affairs Raymond Zorilla said via SMS. At end-2017, Phoenix had a total of 530 retail service stations.

It posted record sales volume, revenues and net income last year.

Phoenix reported a net income of P1.79 billion for 2017, up 65 percent from the previous year. Sales volume increased by 17 percent to 1.76 billion liters, from 1.5 billion liters. Revenues, meanwhile, rose

by 45 percent to P44.426 billion.

The oil firm attributed last year’s higher sales volume to the addition of new stations, acquisition of new direct commercial accounts across various industries, as well as the consolidation of the liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) business.

PTT Philippines Corp., which has 122 service stations in Luzon and Central Visayas, expects demand for petroleum products to continue.

This, despite the retail price for

gasoline products now costing anywhere between P46 and P57 a liter.

Diesel price now ranges from P35 to P41 per liter. Kerosene is sold anywhere from P47 to P55 per liter.

“We still expect demand to grow despite the implementation of TRAIN. Back in 2011-2014, crude prices were trading above $100 per barrel, but national demand continues to grow at a CAGR [compound annual growth rate] of 7 percent. Now, crude is trading below $70/bbl. Vehicles are becoming Continued on A2

CUSI: “The motorists, just like any consumer, will look for cheaper prices or gas up where he finds his money’s worth.”

Pinay is expert linguist in America

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By Roger Pe

n her work, the phrase “lost in translation” is a no-no. Medy Beroy is a Filipina who works as an independent legal and medical interpreter in Georgia, USA. As an interpreter, she listens to what her clients say and translates them to another language so that legal or medical procedures are translated accurately without losing their meaning.

In layman’s language, legal interpreting involves cases that are heard between a judge or hearing officer and the defendant. Medical interpreting, obviously, is when it is done in hospitals, clinics or other medical facility involving health practitioners and their patients.

Because of the big number

of foreign-born residents with limited English proficiency (37.5 million, based on current Census Bureau statistics) in the United States, the demand for interpreters has become a necessity.

As a result, interpreting agencies in America have mushroomed, providing readily available profes-

PESO exchange rates n US 52.1160

sional and court-certified interpreters.

As for Beroy’s case, she gets calls around the US and as far as London, to do interpreting jobs. As an interpreter for both disciplines, she must not only speak the language of what a client needs, she must also interpret its nuances intelligently.

Beroy does it either face-toface or through remote telecon.

Her interpreting job may include collecting unemployment benefits, activating clients’ health-insurance plans to doing mundane tasks like fixing telephone-connection problems, among others.

First job in America

Prior to her job, Beroy worked as a caregiver for the elderly and disabled. “I have a soft spot for them,” she said.

Her patients were rich men and women who started out as ordinary people and ended up being successful.

“I learned a lot from them.

They also brought me to places that I otherwise won’t be able to see,” she narrated. But health issues forced her to stop what she loved doing and had to reinvent herself as an interpreter.

When she migrated to the US in 2009, transitioning was very hard for Beroy. She was a department head in the Philippines with the power to hire and fire, yet had a hard time getting a decent job.

While domestic helpers were common in the Philippines, housekeepers were expensive in the US. Only the rich could afford to hire them. Out of need, she learned to clean the house, tidy up and cook.

As former head of a provincial Public Employment Services Office that deployed local and overseas workers, Beroy felt bad about the diaspora of Filipinos, but accepted it as a fact and a reality, noticing that her kababayan with spouses, children or siblings abroad have a better quality of life.

In her former place of work Continued on A2

MEDY BEROY, a successful Pinay linguist who just bought a vintage house in Georgia, USA.

n japan 0.4885 n UK 72.7018 n HK 6.6609 n CHINA 8.1988 n singapore 39.5148 n australia 40.8694 n EU 64.2486 n SAUDI arabia 13.8976

Source: BSP (February 23, 2018 )

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Battle of promos “I

can foresee that we need to penalize oil companies if they don’t submit their inventories on time or if they give incomplete or inaccurate information about their stock levels. With or without the additional excise taxes from the TRAIN law, these companies are still duty-bound to submit their monthly inventories. And the DOE should ensure their compliance.”

—Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian

Continued from a1

more fuel efficient, but consumption will continue to grow as our population grows,” said a PTT official, who asked not to be named.

The oil firm’s January sales is higher than in 2017, added the official, “since most of the motorists preferred to have their gas tanks full while fuel inventory is from the old stock.”

PTT plans to put up more stations this year—possibly 30— from last year’s 23 new outlets established.

Pilipinas Shell, for its part, said it “sees no impact” on retention of its current customer base for now.

“I think it is still too early to gauge because the TRAIN implementation is relatively new and we haven’t gathered yet the trending,” said Cesar Abaricia, the company’s media relations manager, in an interview.

A dealer at Petron Corp. also noted that an assessment of the TRAIN implementation is yet to be done in relation to its impact on sales volume.

The company, according to one of its officials, could be able to provide an assessment after the first three months of the year.

Oil firms submit to the Department of Energy (DOE) a monthly sales report due every 15th of the following month. However, some oil companies have yet to comply.

“January sales report is due for submission on February 15. Basically, we can’t make a conclusion on the final sales volume, as submission is still incomplete,” the agency said.

Under TRAIN, the excise tax on gasoline went up to P7 per liter, from P4.35 per liter; while the new tax rates of P2.50 per liter were imposed on diesel, P3 per liter on kerosene and P2.50 per liter on auto LPG. Based on DOE estimates, gasoline prices are expected to cost an

additional P2.97 per liter; diesel, P2.80 per liter; kerosene, P3.36 per liter; LPG for motor vehicles, P2.80 per liter; and LPG for household, P1.12 per kilogram.

No TRAIN violators

The DOE has cleared oil firms that were earlier alleged to have taken advantage of the tax-reform law by selling old inventories at much higher prices.

“We compared their submissions with historical data and, so far, there are no violations,” Energy Assistant Secretary Leonido Pulido said.

Earlier, the agency said more than 20 oil retailers took advantage of the tax reform. Random inspection on all 6,800 gasoline stations were conducted to verify whether the excise tax under the TRAIN law was properly imposed.

These include 408 Shell stations in Luzon from January 5 to 11; 245 Petron stations in Luzon from January 8 to 12; 37 Flying V stations in Luzon from January 9 to 11; and 178 Caltex stations—49 in Luzon, 84 in the Visayas and 45 in Mindanao— from January 13 to 14.

The oil companies were told to submit several documents, such as inventory as of December 31, 2017, and the withdrawal records from depots as of January 28. “We based it on historical records and usually that’s enough because their numbers should be within a reasonable range,” Pulido said.

Still, the agency’s initial assessment would have to be verified with the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR), saying the tax agency cannot provide official register books (ORBs) to the DOE since these are treated as confidential documents.

“Since the documents came from [oil firms], who will validate these? We based it on historical records, usually that’s not enough.

But we wrote the BIR, confirming that the ORB is confidential, but they can confirm what [the oil firms] submitted to us are more or less accurate,” he said.

“I met with the BIR deputy commissioner and assistant commissioner. They agreed in principle [that there were no violations], but we haven’t received their formal reply,” the DOE official added.

However, three LPG retailers have violated administrative regulations and would be slapped with penalties.

“But we found three LPG retailers to have violated administrative rules. We have implemented requirements, such as posting of prices compliant with the TRAIN within their vicinity,” Pulido said.

The Senate Committee on Energy had said it wants to put in place mechanisms to monitor the levels of supply of petroleum products, including the imposition of stricter penalties for late and incorrect inventory submissions of oil companies, as well as for the negligence on the part of government agencies to monitor price movements.

“I can foresee that we need to penalize oil companies if they don’t submit their inventories on time or if they give incomplete or inaccurate information about their stock levels. With or without the additional excise taxes from the TRAIN law, these companies are still duty-bound to submit their monthly inventories. And the DOE should ensure their compliance,”

Sen. Sherwin T. Gatchalian said.

Under Section 14 of the oil-deregulation law (Republic Act 8479), the DOE is mandated to maintain a periodic schedule of present and future total inventory of petroleum products in the country. Because of this, oil companies are required to submit a monthly report that details their sales and consumption levels, actual and projected importations, and inventory of oil products.

“So, even if oil companies and gas stations already raised prices using their new supply in accordance to TRAIN, they would still have to be audited by the DOE and determine whether they unduly increased their prices without any clear basis, in which case they will have to face the appropriate penalties and fines,” he said.

Retaining customers

To mitigate any risk of volume decrease as a direct consequence of higher fuel prices, oil companies are implementing their respective rewards program, rebates and promotional offerings.

“As to market share of each company, it’s still primarily influ-

enced by strategies, positioning, branding and promo gimmicks,” a PTT official commented.

Shell Marketing Manager Kit Bermudez said Shell service stations continue to implement various discounts, value-added service and loyalty programs to continue to entice motorists to gas up at different Shell stations.

“We are continuing our efforts in adding value to their everyday journeys via various rewarding programs and customer delight activities. These go with our longstanding commitment of providing quality products and unparalleled service across our 1,000+ retail stations nationwide.

We also continuously invest in enhancing our facilities and offers to ensure a great consumer experience every time, to create repeat visits and loyal behavior,” he said.

Some Petron stations provide free 1 kilo of rice for every P1,000 worth of fuel products. The freebies vary, as other Petron stations give free snacks.

Various oil retailers provide a P1-per-liter discount to jeepneys, buses and, sometimes, to GRAB drivers.

“With fuel prices increasing, we want to give the best value to our customers with improved products and services. One of these is the launch of our Phoenix PULSE Technology, with advanced cleaning and protection properties for enhanced power and acceleration.

Our fuels are high-performing and priced reasonably, so our customers get more distance for every peso,” Zorilla said.

Energy Secretary Alfonso G. Cusi said fuel is essential to motorists. “They will continue to gas up, maybe not with the same gas station every time, because they need to in order to continue using their vehicles. The motorists, just like any consumer, will look for cheaper prices or gas up where he finds his money’s worth.”

Pinay is expert linguist in America Continued from a1

back home, she laments how her colleagues slowly became powerless to fight cultures of impropriety. “They have eventually succumbed to the pressure just to keep their jobs. I didn’t want to place myself in a situation where I would be swallowed by the system. So I got out when I still could,” she recalled.

Beroy was born and raised in Cuyo, formerly Palawan’s capital.

Her parents were Engr. Leandro Feria and Mrs. Neria K. Feria, a retired elementary-school teacher.

Her oldest brother is Fr. Peter Feria, parish priest of San Isidro Labrador parish in Maruyugon, Puerto Princesa City.

“My other brothers are Bong, a musician; Jhie, a Navy serviceman; and Dominic, a talented comic and skilled welder. Father Peter and I went to kindergarten at Saint Joseph Academy. We all studied at Cuyo Central School. I finished high school at Saint Joseph Academy,” she continued.

Her parents came from generations of close-knit and religious Catholics who practiced simple living and nationalism, and ignored the trappings of material wealth.

Her father was a lay minister, while her mother was a church organist.

Her earliest memory of her family was tagging along with them in church and singing in the choir.

She lived a sheltered, decent life in a community where everybody knew everybody and almost everyone was a relative.

Beroy was studying at the

University of Santo Tomas when martial-law rule was getting worse.

That period opened her eyes to a startling awakening: “We don’t only think and live for ourselves, we also need to be concerned with issues affecting our country and our future.”

While in college, she actively joined rallies at University Belt in Manila. Not amused, her landlady would inform her parents and the latter would, in turn, cut off allowance off and ask her to return home.

Determined, she instead looked for a job, underwent training on sales and marketing and got hired as a field demonstrator. She worked hard to survive. “Earning my own money gave me the power to focus on my career. At 19, I was already a division manager with three units of people working under me,” she recalled.

Worried about her safety in the looming political storm, her father wrote her once again and begged for her to come home. Homesick and scared being a college dropout, she went back to Palawan and enrolled at Palawan State College, now a university, on a scholarship program.

But a major blow happened to her family after the Edsa revolution. Her father lost his job even after faithfully discharging his duties and responsibilities as a government employee for 23 years. “It all went down the drain and I could not forget his bitterness,” Beroy recounted.

That left her supporting herself, as a singer at a local res-

taurant at night while attending school at daytime. Little by little she started standing on her own two feet. She was soon hired as a casual clerk at the National Power Corp. (Napocor) and worked at the Palawan Council For Sustainable Development Staff (PCSDS) from 1991 to 1999 as project development/human resources development officer III. She then got a scholarship grant from the Civil Service Local Scholarship Program, where she acquired her Masters in Public Administration degree in 1996. In 1999 she was hired as chief manpower development officer at the provincial office Care for the environment has since been her advocacy for many years. Why does she think it’s worth fighting for? She tells her story: “It started in 1990, when the Palawan Integrated Area Development Project Office was phasing out. Worried about lack of security of tenure in my job at Napocor, I joined a play, Kung Hindi Ngayon, Kelan? Kung Hindi Tayo, Sino?

“That very successful play tackled issues on illegal logging, illegal fishing, kaingin [slash-andburn farming], as well as mining.

The message left a lasting impact on my mind. Shortly after, I joined some local people to lobby for the passage of Republic Act 7611, or the Strategic Environmental Plan for Palawan Act. It was passed into law on September 19, 1992, before President Cory Aquino finished her term,” she recalled.

When Gen. Fidel V. Ramos be-

came president, Beroy continued to write news reports and did environmental articles for a local newspaper. She was then assigned to the Secretariat, where she transcribed and prepared volumes and many minutes of the meetings.

She heard the pros and cons of environmental protection and sustainable development efforts from technical experts and powerful businessmen who wanted to invest in Palawan. She learned to appreciate Palawan’s beauty and rich natural resources, and realized the serious threat of losing it if abuse will continue and people will not take good care of it.

As a Pinay working abroad, Beroy thought she can be effective with her advocacies even if working away from home.

“I’d rather write about my advocacies than do nothing at all.

When Jose Rizal went abroad, he wrote. He didn’t organize or lead a revolution. Yet, he influenced the world with his writings. He is also our national hero.” She believes in the sayings: “The pen is mightier than the sword” and “The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.”

“I’m nothing compared to these great men. But I’d rather write about the things that would benefit Palawan, if not today, at least someday. When God calls me back home in His time, I could say that I used my gift of singing to sing in the church choir and my gift of writing to help awaken our people to protect Palawan’s environment.”

Filipino diaspora

Beroy noted that the more serious issue here is the brain drain.

“Most brilliant and highly skilled Filipino professionals have gone out of the country to work abroad.

They are known all over the world as God-fearing, hardworking, loving, patient, understanding and, most of all, resilient in times of adversity,” she said.

She added Filipinos abroad, in general, are honest, highly skilled, professional, disciplined, support their family back home and, more important, law-abiding citizens.

On what would make Filipinos become successful abroad, Beroy said there are many definitions of success. When she moved to the US, her goal was to support her kids until they finished college.

She wanted them to become wellrounded kids who are God-fearing, honest, responsible and kind, and be able to survive and make it anywhere in the world.

“My daughter graduated in 2013 and now working part-time in Sweden. As a mother, I could only guide them, support them and be there for them when they need me. But I don’t impose my will on them,” she intimated.

If given a chance to have an audience with the President of the Philippines, what are the burning things she would like to tell him and act swiftly on? “Graft and corruption in the government. The scandal reaches from the highest echelon down to the lowliest clerk.”

Environmental protection is also close to Beroy’s heart. “The Philippines is rich in natural re-

sources and blessed with beautiful islands. If we focus on protecting the environment, the day would come when the majority of the Filipinos would become happy, peaceful and prosperous,” she said.

The three things she would like to happen in her hometown:

1. God-fearing and honest people elected as public officials. 2.

Drug problems and all sorts of illegal activities eradicated. 3. Positive investor atmosphere that would also protect the environment and its own natural resources.

Who is Medy Beroy as a person? She replied: “What you see is what you get.” She misses the Philippines and can only say the following to her fellow Filipinos: “The Philippines is our country, the Earth is our planet. We have to start thinking that we only have one planet. We need to love and take good care of each other.

“If you were rich and God has abundantly blessed you, focus on doing philanthropic deeds. Do not squander your money on the latest fashion, collecting cars, yachts and mansions while people around you are collecting and eating garbage, homeless and living like rats in hovels.

“If God blessed you as a talented musician, write music that would praise God and help our people. If you were a scientist, do some research that would help protect our environment. What I’m only pointing out here is that whatever talents, skills or gifts that God blessed you with, use it not just for yourself or your family, but for the good of your community and your people.”

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Teo eyes stricter law to preserve Boracay A

uthorities assured that the full-scale government effort on the famed Boracay Island is geared toward preserving and upgrading the maintenance of its natural assets, amid reports of seawater pollution and street flooding.

Tourism Secretary Wanda Corazon T. Teo, who heads a multiagency program called “Oplan Save Boracay” (#saveboracay), disclosed that a delegation of senators will check the actual situation on Boracay, as part of the Senate inquiry, in aid of legislation.

Findings of a joint field inspection of Boracay by Teo and Environment Secretary Roy A. Cimatu recently prompted a congressional inquiry into the island’s condition, as well as a strong directive from President Duterte to implement preventive measures.

“If enacted and implemented, a tourism heritage law will be more effective in ensuring the preservation and protection, not only of Boracay Island and its seawaters, but all of the country’s natural tourist destinations,” said Teo after a daylong multiagency meeting at the DOT recently.

Over 60 establishments, including five-star resorts, have been reportedly

dumping untreated sewage water into the seas off Barangays Balabag, Manoc-Manoc and Yapac that comprise Boracay Island, in municipality of Malay, Aklan.

Local government officials have taken flak over the perennial problems of water pollution, lack of garbage disposal and violations of building prohibition of 30 meters from the shoreline.

“Boracay, as it is now, remains among the world’s most beautiful islands as recognized by top international travel magazines, and that’s precisely why we are seriously concerned over these environmental threats that might affect its viability as an international tourist destination,” Teo said.

DOT Undersecretary for Public Affairs Katherine de Castro revealed that a communications plan is being crafted to keep the world updated on the developments on Boracay.

“Certainly, all is not lost for Boracay Island, and we owe our guests, who have set foot in its fine white-sand beaches and have come to love it and its people, to know that this government is taking measures to protect this paradise,” de Castro added.

Saturday, February 24, 2018

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Deciphering BSP’s RRR cut

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By Bianca Cuaresma

ong before its actual implementation, the economy, particularly the local currency, has been feeling the effects of the recent surprise move from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) to cut its reserve requirement ratio (RRR) to 19 percent just last Thursday.

Markets speculated on the effects of the one-percentagepoint cut in the banks’ deposit requ irement to t he economy and to BSP’s policy direction, thereby sending the peso into a downward spiral a full week before the actual implementation of the cut on March 2.

At t he star t of t he week, t he peso fe l l to 52. 3 4 to a dol l a r, abr upt ly losi ng 3 4 cent avos du r i ng t he d ay f rom t he pre v iou s w e e k ’s 52- t o - a - d o l l a r c losi ng rate.

The local currency has not been this weak since the precrisis levels. The last time the peso has been this low was on July 19, 2006, when it hit 52.745 against the dollar. The peso started to recover toward the week ’s end, but remained above the 52 territory.

Traders and analysts have been attributing the peso’s weakness to the rising speculations of the market behind the BSP’s move to cut the banks’ RRR—a move that will effectively release about P70 billion to P90 billion of liquidity

into the economy despite rising inflation prospects.

ING Bank Manila economist Joey Cuyegkeng said the Central Bank’s decision to cut banks’ RRR was “another indication that BSP is in no mood to fight inflation.”

This is after the BSP, a week before cutting its RRR, decided to keep policy settings steady despite inflation prospects breaching the inflation target range this year.

The Monetary Board projected a 4.3-percent rise in inflation on average for 2018. The BSP’s target is for inflation to fall within 2 percent to 4 percent this year.

Bias for growth

Cuyegkeng also said the BSP seems to frame its move to keep the local economy growing above 6 percent, at the expense of transitory inflationary shoot-ups.

“We believe that the cut in RRR is not just a structural change in the banking system, but an indication of the BSP’s bias for growth,” he said.

“Cutting RRR would reduce intermediation costs of bank— a plus for loans and the economy but a partial siphoning off the added liquidity would make sense initia l ly in suppor ting

growth, as the incremental liquidity finds its way to government deficit spending or bank loans,” the economist added.

True enough, the Bankers Association of the Philippines (BAP) issued a statement after the cut, saying that the RRR cut will enable borrowers to have “access to more sources of funds and more efficient cost of borrowing that is expected to propel more economic activity in the country.”

“In a few weeks, we expect that BAP member-banks will be able to extend additional credit to consumers and enterprises that require adequate funds for their personal and business needs,” BAP Managing Director Benjamin Castillo said in a statement.

Cuyegkeng said market perceives further cuts in RRR not only this year but for the rest of the term of the BSP governor, as the governor wants to bring RRR to 10 percent or less in the next five to six years.

Central Bank Governor Nestor A. Espenilla Jr. earlier signaled more moves to reduce the RRR, as he vowed to “gradually lessen its reliance on reserve requirements for managing liquidity in the financial system.”

DENR to investigate expansion of MPSA areas despite moratorium I

By Jonathan L. Mayuga

n spite of the ban on new mining projects, the areas covered by mining contracts, specifically mineral production sharing agreements (MPSAs), have increased by at least 6 percent between 2015 and 2016.

The reason: Executive Order (EO) 79, which imposed the ban on new mining projects pending new legislation that would put in place a new mining revenue-sharing scheme, also allowed mining companies to apply for area expansion through an amendment to the existing MPSAs. The amendment allowed areas covered by another mining permit, including exploration permit—via “annexation”—hence, allowing a company to expand mining tenements under the terms and condition of the existing MPSAs. Po s s i b l y, m i n i n g c o m p a n i e s granted with MPSA area coverage expansion have skipped the normal permitting process under the Philippine Mining Act of 1995 and its implementing rules and regulations (IRR), a very tedious process that would sometimes take a decade, and completely avoided not

only the increase in mining tax, but a future equitable mining revenuesharing deal with a new legislation being sought by the government.

Is it legal?

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) said it will scrutinize the MPSA area expansion and review EO 79 signed by President Benigno S. Aquino III on July 6, 2012, and its IRR. Environment Undersecretary for Climate Change Services and Mining Concerns Analiza Teh said they will look into the legal basis of the MPSA coverage expansion to settle the issue and eliminate some gray areas on the matter.

She said they will come up with a recommendation that will possibly form part of a new mining policy under the watch of Environment Secretary Roy A. Cimatu.

To be reviewed mostly are MPSA expansions made during the second half of 2015 and the first half of 2016, six months before President Duterte took over.

Anti-mining advocates consider these as “midnight deals” secured by quarry and mining companies at the tail end of the Aquino administration leading up to the turnover to the Duterte administration.

EO 79’s intention

EO 79 aims to introduce reforms in the mining sector, starting with increasing the government’s share in mining profit.

As such, it imposed a ban on new mining projects, which remains in effect until now, as no new legislation putting in place a revenue-sharing scheme has been enacted.

For decades, anti-mining groups have raised the issue of e nv i ro n m e n t a l d e g r a d a t i o n a s against the benefits of mining to the government through taxes and the host communities through jobs and livelihood, and better infrastructure. There is also the adverse impacts of mining, such as loss of livelihood and environmental degradation, that often lead to disasters.

Communities in mining impact areas benefit from various programs and projects, but they are also the first to suffer the consequence of irresponsible mining.

Also known as Aquino’s mining policy, EO 79 increased the number of areas that are closed to mining, or no-go zones, and limited small-scale mining operation within a declared Minahang Bayan.

It also banned the use of toxic

chemicals, particularly mercury, in small-scale mining.

Despite the ban on the approval of new mining projects, EO 79, however, gave quarry and mining companies the option to expand their mining areas.

Sweet deals

Under the scheme, government regulators, particularly the DENRM i n e s a n d G e o s c i e n c e s B o a rd (MGB), grant special favor to MPSA holders because they will be able to expand their mining tenements.

Teh said that, in reviewing the MPSA area expansions, the DENR will discuss the circumstances in which area expansions of the existing MPSAs were allowed and to verify claims that they were, in fact, approved by the Mining Industry Coordinating Council (MICC).

She added they will ask for a meeting with the MGB and would have to sit down with MICC people to shed light on the MPSA area expansion, including the basis of the applications’ approval or rejection.

The MGB had been asked to provide details of the expansion, as Teh learned that 25 holders of MPSAs were allowed to expand their areas.

The MGB started receiving applications for MPSA expansion as early as 2013. Most of the applications were filed in 2015 and 2016, but the bulk of the approved applications happened in May and June 2016.

No formal complaint

While there is no formal complaint about the expansions made, it was learned that the issue has been the subject of discussions within the MGB and the DENR because some of the annexed areas are covered by other mining applications, or in another location, during the short stint of former Environment Secretary Regina Paz L. Lopez.

“It is worth looking back while we are doing policy reform,” Teh said. “ Timely so, we are conducting a mining-polic y review. So there will be parallel reviews on the issue of closure or suspension orders, the 75 MPSAs, and the MPSA area expansion,” she said.

The official is referring to the controversy hounding the closure and suspension orders affecting more than two dozen large-scale operating mines and 75 MPSAs within or near watershed.

According to Teh, with the review of the MPSAs, a look into the provisions of EO 79 is in order, plus the two

DENR administrative orders (AO) that pertain to the IRR of EO 79.

Clarification

Two consecutive DENR administrative orders were issued, putting in place the IRR. The first, AO 2012-07, was issued on September 10, 2010. However, amid clamor seeking clarification on certain provisions of EO 79, the DENR issued AO 2012-07A, amending Sections 3, 7 and 9. It took effect on October 25, 2012.

Under the provision of EO 79 on the continued moratorium, no new mineral agreements shall be entered into until a legislation rationalizing existing revenue-sharing schemes and mechanisms shall have taken effect.

The moratorium does not cover exploration permits (EP) and financial and technical assistance agreements, which will continue to be granted.

Since no new MPSA will be issued pending new legislation that will put in place a new revenue-sharing scheme, MPSA holders appealed to the MGB for area coverage expansion of their existing MPSAs through annexation of another area covered by another mining-permit application.

The window for the expansion was provided under EO 79’s amended IRR, which states that “no expansion of existing contract areas shall be allowed by the DENR secretar y unless there is imminent and/or threatened economic disruption, such as a shortage of critical commodities and raw materials, that could adversely affec t pr ior it y government projects and/or economic activities as determined by the Economic Development Cabinet Cluster.”

According to Teh, the first IRR has no expressed prohibition, allowing the expansion in contract areas with available mineral reserves subject to validation by the MICC. Some applicants, such as Holcim Cement, reasoned out possible supply shortage and hence were granted area expansion.

Conditions

Under the Revised IRR, Teh noted that it was expressly stated that the approval for expansion may be allowed by the DENR secretary, because of the same reason.

“We will review this [MSPA area coverage expansion] whether this is in accordance with the guidelines,” she said.

“We will discuss this with the

MGB…. We would also like to sit down with the MICC to understand the context. We will hold a preliminary review,” she added.

The new provision also now allows the grant of new mineral agreements in case of an imminent and/ or threatened economic disruption that could adversely affect priority government projects or activities—such as, in the case of a quarry, where construction materials such as gravel and sand come from.

Does it apply to metallic minerals, particularly precious metal?

Teh said it is a general provision and does not distinguish the commodity being mined. This means gold and copper, silver and other precious metals, and nickel, which is the country’s top commodity, are included.

What is important, Teh added, is for the DENR to know whether the MPSA area expansions were, in fact, approved by the MICC and have corresponding MICC resolutions.

To recall, as early as April 2015, former DENR MGB Director Leo Jasareno bared that quarry and mining companies are opting to expand areas covered under their MPSA to continue their operation in the face of the moratorium on new mining projects.

Holcim and LaFarge, two of the leading cement companies, were among the first to avail themselves of the scheme to increase their limestone resources. Limestone is a main ingredient of cement, the production of which is important so as not to adversely affect the construction industry.

Several mining companies, whose mines are nearly depleted of resources, have followed suit.

Under such scheme, the total area covered by MPSAs had increased from 2015 to 2016 by as much as 35,067.35 hectares, or around 6 percent of the total area of 603,158.21 hectares as of April 2017, which represents a total of 317 existing MPSAs. As of January 2018, the Mining Tenements Management Division of the MGB lists a total of 313 MPSAs covering a total of 598,335.71 hectares. There are also six suspended MPSAs covering a combined area of 13,207.38 hectares; eight expired MPSAs covering 8,409 hectares, with some having applications for renewal; 10 canceled MPSAs covering 13,101.9 hectares with a motion for reconsideration; and nine canceled MPSAs covering 6,474.75 hectares whose orders are final and executory.

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Saturday, February 24, 2018

The World BusinessMirror

Editor: Lyn Ressureccion | www.businessmirror.com.ph

Is America a ‘nation of immigrants’?

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he federal agency that issues green cards and grants citizenship to people from foreign countries has stopped characterizing the United States as “a nation of immigrants.”

The director of the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) informed employees in a letter on Thursday that its mission statement had been revised to “guide us in the years ahead.”

Gone was the phrase that described the agency as securing “America’s promise as a nation of immigrants.”

The original mission statement said: “USCIS secures America’s promise as a nation of immigrants by providing accurate and useful information to our customers, granting immigration and citizenship benefits, promoting an awareness and understanding of citizenship, and ensuring the integrity of our immigration system.”

The new version says: “US Citizenship and Immigration Services administers the nation’s l aw f u l i m m i g r at ion s y ste m , safeguarding its integrity and promise by efficiently and fairly adjudicating requests for immi-

gration benefits while protecting Americans, securing the homeland and honoring our values.”

The agency director, L. Francis Cissna, who was appointed by the Trump administration, described the revision as a “simple, straightforward statement” that “clearly defines the agency’s role in our country’s lawful immigration system and the commitment we have to the American people.”

Cissna did not mention in his letter that he had removed the phrase “nation of immigrants,” which was popularized by a book

by President John F. Kennedy and is frequently used to convey America’s multiculturalism.

However, Cissna did note that he had eliminated the word “customers” in describing the foreign nationals whom the agency serves, “a reminder that we are always working for the American people.”

León Rodríguez, director of the agency from 2014 to 2017,

said the revision of the mission statement marked “a particularly sad turn of history.”

“We should not forget that under the discarded mission statement, the integrity and national security functions of USCIS grew—dramatically so—showing that we could be both a welcoming nation and a safe one,” Rodríguez said. “We should stop to reflect about the many opportunities that America will lose because of the attitudes reflected in this statement, and ask ourselves whether this is really the country we want to be.”

Ira Mehlman, a spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which favors restricting immigration, applauded the change.

“A nation of immigrants isn’t a mission statement,” he said, “it’s a slogan.”

“The biggest problem with our immigration system is that it lacks a clear national interest objective,” he added.

As director of the USCIS, Cissna has promoted an agenda that reflects the Trump administration’s skeptical and often hardline stance on immigration. The agency has increased scrutiny of visa applications for foreign workers whom US companies seek to hire; it has changed the asylum application process to discourage people from seeking safe haven in the United States; and it has added

steps to the process for foreigners already in the country to obtain legal permanent residency, or a green card.

The USCIS reviews petitions of foreign nationals who seek to visit, work, reside and find refuge in the United States. It also processes citizenship applications, which have surged since President Donald J. Trump won the election in 2016.

In his letter to his staff, Cissna wrote, “We are also responsible for ensuring that those who naturalize are dedicated to this country, share our values, assimilate into our communities, and understand their responsibility to help preserve our freedom and liberty.”

Published posthumously, Kennedy’s A Nation of Immigrants highlighted the contribution of immigrants when the country was engulfed in a debate over the direction of its immigration policy.

The phrase appears at least as far back as 1874, in an editorial published in The Daily State Journal of Alexandria, which praised a bill passed by the Virginia Senate appropriating $15,000 to encourage European immigration. “We are a nation of immigrants and immigrants’ children,” it said.

Immigrant advocates today invoke the phrase to remind the country that most Americans have an ancestor who was once a newcomer to the United States.

New York Times News Service

Myanmar bulldozes what’s left of Rohingya Muslim villages

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irst, their villages were burned to the ground. Now, Myanmar’s government is using bulldozers to literally erase them from the earth—in a vast operation rights groups say is destroying crucial evidence of mass atrocities against the nation’s ethnic Rohingya Muslim minority.

Satellite images of Myanmar’s troubled Rakhine state, released to The Associated Press by Colorado-based DigitalGlobe on Friday, show that dozens of empty villages and hamlets have been completely leveled by authorities in recent weeks—far more than previously repor ted. The villages were all set ablaze in the wake of violence last August, when a brutal clearance operation by security forces drove hundreds of thousands of Rohingya into exile in Bangladesh.

While Myanmar’s government claims it’s simply trying to rebuild a devastated region, the operation has raised deep concern among human rights advocates, who say the government is destroying what amounts to scores of crime scenes before any credible investigation takes place. The operation has also horrified the Rohingya, who believe the government is intentionally eviscerating the dwindling remnants of their culture to make it nearly impossible for them to return.

O ne displaced Rohingya woman, whose village was among those razed, said she recently visited her former home in Myin Hlut and was shocked by what she saw. Most houses had been torched last year, but now, “everything is gone, not even the trees are left,” the woman, named Zubairia, told AP by telephone.

“They just bulldozed everything...I could hardly recognize it.”

The 18-year-old said other homes in the same area that had been abandoned but not damaged were also flattened. “All the memories that I had there are gone,” she said. “They’ve been erased.”

Myanmar’s armed forces are accused not just of burning Muslim villages with the help of Buddhist mobs, but of carrying out massacres, rapes and widespread looting. The latest crisis in Rakhine state began in August after Rohingya insurgents launched a series of unprecedented attacks on security posts.

Aerial photographs of leveled villages in northern Rakhine State were first made public Feb. 9 when the European Union’s ambassador to Myanmar, Kristian Schmidt, posted images taken from an aircraft of what he described as a “vast bulldozed area” south of the town of Maungdaw.

Satellite imagery from DigitalGlobe indicates at least 28 villages or hamlets were leveled by bulldozers and other

This December 2, 2017, satellite image provided by DigitalGlobe shows the village of Thit Tone Nar Gwa Son, about 50 kilometers (31 miles) north of Maungdaw, Rakhine state, Myanmar. Satellite images of Myanmar’s troubled Rakhine state, released to The Associated Press by Coloradobased DigitalGlobe on Friday, February 23, show that dozens of empty villages and hamlets have been completely leveled by authorities in recent weeks, far more than previously reported. The villages were all set ablaze in the wake of violence last August, when a brutal clearance operation by security forces drove hundreds of thousands of Rohingya into exile in Bangladesh. DigitalGlobe via AP

machinery in a 30-mile (50-kilometer) ra d i u s a ro u n d M a u n g d aw b e t we e n December and Februar y; on some of the cleared areas, construction crews had erected new buildings or housing structures and helipads. A similar analysis

by Human Rights Watch on Friday said at least 55 villages have been affected so far.

The images offer an important window into what is effectively a part of Myanmar that is largely sealed off to the outside world. Myanmar bars independent media access to the state.

The government has spoken of plans to rebuild the region for months, and it has been busily expanding roads, repairing bridges, and constructing shelters, including dozens at a large transit camp at Taungpyo, near the Bangladesh border. The camp opened in January to house returning refugees; but none have arrived and Rohingya have continued to flee.

Myint Khine, a government administrator in Maungdaw, said some of the new homes were intended for Muslims. But that does not appear to be the case for the majority of those built or planned so far, and many

Rohingya fear authorities are seizing land they’ve lived on for generations.

One list, published by the government in December, indicated 787 houses would be constructed, most of them for Buddhists or Hindus. Only 22 of the houses were slated for “Bengalis”—the word Myanmar nationalists often use to describe the Rohingya, who they say are illegal migrants from Bangladesh.

Myint Khine said the government had no ulterior motive.

“Of course we have been using machines like earth removers and bulldozers because we have to clear the ground first before building new houses,” he said.

Chris Lewa, whose Arakan Project monitors the persecuted Muslim minority’s plight, said the degree to which the villages had been razed would make it even harder for the Rohingya, who have no citizenship and few rights, to ever reclaim their land.

“How will they identify where they lived, if nothing is left, if nothing can be recognized?” Lewa said. “Their culture, their history, their past, their present—

it’s all being erased. When you see the pictures, it’s clear that whatever was left—the mosques, the cemeteries, the homes—they’re gone.”

Richard Weir, a Myanmar expert with Human Rights Watch, said on the images he had seen, “there’s no more landmarks, there’s no trees, there’s no vegetation.”

“Everything is wiped away, and this is very concerning, because these are crime scenes,” he said. “There’s been no credible investigation of these crimes.

And so, what we’re talking about really is obstruction of justice.”

Both Weir and Lewa said no mass graves were known to have been destroyed. But, Weir added: “We don’t know where all the graves are...because there is no access.”

Zubairia, who asked that only one of her names be used to protect her identify because she feared reprisals, said she did not believe any of the newly constructed homes were intended for Rohingya.

“Even if they give us small houses to live in, it will never be the same for us,” she said. “How can we be happy about our houses being ripped off from our land?” AP

Sports BusinessMirror

Editor: Jun Lomibao | mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph

Saturday, February 24, 2018

A5

TRICKY POLITICAL DANCE P

YEONGCHANG, South Korea—A group of high-school students plan to keep their new flags all their lives, as a souvenir of this historic political and Olympic moment that they traveled across their nation to witness.

They joined thousands of others at a women’s hockey game, waving their unified Korean flags—white rectangles with the light-blue silhouette of the Korean Peninsula, the North and South together.

“This flag means we are all one,” 19-year-old Kim Na Yeon said of this seemingly simple expression hope, of the power of sport to transcend dangerous political friction and bring the world together for two weeks every two years.

Except: The teenagers point to tiny blue dots, no bigger than strawberry seeds, off to the right.

The spots represent a group of islands controlled by South Korea but also claimed by Japan. Their inclusion on this flag delights the Korean teenagers and infuriates the Japanese government.

These barely visible yet controversial specks—erased on the version approved by the International Olympic Committee—embody the delicate dance Olympic organizers must do to manage the political implications of the flags that represent each nation.

They are piece of cloth, yes—rectangular symbols. But embedded in its threads, the cloth carries generations of political baggage and competing interests.

Fifty years ago, amid years-long wrangling over Cold War political disputes, one member of the International Olympic Committee tried to avoid the political choreography of flags by doing away with them altogether.

In 1968 Prince George William of Hanover proposed that flags and anthems be eliminated from the games, according to the International Olympics Committee’s Olympic Studies Center.

“One cannot deny,” he said, “that we are facing a serious crisis. Our strength has so far been not to yield to any political pressure. The future will show whether we shall be strong and united enough to stand up against all interferences whilst striving for our ethical aims.”

He proposed victors stand on the podium below the Olympic flag as the Olympic anthem played—a proposition that was rejected by the committee.

And today athletes stand on the podium before the flags of their own nations as the anthem from the gold medalist’s country plays.

Unless they’re in trouble.

EVER-PRESENT NATIONALISM

DELICATE OLYMPIC BALANCE

“PEOPLE try to say, ‘Let’s keep politics out of it, and the flag is just to cheer on our national team.’ And on the face of it, that’s what it is,” says Katharine Gelber, a political science professor at the University of Queensland in Australia.

“But there’s so much more to it than that. Flags are incredibly expressive,” she says. “These things are difficult to negotiate because people hold their view of flags so strongly; it’s very complex, and very political.”

Taiwan has competed in the Games for decades as “Chinese Taipei,” named for its capital city, under a bland flag featuring the Olympic rings.

It is forbidden by the IOC from using its own flag or anthem because of a long-running dispute with the Beijing government, which considers Taiwan part of China and, like much of the rest of the world, does not recognize its government.

And the United States, when preparing to send its athletes to the Olympics, provides them a training video on how to handle the stars and stripes to avoid controversy that clings to flag mishaps.

Do: Hold the flag with the stars in your right hand so you don’t

Andes wakes up, propels FEU Tams

accidently hoist it upside down when celebrating victory. Don’t: Wear it like a cape. Don’t: Let it touch the ground.

Yet last week, photos captured snowboarder Shaun White, celebrating in the moment after winning a gold medal, dragging the flag around in the snow behind him, occasionally stepping on the edges. The images ricocheted around the Internet, accompanied by outrage.

He apologized and said he was caught in a haze of excitement.

LADY FALCONS Coach Airess Padda has her hands full against the Lady Spikers.

ADAMSON U VS. DE LA SALLE

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ICO ANDES finally found his rhythm and powered Far Eastern University (FEU) past Adamson University, 7-0, for its first win in the University Athletic Association of the Philippines Season 80 men’s football tournament late Thursday at the Rizal Memorial Stadium.

Scoreless in their first four matches, Andes was on target in the 41st, 79th and 88th minute to help the Tamaraws move up the table with five points.

Andes, who had six goals last year, tallied the tournament’s second hat trick after University of Santo Tomas’s Marvin Briceno in the season opener against FEU on February 4.

In the other matches, University of the Philippines beat National University, 2-0, to regain the top spot with 13 points, while De La Salle nipped University of the East, 3-2, in a thriller to bag solo third with nine points.

Subsitute Paolo Perez netted a 49th-minute strike for the Green Archers’ match-clincher.

FEU scored two goals near the end of the first half behind Andes and Marole Bungay.

Alex Rayos Jr. tapped the ball for another goal in the 58th minute, while Audie Menzi scored a header seven minutes later that opened the floodgates for the Tamaraws.

Andes found an empty net in the 79th minute, followed by a goal by substitute Harold Alcoresa six minutes later to make it 6-0.

From a John Paul Salilig cross, Andes capped his splendid showing with an 88th minute strike.

De La Salle’s Darius Diamante opened scoring in the 30th minute from a Juan Rafael Siggaoat assist.

The Red Warriors grabbed a 2-1 lead with Mark Diano and Regil Galaura hitting their target in the 38th and 39th minute, respectively.

MEMBERS of the North Korean delegation wave flags at the women’s slalom at Yongpyong alpine center at the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea. AP

A

DAMSON University gets its mettle tested against two-time defending champion De La Salle, with the Lady Falcons trying to avoid a third straight loss in Season 80 University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) women’s volleyball tournament today at the Filoil Flying V Centre in San Juan City.

The Lady Falcons are not soaring to expectations as a dark-horse team this season, losing three of their five duels.

And they are expected to labor in regaining their winning ways against a strong De La Salle side, which won four of its five games, at 4 p.m.

Adamson University’s American coach, Airess Padda, is disappointed after getting swept by University of Santo Tomas, 9-25, 29-31, 19-25, last week, and failed to complete a comeback in five sets against Ateneo de Manila, 18-25, 25-14, 18-25, 25-15, 10-15, on Wednesday.

Padda already tweaked the rotation of the Lady Falcons, led by Jema Galanza, Chiara Permentilla, Myleen Paat, Eli Soyud, Lea Perez and setter Fen Emnas.

“We haven’t found something that is consistently working for our team yet,” Padda said.

“So that’s a little disappointing because it’s our fifth match and it would be nice to go into a fifth set and have confidence in your lineup.”

Adamson University already surpassed its 1-13 finish last season, having won two

games against Far Eastern University (FEU) and University of the Philippines. The Lady Falcons opened the year with a loss to National University on opening day.

“Of course, I’m thankful for the win, but you’re dealing with a program which has been losing for so long,” Padda said. “I feel like sometimes they don’t know how to handle success. They don’t know how to create momentum off their success—it was like we just crumbled.”

Against De La Salle, Padda wants her wards to shake off pressure and focus on their own performance.

De La Salle Head Coach Ramil de Jesus, on the other hand, wants the Lady Spikers to be cautious.

“Adamson University is dangerous when it finds its confidence and creates a momentum inside the court,” de Jesus said. “We cannot underestimate them because they are a complete team.”

The Lady Tamaraws, meanwhile, gun for their third triumph in five matches against winless University of the East (UE), which has yet to win after five games, at 2 p.m.

In the men’s side, the undefeated Tamaraws shoot for win No. 5 against the Red Warriors (0-5) at 8 a.m., De La Salle (2-3) battles Adamson University (1-4) at 10 a.m. in the other men’s duel. Lance Agcaoili

PERPETUAL CHAMPION

Members of the University of Perpetual Help juniors team pose with their trophy after they beat Letran, 25-17, 25-17, 25-17, in Game Two of the Season 93 National Collegiate Athletic Association juniors’ volleyball Finals on Thursday at the Filoil Flying V Centre in San Juan City. The title was the fourth straight and 11th overall for the Junior Altas.

The incident reveals all the inescapable political implications of the flag, both at home and abroad.

Gelber says polls consistently show that even people in countries with strong free-speech traditions like the United States support laws that illegalize flag desecration.

“Critics of flag desecration say, ‘Well, this flag is a symbol of national unity and the national flag should never be allowed to lie on the ground or be ripped or torn or stepped on,” she says. “Those are people who would not think twice when people put the flag on all kinds of objects. There are flags on underwear, bikinis, flip-flops, and nobody ever calls that flag desecration.”

RUSSIA’S anthem and flag, even its name, are barred from the games this year as punishment for its sweeping state-sponsored doping program. Its athletes are not part of Team Russia; they are called “Olympic Athlete from Russia.”

Fans at a Russian women’s hockey game mocked the designation by waving flags, with “Olympic Fan from Russia” scrawled across its white, blue and red bars.

“The International Olympic Committee cannot stop us from supporting our team,” said Oleg Pak, a 47-year-old from Vladivostok, in eastern Russia not far from the Korean border. “Even if we must call ourselves Olympic fans from Russia. Why not? It doesn’t matter to us. Team Russia, Olympic Athlete from Russia, it’s the same. We are Russians.”

Anastasiia Epifanova, a 20 -year-old student from Saint Petersburg, wasn’t sure if fans were allowed to bring in the Russian flag so she came prepared with an excuse. She cut a hole in the flag and wore it like a poncho.

“It’s not a flag. It’s my coat,” she deadpanned, sure that the ticket-takers would not take her coat in the frigid winter.

She guessed there might actually be more Russian flags in the stands because they were banned. Many Russians, like her, were motivated to attend the Olympics by what she described as “a bad attitude toward Russia.”

So Gelber finds it to be a “silly suggestion” that nationalism could somehow be removed from any international event like the Olympics— when fans will always root wildly for home teams, officially sanctioned flags or none. AP

BusinessMi

A6 Saturday, February 24, 2018 | Editor: Jun Lomibao

60 years of women’s track cycling at the UCI World Championships

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HE 2018 International Cycling Union (UCI) Track Cycling World Championships presented by Tissot marks 60 years since the addition of women to the track program in 1958.

It was last year in Hong Kong when women finally achieved parity with men for the number of world titles awarded—at 10 each.

The 1958 UCI World Championships took place in Paris with the women competing in two events—sprint and individual pursuit. Riders from the former Soviet Union won both titles with Galina Ermolaeva topping the sprint and Lyudmila Koch the individual pursuit.

The Soviet Union and Great Britain took all the medals that first year, winning three each. Ermolaeva dominated the sprint in the early years, winning five of the first six world titles for women, then again in 1972.

In the individual pursuit, Great Britain’s legendary road and track rider Beryl Burton was just as dominant, with five titles between 1959 and 1966.

Until 1988 the women continued to contest only the sprint and individual pursuit. The sprint was

FROOME: DOP ‘HYPED UP’BIN

EFORE Stage Three of t was again met by que starting his season, wh analytical finding is sti This time, he rejecte to be racing rather than facing his case.

“It’s great to be racing, not anything like that,” Froome said When asked by one journal of media interest about his urin allowed level of salbutamol in h “seemed a bit ridiculous,” Froom been hyped up in the media. An shows here at the race.”

However, he rejected the id away from the pressure. “I wou he insisted.

Taking the whole race into p a heavy travel schedule could h below-expectations performan where he had effectively won t he insisted things were going w “I obviously did a really big weeks, coming into this race, I p as much as I should have, partic over here from South Africa.

“But I’m really happy about given where I was yesterday [St thereabouts. Obviously, I’ve stil second day’s racing I’m pretty h Froome said he would not b as a result of his difficulties on t Tirreno-Adriatico remaining ne up to the Giro d’Italia.

replaced by the points race in 1988 and from 1989 to 1991, women raced all three—sprint, individual pursuit and points race.

The year 1992 saw them drop to just the points race for one year, before returning to the three events the next year.

The next increase in events was in 1995, when the 500-meter time trial was added to the program, and it stayed that way until 2002 in Copenhagen, Denmark, when the women’s program jumped to six events with the addition of the keirin and scratch race. At that time, the men had nine medal events.

It took five more years to add the team sprint for women, bringing the total number of events to seven (compared to 10 for men), but a year later the women also added the team pursuit, and the year after (2009) the Omnium, leaving the only difference the Madison, which finally became part of the women’s UCI World Championship program last year in Hong Kong.

The Madison will also feature at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. UCI News

THE MADISON OF TRACK CYCLING

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HE Madison is one of the most exciting events in track cycling—with each team of two riders taking turns sling-shotting each other into the action.

The Madison was introduced more than 125 years ago in Six Day races and became part of the International Cycling Union Track Cycling World Championships in 1995 for men, with the women achieving parity at last year’s UCI World Championships in Hong Kong.

The first women’s Madison UCI World Champions to enter the record books are the Belgian pair of Jolien D’hoore and Lotte Kopecky, who will attempt to defend their title on March 3 in Apeldoorn, The Netherlands, at the 2018 UCI Track Cycling World Championships presented by Tissot.

D’hoore, who won a bronze medal in the Omnium at the Rio de Janeiro 2016 Olympic Games, and her partner Kopecky went into the 2017 UCI World Championships as favorites for the Madison after winning the European title for the event in 2016.

Twenty-seven-year-old D’hoore remembers exactly where she was when she heard that the Madison would be added to the UCI World Championships and Olympic (2020) programs.

She also recognizes the honor of being the first UCI World Champion in the discipline.

“It feels like we made our mark in the history books, although, at this point, we’re just happy to have taken a rainbow jersey. But later, after our career, we will look back at this with another view I guess,” D’hoore said.

While the event is new for women’s international competition, D’hoore has been training for it for most of her career.

“I’ve been doing Madisons since I was 15 years old. In Belgium, you grow up with it. I used to go to the Netherlands to ride Madisons together with boys at that age,” D’hoore said.

“So, once the Madison was a new event for us, it wasn’t that hard to pick up our Madison skills again.”

“Thanks to Kenny de Ketele and Moreno de Pauw, we’re still getting better and improving our technique. We practice the Madison [at the end of] each training [session] for a couple of minutes,” she added.

However, D’hoore acknowledges that the level of competition is increasing rapidly, and that she and her teammate cannot count on retaining their title in Apeldoorn.

“Everybody has a chance to step up. It’s a fairly new event, and the evolution in every team compared to last year is huge. The level will become higher each year, and I’m looking forward to a race where everything can happen.” UCI News

A

IRELAND’S Philip Deignan says teammate Chris Froome has ma to race this season.

Froome was notified on Se an adverse analytical finding sample taken from him on Sta España exceeded the allowed salbutamol. He contends he d allowed dosage of the medica worsened during the race, an

CHRIS FROOME rejects the idea that he is racing to get away from the pressure.

Armstrong, Hincapie having fun on MTB in Arizona desert T

HE unofficial start to the US Mountain Bike (MTB) ßseason rolled out of the desert this weekend with a couple of special guests as Lance Armstrong and George Hincapie took part in the 19th annual “24 Hours in the Old Pueblo” relay race outside of Tuscon, Arizona.

Epic Rides’s 24-hour event began the mountain biking season with more than 4,000 people camping at the race north of Tucson. This year the 2,000 spots for racers sold out in just seven hours. It remains the largest 24-hour mountain biking event in the United States and certainly one of the largest in the world.

Former pros Armstrong and Hincapie planned to join Christian Vande Velde and Dylan Casey in the four-person Men’s Open, but Vande Velde fell ill before the event and was replaced by triathlete Julia Polloreno.

“It’s a killer vibe, really, not like anything else I’ve done before,” Armstrong said. “We rode yesterday, and

HOW NOT TO DO A BIKE CHANGE DAM BLYTHE of Aqua Blue Sport had an anticlimactic finish to the Tour of Oman after he was disqualified for an “irregular bike change” on stage 6. Blythe had been targeting victory on the stage, which was won by Alexander Kristoff (UAE Team Emirates), after finishing sixth in the bunch sprint on Day 1.

Blythe had an issue with his bike and, as the race approached the final circuits around the Matrah Corniche, the team decided to change it. Unlike with the roof racks on the team’s usual cars, the racks on the vehicles at the Tour of Oman do not allow full bikes to be placed into them, so they must be attached with one wheel missing. The team was given permission to go ahead and prepare the bike, but there appeared to be confusion as to how the bike must be given to Blythe.

“The guys went ahead to get my bike ready so that I could change it because I had a problem with it beforehand,” Blythe explained after arriving at the team

FROOME IS RIGHT TO RA

parking area while the race continued around him. “So, as the peloton went past, I went ahead and changed my bike and started to get back to the bunch, and then the commissaire said, ‘No, you’re out’. It was behind the peloton when I changed, which is allowed. The car was still there, it’s not like they left it there.”

President of the race jury Jean-Pierre Coppenolle explained after the race that, while the team had been allowed to go up the road to give them time to set up the bike for Blythe, the bike needed to be delivered from the team car and not from the side of the road, which is what happened.

“The team manager of Blythe asked me if he could go to the front of the bunch to prepare the bike. I said, ok, I understand because the new system with the brakes is not easy,” Coppenolle said. “He went to the front and prepared the bike but, for the changing of the bike, it must happen from behind the bunch and from the car, and only from the car. He gave him the bike, but from the ground, that is not allowed in the rules.” Cyclingnews

the weather was pouring rain, cold and miserable. Now, because of the rain, the course is perfect.”

Armstrong is banned from officially sanctioned events, so the relaxed atmosphere and community at the Epic Rides 24-hour mountain bike race was a perfect fit for him and his crew.

When asked about the Wedo Team strategy this year, Armstrong didn’t hesitate.

“We’re going slow, having fun and drinking.” Having said that, Hincapie, who is expected to race at Cape Epic again this year, consistently recorded some of the fastest laps on the course, finishing two of his three laps in less than an hour each,” he said.

The team eventually finished in the bottom half of the category.

Racing took place on Willow Springs Ranch about 30 miles from Tucson, to the

west of the 3,050-meter Catalina Mountain Range. While Tucson has had an extremely mild and dry winter, two solid days of rain on Thursday and Friday made the car trip to the race extremely difficult. Bonnie Springs Road, a 19-kilometer dirt road that leads to the event, actually had to be closed to non-four-wheel vehicles on Friday due to the deep mud.

The course is 25.5-km long and consists of desert single track, fire road and some very rocky terrain. There were 375 meters of climbing per lap. The top riders were able to average an astounding 28-km per hour on the course.

Taylor Lideen from Phoenix won the Solo Men’s race with a total of 20 laps or 512 kms. His fastest lap was 1:02 and slowest was 1:24 during the night.

Kaitlyn Boyle from Prescott, Arizona, won the Solo Female race with 17 laps. Carla Williams from Roanoke, Virginia, also rode 17 laps but 43 minutes slower than Boyle.

The Average Joey’s four-person Men’s Open Team won that category by clocking an impressive 22 laps for 563 kms. M&M Cycling Youngsters finished in second place with 21 laps. CZ Racing’s four-Person Women’s Open team crushed the competition with an astounding 19

laps. The closest team to them had 14 laps.

Timon Fish from Albuquerque, New Mexico, won the Men’s Singlespeed race with 18 laps. Ann Sudoh won the Women’s Singlespeed race with 13 laps. Lindsay Nohl also clocked 13 laps, but was 48 minutes off the pace of Sudoh.

In one of the most impressive results of the weekend, Nash Dory and Collin DiMattio completed 22 laps in the Duo Male category, equaling the winning result of the four-person Average Joey’s Open Team.

Esther Blom-Geiser and Rachel Alter completed 16 laps to win the Duo Female competition.

Todd Sadow, Epic Rides president and cofounder, was pleased with the weekend. He remarked, “To see the growing popularity of the #24HOP is proof the 24-hour relay race format is a great way to gather folks who love the outdoors and mountain bikes.”

The 2018 edition of the 24-Hours in the Old Pueblo was dedicated to Victoria Cramer, who is a published author and cancer survivor. She has missed only two years of the event, and even raced while undergoing chemotherapy. Her struggle is documented in her memoir, “Living Life Loudly.”

Cyclingnews

De Plus: Mental damage has be L AURENS DE PLUS has opened up about his second serious crash and injury in the space of a few months, saying the psychological impact has been greater than the physical in an interview with Belgian broadcaster Sporza.

After fracturing his knee in a dramatic crash at Il Lombardia last October, the 22-year-old broke his pelvis last month when he and Quick-Step Floors teammate Petr Vakoc were hit by a truck while

training in South Africa in preparation for the 2018 season.

On both occasions, the crashes could potentially have had much more severe consequences, which, combined with their proximity, has taken its toll psychologically.

“The mental damage was certainly great in the first weeks. I had the feeling that everything was lost,” de Plus told Sporza.

“It can be over from one day to the next, and you realize that. Vakoc and I were in the hospital together. You can raise your thumb for an Instagram photo, but I do not want anyone to see what we experienced there.

BELGIAN Lauren de Plus is having flashbacks after Il Lombardia and South Africa crashes.

irror CYCLING

mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph | Saturday, February 24, 2018 A7

PING ISSUE N MEDIA

the Ruta del Sol, Chris Froome estions from journalists about hile his antidoping adverse ill pending. ed claims that he was relieved intense media scrutiny about

about tension or relief or d. “It’s the start of my season.” list if the “whole pantomime” ne turning up with twice the his Vuelta a España sample me answered: “It’s definitely nyone can see that. It shows, it

dea that he was racing to get uldn’t say that. I’m here racing,”

perspective, Froome said that have been to blame for his nce on the Alto de Allanadas, the Ruta del Sol in 2015. But well. g workload over the last few probably haven’t freshened up cularly with the travel coming

t where I am at the moment, tage Two] I was there or ll got work to do, but for a happy with how it’s all going.” be changing his race schedule the Stage Two climb, with ext on the agenda in his build-

ACE

he feels that his Sky ade the right choice by opting

eptember 20, 2017, of (AAF) because a urine age 18 of the Vuelta a d limit of the asthma drug did not exceed the Wadaation, saying that his asthma nd he followed his team

doctor’s recommendation to increase his dose.

While his case was still being reviewed by the UCI, Froome started the Ruta del Sol on Wednesday, as is allowed under UCI rules, which do not require a provisional suspension in cases of “specified substances” like salbutamol.

There have been calls from UCI President David Lappartient, along with some riders and team managers, for Froome to step aside while his AAF for salbutamol case is resolved. But Deignan is not among their numbers. Like Movistar’s Mikel Landa, Deignan believes that Froome should race on.

“Chris is totally entitled to be here,” Deignan said before the start of Stage Two of the Ruta del Sol. “When he’s done nothing wrong, I think it’s unfair to ask him to sit out from races, possibly six months of the year, if it takes that long to get this sorted.”

Deignan said the current morale inside Team Sky is good. “We all just get on with the job. You see everything in the media, but we don’t let it affect us.”

Later in Stage Two, Sky’s morale was strengthened further after Wout Poels took the stage win and overall lead.

Deignan said he is in good shape, too, after a solid off-season of training toward 2018.

“The off-season and preseason training went really well, really consistent, so I’m very happy where I am,” said Deignan, who is racing the Ruta del Sol for the first time in his career.

“I would say I’m about the same as I was at this time last year. I had a very long break, five weeks off the bike and I’ve bumped it up nice and slow since then.

“It’s probably the first winter I spent almost all of my time in [his home base of] Monaco, so staying in one place meant I could get into a good routine. I’ve stayed healthy and consistent. There are 10 or 12 guys from Sky there, and a couple more in Nice, so there’s a massive group there, and it’s almost like a team base, and there’s plenty of people to go training with. And the weather was OK, too.”

The 34-year-old’s program before the Giro will be the Volta a Catalunya, an altitude training camp, the Tour of the Alps and then the Italian Grand Tour. “There’s some hard blocks in there with Catalunya and the Alps, but with some good training blocks too, so I won’t get too tired. It’s a pretty nice buildup.”

Then he will head to Italy for another Corsa Rosa.

“I’ve done the Giro six or seven times”—first in 2008, then working as a domestique for Carlos Sastre in Cervelo and all the way through to working with Landa and Geraint Thomas in last year’s ill-fated race for Team Sky’s GC hopes.

Recalling Sastre, who had won the Tour in 2008 and started the Giro as a top favorite, Deignan recollects that “Carlos was very laid back about it all and a very different style of leader. He’d sit at the back and hide in the bunch and then just appear at the last minute when he needed to.”

Deignan’s own 2018 targets are more about working hard and well for Froome and the other leaders, rather than taking personal cracks at glory. “The big goal is to be there for the Giro d’Italia, but I need to be there and ready to do a job at all of these races. Just always to be at a good level.” Cyclingnews

Froome winds up 10th in Ruta del Sol

M

ADRID —Chris Froome finished Spain’s Ruta del Sol race in 10th place behind winner Tim Wellens last Sunday.

The five-stage race in southern Spain was Froome’s first event since the four-time Tour de France winner was found to have failed a doping test at last year’s Spanish Vuelta.

Froome, who denies any wrongdoing, has been ordered to explain to the International Cycling Union why a urine sample he provided at the Spanish Vuelta

that last September showed a concentration of the asthma drug salbutamol at twice the permitted level.

Wellens, a Belgian rider for Lotto-Soudal, defended his lead over the final day’s time trial.

Wout Poels, of Froome’s Sky Team, was second at eight seconds behind.

Froome, who won the event in 2015, finished one minute and 57 seconds behind. He started the time trial on the final day in 14th after a puncture toward the end of Saturday’s fourth stage. AP

LANCE ARMSTRONG handles the slickrock with ease.

een greater than physical pain “There have been very very difficult moments, which I sometimes still have, especially when I consider that it could have been even worse. I had just had my crash in Lombardy, and then this happened. The mental damage has perhaps been even greater than the physical.”

De Plus says he has had a great deal of support, from friends and family to team doctors and professional psychologists, but it’s still been tough to overcome.

“Sometimes the film plays out again in my sleep, and then it all comes back,” he said. “That will be part of the processing process, but I still have to try to get it out of my mind.”

De Plus says it is likely that he will make a full recovery and be able to make the most of a promising career. He still has to use crutches, but is set to start riding again indoors next week.

Originally he was due to ride the Giro d’Italia in May, as he did last

year, but his 2018 schedule is still up in the air.

“In South Africa I felt that I was growing toward my top form.

Now I have to start from scratch again. The big goal this year was the Giro d’Italia and I still hope for that, but I also have to be realistic—first see how everything evolves and then see when I can make my comeback,” he said.

“I will assume that I will soon be able to find my top condition again. It is now a bit of a chase, but I still hope to catch up with the front-runners.

“I have had a lot of support, from colleagues, friends, relatives, and even from people I did not expect. That has done a lot of good, and I’m dedicating myself to coming back. Also, I get the feeling that after the crash in Lombardy, I quickly got back into the good flow, and those two things strengthen me in my belief that I can still make it a great season.” Cyclingnews

OurTime BusinessMirror

A8 Saturday, February 24, 2018 • Editor: Efleda P. Campos

Elderly get free training on digital communication

By Manuel T. Cayon

D

@awimailbox Mindanao Bureau Chief

AVAO CITY—Senior citizens in the interior province of Compostela Valley got a free mentoring at digital literacy in a special program by the provincial government intended solely for them.

The digital-literacy program for the elderly was coordinated with the senior high-school management in the province, which were sending senior high-school students on their work immersion to apply their different technical and vocational skills, including electronic and digital-communication skills.

Joyzel R. Odi, chief of the province’s Information Technology and Communication Development Division, said the learners were taught on how to use Facebook, Google, Youtube and electronic mails, or emails, using their laptop computers, or cellular or mobile phones.

She said the participants were senior citizens from Barangay Santa Maria, Nabunturan.

The provincial information office quoted a grandmother among the participants as saying in the dialect: “Many of us are happy that we learned how to use the Internet.

We would like to have more trainings of this kind. In fact, our fellow participants are now chatting with their children abroad.”

Odi said the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) chose the beneficiaries of the training, and further shouldered the food, venue and accommodation of the participants.

“We are the resource speakers.

We are tasked to assist and orient the beneficiaries in basic computing concepts, internet use, applications, collaborations and productivity apps,” Odi added.

The DICT partnered with the provincial government of Compostela Valley to hold the three-day digital-literacy hands-on training for senior citizens from February 7 to 9 at the DICT training hub, Poblacion, Nabunturan, Compostela Valley.

The organizers assigned senior high-school students the digitalliteracy training as part of their work immersion.

Odi added the assigned students expressed satisfaction, saying it was a different experience to teach the elderly. At the same time, many students were also introduced to the digital gadgets, such as laptop computers, and how to open softwares and applications.

“I am happy that I know how to operate a laptop, especially in the basic operations, how to open, encoding, surfing for FB, Google, Youtube and [how] to create an account,” said Christian Ybañez, a senior highschool student at Camanlangan National High School.

Another student, Rannie Lachica, said she expected only to help in the training, but found out they were also introduced to the gadgets, including installing cables for the Wi-fi connection.

The provincial information office said the digital-literacy program adopts the DICT Tech4Ed project for digital inclusion for special sectors, such as women, PWDs, senior citizens, overseas Filipino workers including their families and relatives, career shifters and teachers.

T

ence with the council a “bothersome thing,” but chalks some of it up to a political miscalculation.

“When I ran for mayor, there were two people who ran for council unopposed, and that was a big mistake,” he said. “I mean, I should have had two people run with me—at least I would have had two people on the council that I could count on.”

Tinton Falls has a nonpartisan government, so the council does not caucus as political parties or proclaim allegiance to Republicans or Democrats. Perillo is a registered Republican, though he said that was because of a single vote long ago, adding that he has always been an independent.

The battle with the council has quickly enveloped the entire town.

Perillo’s supporters have launched a Facebook group to back him, while his campaign Facebook has also been pushing his arguments.

Soon, hundreds of people were flooding the normally staid Council sessions, loudly cheering on their new mayor. It elicited a rare emotion from Perillo: surprise.

“I don’t know what was going on,” he said. “The public was doing more than I was. There were people who thought I wasn’t being treated fairly.”

Some council members described their early dealings with Perillo as “challenging,” attributing it to the mayor’s inexperience. “He is very new at politics, and the things that go on in the internal side of it,” said Christopher Pak, a councilman. “But he’s working hard toward making it work.”

If there is a starting point for

More than 13K senior citizens from Iloilo City get social pension

I

FISH SELLER Nanay Juanita, an elderly fish seller, sells fish in an Ilocos Sur public market to help her family instead of simply staying at home. MAU VICTA

Bacoor seniors laud LTFRB for prioritizing elderly in buses

S

ENIOR citizens in Bacoor City, Cavite, are lauding the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) for its effort to implement the law by giving them and other disadvantaged groups priority when boarding buses.

The LTFRB have also required buses to reserve seats to seniors, persons with disabilities (PWDs) and pregnant women.

The LTFRB has compelled bus companies and operators to implement Republic Act 967 and Batas Pambansa Bilang 344 to reserve seats in public-utility vehicles for senior citizens, people with disabilities and pregnant women.

Public Relations Officer Leonardo Canta of the Sorrento Senior Citizens Association in Panapaan IV of Bacoor City had sent letters to the LTFRB to implement the law. The LTFRB acted and held a consultative meeting with bus owners.

The meeting resulted in giving priority to the elderly, PWDs and pregnant women in bus terminals.

These groups are allowed to ride local buses first.

However, in many instances, conductors of buses allow young and able-bodied passengers to occupy the reserved seats. Consequently, older people, PWDs and pregnant women end up standing at the aisles.

Canta contacted the LTFRB and apprised the government agency of the situation. After several letters, buses operating in the metropolis started implementing the law. Conductors and drivers remind young and able-bodied passengers not to occupy the reserved seats. Now, passengers on city buses know where to sit.

However, provincial buses—particularly in Cavite—continue to ignore the law. Canta wrote to the LTFRB, citing noncompliance of the provincial buses. Canta cited Donato Dinco Jr. of the Cavite Batangas Transport Service, who keeps reminding passengers not to occupy the seats reserved for the elderly.

Freshman New Jersey mayor, at 93, tackles same old problems INTON FALLS, New Jersey—The new mayor here looked gleefully down at the 6-month-old girl, the daughter of a councilman, but opted against the traditional political peck on the baby’s cheek—it was the germs, he said.

Of course, there is not much that is traditional about this first-term mayor, Vito Perillo. He is a 93-year-old World War II veteran who had never held elected office. His campaign consisted largely of knocking on every door in town, accompanied by his campaign manager, and wearing out two pairs of shoes in the process. He defeated a two-term incumbent who had been involved in the borough’s government for nearly two decades.

His surprise victory last fall gave him a national profile—even Lester Holt of NBC came for an interview. Tinton Falls, a quaint town of roughly 18,000 people 5 miles inland from the Jersey Shore, was quickly in the spotlight, and it had its new mayor to thank.

But now, after several weeks in office, he is running into the kind of traditional problem that plagues mayors across the country: a disagreeable Borough Council.

“There’s been a lot of pushback, but things are getting better now,” Perillo said. He had expected to be able to appoint his choice for borough administrator and borough attorney quickly, but the Council was not moving as fast as he hoped.

It took more than a month, but he finally has his administrator, Michael Skudera, though he is still waiting for the borough lawyer to be approved. He calls his experi-

www.businessmirror.com.ph

LOILO CITY—Beneficiaries of the national government’s Social Pension Program for Indigent Senior Citizens here have received their benefits for the past two quarters of 2017.

Cherry Lyn S. Bermejo, Social Welfare Officer III and focal person for senior citizens and persons with disabilities, said on February 21 that 13,190 indigent senior citizens from this city are qualified for the program.

She said the distribution for the social pension of 12,419 pensioners entitled to a P3,000 pension was held from February 6 to 15.

Those with claims starting on the second quarter of last year, worth P4,500 was held last January 23. The distribution covered 771 pensioners.

The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) downloaded to the Iloilo City government a total of P40,726,500 for the pension of identified recipients.

However, she said they are giving those who have not claimed their pension until February 23 to claim their money.

Thereafter, they will proceed with the liquidation to process the pension for the first quarter of this year.

She said that, for now, they stick to the more or less 13,000 pensioners who are dependent on the DSWD, whether or not to increase the recipients.

Iloilo City has nearly 50,000 senior citizens. Indigent elderly who did not qualify for the national pension program were provided a P1,000 pension annually by the city government.

Annually, the city government extends some P5 million for the localized social pension under the social-welfare program of the local government here.

The qualified recipients were chosen in partnership with the federation of senior citizens affairs office. PNA

650 senior citizens in Bacolod receive P1.95-M social pension

B

TINTON Falls, New Jersey, Mayor Vito Perillo greets a customer at Woody’s Ocean Grille, on February 12. Perillo, a World War II veteran, was elected to his first term as mayor of Tinton Falls at 93. BRYAN ANSELM/THE NEW YORK TIMES

Perillo’s decades-long, relatively unplanned drift into politics, it might be sometime in the past year, when he finally reached a breaking point with his property-tax bill, and grew increasingly angry at what he viewed was opaque spending by the town’s administration. A whistle-blower lawsuit involving the Police Department that cost his town $1.1 million further motivated him.

“I wanted to find out what was going on, actually,” he said. “That kind of ticked me off a little bit.”

So he made up his mind to run.

Or, more precisely, walk. “I asked a previous mayor, I say, ‘Mayor soand-so, how’d you get elected, what was your secret?’” explained Perillo. “‘Vito,’ he says, ‘You gotta walk.’”

In a stroke of luck in a campaign marked by good fortune, Perillo’s campaign manager, Steve Leech, was a former postal worker. Perhaps no one was better suited to canvass the 15-square-mile borough.

“We didn’t really see the point of mailing a flyer out if we could walk them to people’s doors,” said Leech, 60, who has also been Perillo’s nextdoor neighbor since 1992.

So the two men with no political experience (Leech says he did technically serve as campaign manager for a student council president in high school—“I’m two-for-two now”) set out for a months-long walkabout.

Sometimes they just left flyers, while other times visits led to ex-

tended conversations. Perillo was always proud to end an encounter with a handshake, a grip that, even after 93 years—38 of them as an electrical engineer for the defense department, plus a tour in the South Pacific during World War II—can still crack a knuckle.

His vigor, he says, comes from keeping his body in motion. He tries to play golf at least twice a week, though he laments that he uses a golf cart now, and considers himself a consistent player (“Sometimes I wish I could hit it like him,” said his grandson, Mike PerilloGentile). Perillo also belongs to the local YMCA, regularly completing a demanding circuit of “about 10 to 12 machines.” New York Times News Service

ACOLOD CIT Y—A tota l of 650 senior citizens received P1.95 million in government social pension from the city government during the turnover rites on Monday facilitated by the Department of Social Services and Development (DSSD) here.

Mayor Evelio Leonardia, Vice Mayor El Cid Familiaran and DSSD head Pacita Tero led the distribution to the beneficiaries from various barangays.

Each senior citizen received a total of P3,000, or P500 each month covering six months.

The age requirement of beneficiaries has been lowered to 60 years, with additional funds as provided for by Republic Act 9994 or the Expanded Senior Citizens Act of 2010.

Originally, only senior citizens aged 77 and above received the pension, but the age was later lowered to 65, and then 60 years old.

An elderly will also qualify as program beneficiary if they are sickly, frail and with disability, have no regular source of income, as well as with no financial support from family members and pension from the Social Security System, Government Service Insurance System, and the Philippine Veterans Affairs Office. PNA

BusinessMirror

Editor: Gerard S. Ramos • lifestylebusinessmirror@gmail.com

Saturday, February 24, 2018 A9

Long lines for Xiaomi Philippines’ first store The Quicksilver x Pacsafe 25L Anti-Theft Backpack

Your tech life is in the bag This year Pacsafe (www.pacsafe.com) spotlights a one-of-a-kind collaboration with another respected adventure gear brand, Quiksilver. The Quiksilver x Pacsafe collection aims to incorporate the stylish, edgy aesthetic of the pioneer boardsports brand into Pacsafe’s roster of signature travel safety features. Available in Urbanize and Pacsafe stores, plus all Travel Club and Rustan’s branches, the collaboration features two unique pieces made for any kind of traveler, especially those who love to go on adventures.

The Quicksilver x Pacsafe 40L Anti-Theft Carry-On Pack has unique safety and convenience features, such as a removable dry bag, heavy-duty tarpaulin pockets and storage space for the board rider with lots of gear to go. Anti-theft technology, such as an eXomesh slashguard, Carrysafe slashguard straps and secured zip tabs, makes it theft-proof, perfect for adventures sans the fear. Meanwhile, the Quicksilver x Pacsafe 25L AntiTheft Backpack is good for both wet adventurers and city travelers. Its multiorganizational storage allots ample and secure spaces for laptops, tablets and gadgets, while safety features such as the PopNLock security clip allows travelers to anchor the bag to fixed object like a table leg or post, without the threat of being stolen. All Pacsafe-pioneered security features are shared by both models, along with Quicksilver’s striking “Heavy Water” boardshorts lining. Clearly, with Quiksilver x Pacsafe, there’s high adventures waiting to be experienced—all done with peace of mind.

Meanwhile, adventurers with more diverse adventures can find their perfect carry on from Pacsafe’s Venturesafe X series, featuring seven different styles fit for any trip, whether that’s a quick mountain hike or a lengthy backpacking expedition. The Venturesafe X line can go compact, with the Venturesafe X Waistpack and Venturesafe X Slingpack suitable for lightweight travels that require quick mobility and the bare essentials.

However, epic explorations are also possible as the Venturesafe X prepared five different backpacks that allow you to go into high gear, carrying all necessary travel equipment in one load, complete with Pacsafe’s security innovations that will bring you fearlessly from one destination to another.

primetime

diNna chan vasquez @dinnachanvasquez luckydinna@gmail.com

T

he Mi Authorized Reseller store in TriNoma, Quezon City, is not expansive with a floor area of 108 square meters. But in terms of merchandise, you’d be very surprised at what Xiaomi Philippines has

to offer.

The range of products—from smartphones, laptops and mobile accessories, to umbrellas, shoes and luggage—is quite robust.

Xiaomi Philippines Brand Manager Joyce Borlagdan explained that Mi Authorized Reseller, which is owned and operated by Grimalkin Corp., is a lifestyle store and not just a retail space for gadgets.

“Xiaomi’s business model is to work with manufacturers of products of specific types. They utilize the techology of those products to make their own and sell these products at a lower cost,” she said.

For instance, Xiaomi sells a self-balancing scooter in China that was manufactured by a company that’s known for that product. The same is true for Xiaomi’s powerbanks and headphones.

When Xiaomi Philippines opened in TriNoma on February 17, I was astounded at the long lines of people

wanting to get into the store. I learned that many of them started lining up at 5 am just to get first dibs on the products.

A Xiaomi representative from China was present during the event but he directed us to the local distributor for the interview.

“Xiaomi has an organic fan base in the Philippines.

We just made an announcement on our Facebook page and people showed up,” Borlagdan said.

Mi Philippines had trucks on standby that day so that the store would be fully stocked no matter how much and how many people shopped. I saw pictures of the store at 10 pm and people were still shopping.

The Xiaomi Redmi 4A is the most affordable Android-powered smartphone at the store. The 2GB RAM + 16GB ROM version is priced at P4,795 and the one with 2GB RAM and a larger 32GB onboard storage is P5,350. Each handset has a 5-inch HD IPS display, 13 MP rear cam, 5MP front shooter, 3,120mAh battery pack and Quad Core 2.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 425 processor. The Redmi 4A has been described as an attractive option for an entry-level phone.

The most expensive phone at the Mi store right

now is the Mi Mix, which is priced at P25,500. It has an edge-to-edge 6.4-inch Full HD AMOLED panel, a 16MP rear camera, 5MP selfie camera, Snapdragon 821 processor, 6GB RAM and 256GB storage. The phone has received good reviews for its design and performance.

Aside from the phones, we saw other interesting items inside the store. These include Mi Induction Heating Pressure Rice Cooker (P4,200), Mi Air Purifier 2 (P6,490), Mi Smart Scale (P995), MiJia Electric Scooter (P18,850), plus wearables such as the Mi Band 2 (P1,199).

For 2018, Xiaomi plans to open two more stores.

The first one, said Borlagdan, will be the 200-squaremeter flagship store in SM Megamall’s Cyberzone area. The target opening date is in March. The second one will possibly be in SM Mall of Asia.

“The goal is to have a Mi Philippines store in every city in Metro Manila but not every store has to be owned by Grimalkin Corp. We can actually franchise it,” Borlagdan added.

The Mi Authorized Reseller store is at the fifth floor of Trinoma, near Cinema 5.

Facebook forges ahead with kids app despite expert criticism

By Barbara Ortutay Associated Press

NEW YORK—Facebook is forging ahead with its messaging app for kids, despite child experts who have pressed the company to shut it down and others who question Facebook’s financial support of some advisers who approved of the app.

Messenger Kids lets kids under 13 chat with friends and family. It displays no ads and lets parents approve who their children message. But critics say it serves to lure kids into harmful social-media use and to hook young people on Facebook as it tries to compete with Snapchat or its own Instagram app. They say kids shouldn’t be on such apps at all—although they often are.

“It is disturbing that Facebook, in the face of widespread concern, is aggressively marketing Messenger Kids to even more children,” the Campaign For a Commercial-Free Childhood said in a statement this week.

Messenger Kids launched on iOS to lukewarm reception last December. It arrived on Amazon devices in January and on Android on Wednesday.

Continued on A10

Smart Infocast boosts disaster preparedness of Bogo City Residents of Bogo City in Cebu will now benefit from the services of Smart Infocast, a communications solution by PLDT wireless unit Smart Communications.

Smart Infocast is a web-based platform that offers various SMS facilities catering to the needs of an organization.

The system will enable the local government unit of Bogo to send news broadcasts, weather bulletins and other critical information to residents via text message, making it an effective emergency communications solution. It also allows registered subscribers to send reports or feedback to the system administrator.

Just last month Bogo was placed under state of calamity when Tropical Storm Urduja (international code name Kai-tak) hit the Visayas. In 2013 it was also one of the cities devastated by Supertyphoon Yolanda ( international code name Haiyan). Located more than

100 km from Cebu City, Bogo has a population of more than 70,000, based on 2015 census.

By providing a means to disseminate timely messages to the public, Smart empowers communities to strengthen their communication and disaster-preparedness efforts, according to Visayas-Mindanao Public Affairs Head Atty. Maria Jane Paredes.

“We’re very happy that the city of Bogo believes in Smart Infocast as a vital tool of communication in times of disasters. It can also be used by the LGU to send out important information to the community, such as advisories, reminders and safety precautions,” Paredes said during the inauguration of the service at the New Bogo City Hall.

The platform will further enhance Bogo’s existing communication services, according to Bogo Public Information Officer Rhett Vincent Minguez.

“With the Smart Infocast broadcast system, we’ve been given the opportunity to strengthen our communications system. It complements our existing channels and ensures our messages reach our audience,” Minguez said.

Smart Infocast has boosted the communication efforts of the institutions where it has been implemented, among them local government units, government agencies and other organizations.

Under its #SafePH advocacy, Smart promotes the use of technology to help mitigate disaster risk in communities. The company has developed other preparedness programs and solutions, such as the Emergency Cell Broadcast System (ECBS); the Batingaw emergency app; and the TNT Tropang Ready youth readiness caravans, among other projects, in its efforts to reduce vulnerabilities.

Representatives from Smart and the Bogo City local government and Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office during the turnover of Smart Infocast to the city at the New Bogo City Hall.

A10 Saturday, February 24, 2018

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The Anki Cozmo coding robot was on display at CES International in Las Vegas. Cozmo, which debuted in 2016, now comes with an app called Code Lab that allows kids to drag and drop blocks of code that control its movements and animations.

They can even access facial- and object-recognition functions enabled

by Cozmo’s frontfacing camera. AP

BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

4 robots that aim to teach your kids to code

By Ryan Nakashima Associated Press

L

AS VEGAS—You’ve seen apps and toys that promise to teach your child to code.

Now enter the robots.

At the CES electronics show in January, coding robots came out in force. One convention hall area was packed with everything from chip-embedded, alphabet-like coding blocks to turtle-like tanks that draw on command.

Of course, no one can really say how well these coding bots teach kids, or even whether learning to code is the essential life skill that so many in the tech industry claim. After all, by the time today’s elementary-school kids are entering the work force, computers may well be programming themselves.

But experts like Jeff Gray, a computer science professor at the University of Alabama and an adviser to the nonprofit coding education group Code.org, say kids can derive other benefits from coding robots and similar toys. They can, for instance, learn “persistence and grit” when the toys inevitably do something unintended, he says.

So if you’re in the market for a coding robot that teaches and maybe even entertains, here’s a look at four that were on display at CES. But beware: None of them are cheap.

CUBETTO London-based Primo Toys, the makers of this mobile wooden block, believes kids can learn coding concepts at age 3 before they can even read. And they don’t even need a screen.

The “Cubetto” block on wheels responds to where chip-embedded pieces are put on a wooden board.

Different colors represent different commands—for example, to “go straight” or “turn left.”

Kids can bunch together a number of commands into what’s called a function and can also make Cubetto repeat actions in a loop.

Pros: Good for parents who want to avoid more screens.

Cons: Doesn’t offer an immediate path to real coding.

Price: $226 Shipping: Now Online: www.primotoys.com ROOT Root Robotics’s flattish, hexagonal droid has downward-facing scanners, magnetic wheels,

/

touch-reactive panels, lights, motion sensors and a pen-grabbing hole in the center of its body.

Controlling it does require a screen.

The Cambridge, Massachusetts, company also claims kids don’t need to be able to read and can start playing with Root at age 4.

Root draws, moves, sees and reacts to touch and various other commands. Kids can use Root to start drawing lines and progress to creating snowflakelike mathematical patterns called fractals.

Cofounder Zee Dubrovsky says his daughter began coding with Root at age 4, and progressed up to the point where her robot drew her name on a whiteboard in school.

Pros: Sturdy frame; kids can progress from graphical block-based codes to text coding.

Cons: Requires lots of clean, flat-surface area, preferably whiteboards. Root has three difficulty levels, some of which wade into deeper math, so parental time commitment could be considerable.

The Kickstarter-launched company has taken a while to ship items, so delivery could be delayed.

Price: $199 Shipping: June 2018 (although the company

has been working to fulfill Kickstarter orders since May 2017.)

Online: www.codewithroot.com COZMO This bundle of personality on wheels debuted in 2016. It now comes with an app called Code Lab, which allows kids to drag and drop blocks of code that control its movements and animations.

They can even access facial and object recognition functions enabled by Cozmo’s front-facing camera.

Cozmo, recommended for kids aged 8 and up, looks like a little tractor and can pick up interactive cubes, which are included.

Part of its appeal are the twitches and tweets that make it seem like an energetic pet, according to Boris Sofman, the CEO and co-founder of Cozmo maker Anki, based in San Francisco.

Pros: Its expressive eyes and movements make it seem like a little R2-D2.

Cons: Because it’s so full of personality, there might be a disconnect between programming it to do things and just letting it be itself.

Price: $180

Shipping: Now Online: www.anki.com/en-us/cozmo

EVO This dome-shaped, wheeled dynamo about the height of a fewfingers looks for direction right out of the box—and comes equipped to follow around any finger placed before its frontal camera.

“We want kids to immediately engage with a robot,” says Nader Hamda, founder and CEO of Evo’s maker, Redondo Beach, California-based Ozobot.

The robot makes sounds, flashes lights, moves and can sense and react to its environment.

An app helps kids—aged 8 and up—program Evo to do what they want. The bot’s downward-facing scanners also let it follow lines drawn on regular paper, some of which embody coding instructions.

For instance, blue-black-blue gets it to speed up; green-red-green-red tells it to spin.

Pros: It’s cheaper than other coding bots.

Cons: It doesn’t do quite as much as other bots.

Price: $89 Shipping: Now Online: ozobot.com

Kathryn Bernardo gets M-powered with the newest Canon EOS M100

As an embodiment of style and substance, young star Kathryn Bernardo joins Team Canon Philippines.

Even at a young age, Kathryn Bernardo has always had an attachment to a camera. Aside from being always in front of it, she has always secretly wanted to learn more about photography, especially since she wishes to use the power of photography to change people’s lives. Canon Marketing Philippines Inc. (CMPI) recognizes this personal desire of the actress, thus making her the perfect fit, as the world-renowned camera brand partnered with her in launching its latest addition to its line of mirrorless cameras: the Canon EOS M100, which now available at Canon dealers nationwide or lazada.com.ph/shop-canon.

“We are very happy to welcome Kathryn Bernardo to the Canon family and officially make her part of #TeamCanonPH,” says Benny Yu, consumer group director of CMPI. “We know that Filipinos admire her beyond just being a celebrity. Her heart for others, particularly for children, is an admirable trait. We’re here to support her vision to use her rekindled love for

photography to be a platform of inspiration that will eventually benefit others.”

“Our latest addition to our mirrorless cameras, the Canon EOS M100, is a fit for her as she brings her photography game a notch higher. It’s perfect for her style with its sleek design. The pictures it produces deliver depth for strong storytelling, and its functionality enhances the experience of taking and sharing photos in an instant,” Yu adds.

Kathryn, 21, discloses where her enthusiasm for photography comes from, especially now that she’s endorsing the leading camera brand in the country.

“Ever since I was young, I already loved taking photos. I always make it a point to have a camera with me when I travel, or during shoots or events, because I like keeping memories,” Bernardo adds. “My camera is filled with photos of my dogs and my niece.! But given the chance and [more] time, I want to enroll in a photography class.

Being around professional photographers all the time

like Mark Nicdao and Sara Black really inspires me to take photos the way they do,” she shares.

Kathryn expresses she wants to learn how to eventually shoot uncanny and unique images, whether in portrait or street photography, using her Canon EOS M100, and share them in an instant just like a true millennial. “The Canon EOS M100 is a good start for me to learn how to shoot like them. The functions are so easy to manipulate and learn, and I get better quality photos and videos than what I used to get before. This makes documenting and sharing memories a lot easier for me, too,” Kathryn adds.

The uncomplicated technology, handiness, connectivity and uncompromising quality of Canon EOS M100 are the things that Kathryn loves about her new camera. As it is the camera that suits the lifestyle of Filipino millennials like her, it is the perfect tool to add to the range of must-have gadgets, and for sharing professional-like quality photos and videos in an instant.

Facebook forges ahead with kids app despite expert criticism Continued from A9

Throughout, Facebook has touted a team of advisers, academics and families who helped shape the app in the year before it launched.

But a Wired report this week pointed out that more than half of this safety advisory board had financial ties to the company.

Facebook confirmed this and said it hasn’t hidden donations to these individuals and groups—although it hasn’t publicized them, either.

Facebook’s donations to groups like the National PTA (the official name for the Parent Teacher Association) typically covered logistics costs or sponsored activities like antibullying programs or events, such as parent roundtables. One advisory group, the Family Online Safety Institute, has a Facebook executive on its board, along with execs from Disney, Comcast and Google.

“We sometimes provide funding to cover programmatic or logistics expenses, to make sure our work together can have the most impact,” Facebook said in a statement, adding that many of the organizations and people who advised on Messenger Kids do not receive financial support of any kind.

But for a company under pressure from many sides—Congress, regulators, advocates for online privacy and mental health—even the appearance of impropriety can hurt. Facebook didn’t invite prominent critics, such as the nonprofit Common Sense Media, to advise it on Messenger Kids until the process was nearly over. Facebook would not comment publicly on why it didn’t include Common Sense earlier in the process.

“Because they know we opposed their position,” said James Steyer, the CEO of Common Sense. The group’s stance is that Facebook should never have released a product aimed at kids. “They know very well our positon with Messenger Kids.”

A few weeks after Messenger Kids launched, nearly 100 outside experts banded together to urge Facebook to shut down the app, which it has not done. The company says it is “committed to building better products for families, including Messenger Kids. That means listening to parents and experts, including our critics.”

One of Facebook’s experts contested the notion that company advisers were in Facebook’s pocket. Lewis Bernstein, now a paid Facebook consultant who worked for Sesame Workshop (the nonprofit

behind Sesame Street) in various capacities over three decades, said the Wired article “unfairly” accused him and his colleagues for accepting travel expenses to Facebook seminars.

But the Wired story did not count Lewis as one of the seven out of 13 advisers who took funding for Messenger Kids, and the magazine did not include travel funding when it counted financial ties. Bernstein was not a Facebook consultant at the time he was advising it on Messenger Kids.

Bernstein, who doesn’t see technology as “inherently dangerous,” suggested that Facebook critics like Common Sense are also tainted by accepting $50 million in donated air time for a campaign warning about the dangers of technology addiction. Among those air-time donors are Comcast and AT&T’s DirecTV.

But Common Sense spokesman Corbie Kiernan called that figure a “misrepresentation” that got picked up by news outlets. She said Common Sense has public-service announcement commitments “from partners, such as Comcast and DirectTV” that has been valued at $50 million. The group has used that time in other campaigns in addition to its current “Truth About Tech” effort, which it’s launching with a group of ex-Google and Facebook employees and their newly formed Center for Humane Technology.

www.businessmirror.com.ph

BusinessMirror

Saturday, February 24, 2018 A11

Critics wary as Google’s Chrome begins an ad crackdown

By Ryan Nakashima

S

Associated Press

AN FRANCISCO—On Thursday Google will begin using its Chrome browser to eradicate ads it deems annoying or otherwise detrimental to users. It just so happens that many of Google’s own most lucrative ads will sail through its new filters.

The move, which Google first floated back in June, is ostensibly aimed at making online advertising more tolerable by flagging sites that run annoying ads, such as ones that auto-play video with sound. And it’s using a big hammer: Chrome will start blocking all ads—including Google’s own—on offending sites if they don’t reform themselves.

There’s some irony here, given that Google’s aim is partly to convince people to turn off their own ad-blocking software. These popular browser addons deprive publishers (and Google) of revenue by preventing ads from displaying.

Google Vice President Rahul Roy-Chowdhury wrote in a blog post that the company aims to keep the Web healthy by “filtering out disruptive ad experiences.”

But the company’s motives and methods are both under attack. Along with Facebook, Google dominates the online-advertising market; together, they accounted for over 63 percent of the $83 billion spent on United States digital ads last year, according to eMarketer.

Google is also virtually synonymous with online search, and Chrome is the most popular browser on the Web, with a roughly 60-percent market share .

So, to critics, Google’s move looks less like a neighborhood cleanup than an assertion of dominance.

Google’s effort focuses on 12 ad formats criticized by a group called the Coalition for Better Ads, whose members include Google, Facebook, News Corp. and the News Media Alliance, which represents 2,000 newspapers in the US and Canada.

Among those blackballed formats are pop-ups, large ads that hover above the page and ads that flash with bright background colors.

But those standards were intended to be voluntary, said Paul Boyle, senior vice president of public policy for the newspaper alliance that helped create them. Instead, he said, Google is turning the standards into de facto law.

Critics also note that the standards conspicuously exempt one of Google’s most significant forms of advertising—so-called pre-roll video ads, which run before videos on Google’s YouTube.

Scott Spencer, Google’s director of product management, said via e-mail that the coalition is looking into video ad formats, including pre-roll ads. Any new standards will be incorporated “when the research is complete,” he said.

“Chrome filtering is not favoring our own business, our ads or our platforms or anyone else’s,” he said.

Accusations of self-dealing have long haunted Google. Last June European Union regulators hit it with a €2.4-billion ($3-billion) fine for unfairly directing search results to its own shopping listings, from which it gets a direct cut of revenue. A similar Federal Trade Commission probe of Google ended in 2013 with a settlement and no fine .

More recent, the News Media Alliance has urged Congress to look at how Google pressures media outlets to put stories in its “Accelerated Mobile Pages” format, which also tightly restricts ad formats and provides Google a new source of revenue in exchange for giving publishers favored treatment in search results.

Google will phase in the restrictions in coming months; disputes will be handled by the coalition, not Google. Users will see a notification when Chrome blocks ads, and can opt to view them if they want.

Web-site publishers have had months to prepare, yet many are still running afoul of the new standards. According to a recent search of Google’s Ad Experience Report, 1,408 sites had “warning” or “failing” status. Some were targeted to have their ads to be shut down on Thursday.

Sites flagged included niche interest sites like www.playstationlifestyle.net and www.bridalguide.com, as well as established newspapers, such as The Hamilton Spectator in Canada and a number of porn sites.

Spectator owner TorStar said it has fixed the problem; other sites wouldn’t comment publicly.

Atlanta-based Gray Television Inc. also had at least a dozen of its TV station web sites flagged. Gray said it switched to compliant formats and that its sites were cleared as of Wednesday.

Google said almost half of warned sites fixed ad problems after being notified.

Among these were about 50 web sites run by Townsquare Media, the third-largest radio station owner in the US. The sites ran so-called “prestitial”

ads that take over the screen after someone clicks on a link, according to Jared Willig, Townsquare’s senior vice president of digital.

The company subsequently developed a new and less intrusive ad format that solved the problem, Willig said. While he agreed with the push toward fewer distractions, Google’s outsized influence gives him pause.

“They wield a lot of power, which is a little scary,” Willig said. “But, in this case, they’re using that power to make the Internet better.”

Others were less sanguine.

“Who’s to say what’s a good ad and what’s a bad ad?” asked Chris Pavlovski, the CEO of Rumble Inc., a Toronto-based video platform that considers itself a rival to YouTube. “For some reason, we have an arbitrator that owns a browser and dictates what we can put on our web sites.”

Overall, Google wields too much influence over publishers, said Sean Blanchfield, the CEO of PageFair, a start-up that helps publishers get around ad blockers.

“Traffic comes through Google Search, users come through Google Chrome, monetization is from Google ads,” Blanchfield said. “Publishers are beginning to feel like they’re playing in a gig economy operated by Google.”

Globe CEO Ernest Cu joins thought leaders in new, original Netflix documentary for ‘Altered Carbon’ Top streaming platform Netflix recently released a documentary that tackles the possibility of immortality through technology, as a brief introduction to its latest science fiction series Altered Carbon. The short video featured several prominent thought leaders in entertainment, technology, science and literature, including Ernest Cu, president and CEO of Globe Telecom.

Cu is an immensely forward-thinking leader and tech innovator who believes in empowering the Filipinos by elevating their digital lifestyle within the global standards. That vision has shaped the trajectory of Globe as a purveyor of all things digital. Hence, Netflix decided to profile Cu, along with Altered Carbon author Richard K. Morgan, Steve Aoki, Jesse Wellens and other thought leaders to discuss how technology is changing

the landscape of human society, and how technology deeply affects the lives of individuals. They were also asked to imagine the various possibilities of living forever.

Altered Carbon is the new Netflix original series based on the classic cyberpunk novel written by Richard K. Morgan. Its story is set 300 years into the future, in which technology allows human consciousness to be digitized and stored in discs called “stackers” or uploaded to the cloud. When a person dies, this stacker is recovered from the body (called a “sleeve”), or downloaded from the Cloud and reinserted into another “sleeve”, thus ensuring that the person lives again. Since the process is very expensive, only the rich can afford to live lengthy and seemingly immortal lives. This status quo has led to a careless disregard

for human lives among the wealthy.

Takeshi Kovacs, the protagonist in the series, is the lone survivor of a group of elite interstellar soldiers that was defeated in an uprising against the new world order. After 250 years in ice, Kovacs is revived by Laurens Bancroft, an impossibly wealthy, long-lived man, to solve Bancroft’s suspicious death.

From writer and executive producer Laeta Kalogridis, Altered Carbon stars Joel Kinnaman, James Purefoy, Martha Higareda, Renee Elise Goldsberry, Will Yun Lee and Dichen Lachman.

Globe customers can enjoy six months access to Netflix with Globe At Home Plan 1299 and up, while Postpaid customers can get six months worth of Netflix with Plan 999 and up. For information, visit www. globe.com.ph/content/netflix.

Ernest Cu

What do Pinoy travelers want?

Continued from A12 Zealand; Belgium; London; Spain; Quebec, Canada; Alaska; Maldives; Brazil; Osaka, Japan; South Korea; Cambodia; Bali, Indonesia; Taiwan; and Malaysia.

RCBC’s Savecation raffle promo will run until March 20. Winning accountholders will get a trip for two, including round-trip airfare, accommodations and tour packages to any of the destinations offered by the bank.

FIVE PLACES TO VISIT THIS LOVE MONTH Valentine’s Day may have passed, but there are still a few days left in February to surprise or make it up to your SO. It may not be their dream destination yet, but these places are good enough to rekindle the fire or at least put a smile on their faces.

1. SPA AND WELLNESS CENTERS Relaxation

is at its finest in spas and wellness centers. These places offer different ways to destress after a long and tiring workweek. Among the things you can try are massages from skillful masseurs. Coupled with aromatherapy, massages can help you feel refreshed in just a few minutes. On another note, some spas and wellness centers offer unique amenities like saunas, fish spas, Jacuzzis and hydromassage pools that are guaranteed to leave you wanting more.

2. GLAMP OUT! If you’re looking for an out-of-the-box experience, why not try camping and lounge on the best of what nature has to offer? There are groups of professional hikers and mountaineers offering this kind of experience in different campsites near Metro Manila. Also, some resorts take camping to the next level by offering “glamping” as one of their options for accommodation. Glamping lets you enjoy the best of nature with resort amenities.

3. BEACHSIDE RESORTS Summer season has yet to officially start, which means it’s the best time to go to the beach. Instead of just lounging around in the sun, why not try kayaking, canoeing or even islandhopping for beachside resorts in places like Alaminos, Zambales, Batangas, Puerto Galera or even Boracay.

If you want to check what’s underwater, you can try snorkeling, scuba diving, or riding glass-bottom boats.

On land, you can explore different areas of a resort or schedule dinners by the seaside.

4. HISTORICAL CHURCHES Central Luzon houses some of the oldest churches in the Philippines, making it a popular spot for pilgrims and tourists alike. One example is the Monasterio de Tarlac, which is a monastery at the top of Mount Resurrection that showcases a relic of the cross where Jesus Christ died. A colossal 30-foot statue of Jesus Christ also stands on top of the mountain, making it a popular destination, especially during

the Holy Week.

5. ANNUAL FESTIVALS The Panagbenga Festival in Baguio City is a celebration of the city’s floral crops showcased through huge floats and artistic displays. Crowds from across the country flock to Baguio City just for this event, which this year will be held on February 24. I’ve been there a couple of times and, despite the crowd, seeing all those colorful floats is certainly worth it.

With these suggestions, you’ll surely have a rich and worthwhile experience that will help inspire your success in the years to come. You might even meet some entrepreneurs that have partnered with Globe myBusiness, the micro-, small- and mediumenterprise arm of the telco giant that provides digital solutions to local entrepreneurs to help them grow their business. Follow Globe myBusiness’s Facebook Page and get to know the entrepreneurs they support.

Editor: Gerard S. Ramos • lifestylebusinessmirror@gmail.com

BusinessMirror

Saturday, February 24, 2018 A12

What do Pinoy travelers want? ❶ Travelers leverage online data to expand their experiences abroad.

the technivore ed uy

❷ AXN is

whereiseduy@gmail.com

charting journalist Atom Araullo’s adventures.

T

here used to be a time when I would play video games till the early hours of the morning, almost up to breakfast time. Then I’d grab a bite and resume playing again until the PlayStation 2 or my wrists gave out (usually it’s the Playstation).

Eventually my wrists did give out and, now that I have carpal tunnel syndrome, I can’t play longer than 30 minutes without my hands getting numb.

After video games, it was movies, followed by binge-watching TV series until eventually it was social media that kept me up at night. For the past few years, however, something else has been keeping me awake, which I know a lot of other Filipinos can relate to: seat sales.

Those rare times when plane tickets are so cheap, you decide to book flights to places you haven’t even heard about.

According to an article I read, Filipinos are now among the top travelers in Asia. The study done by Visa listed the Philippines as the fourth top AsiaPacific market with the “highest average number of countries visited by a Visa credit card holder surpassed only by Australia, New Zealand and India.” Those results indicate that “Filipinos are now part of an emerging global traveling class,” having visited more than five countries.

I must agree, because even I have gone to several countries in the last few years and I’m not even much of a travel bug. #Wanderlust #TravelGoals are just a couple of hashtags Pinoys often use when sharing their photos or their travel posts, and as another study found out, Filipinos are very much open to sharing not just their photos, but even personal information in exchange for a more personalized travel experience.

Amadeus, a global travel and tourism industry information technology service provider, in collaboration with YouGov, recently shared the findings of its study “Journey of Me Insights,” which takes a deeper look into the profile of Apac travelers.

Spanning 14 Asia-Pacific markets, and considered the most comprehensive Apac traveler survey to date, the study found astounding diversity among travelers’ preferences, behaviors and demands across different nationalities, genders and age groups.

Part of the project is a report on Filipino travelers, titled “Journey of Me Insights: What Filipino Travelers Want.” From when and how Filipino travelers plan and book their trips, to how and why they want to stay connected while traveling, to how frequently they use sharing economy services and the types of new technologies they would be most interested in, the study takes a multifaceted look at what Filipino travelers want.

The findings unveiled a few themes that travel providers can focus on: n THE PERSONALIZATION-PRIVACY PARADOX While slightly more cautious than the 64 percent of other Asia Pacific travelers, Pinoys are also open to sharing personal data in return for more relevant offers and personalized experiences.

For travel providers, the mandate is clear— personalization must be carefully balanced against rising privacy concerns. They will need to respect and protect personal data and the need for privacy at all times. Above and beyond adhering to legislation, travel players must be able to articulate “What’s the value?” to get travelers to share their data. n GET REAL Travelers take their lead from other travelers, that’s why a lot of people now follow travel bloggers. Inspiration is the doorway to opportunity for travel providers, but authenticity is the key to unlocking it. Rather than the glossy pictures of travel brochures or the carefully curated Instagram feeds of celebrities, Asia Pacific travelers seek what’s genuine and turn to their fellow travelers for inspiration. When planning trips, Filipinos are most influenced by word-of-mouth from friends, family and colleagues, as well as travel reviews. Their social network and travel review sites were, likewise, voted most likely to have sent them relevant recommendations about travel.

❸ What Asia Pacific travelers wants in a capsule, according to Amadeus and YouGov.

❶

❸

❷ n THE RIGHT CONTENT, THROUGH THE RIGHT CHANNEL, AT THE RIGHT TIME In the world of travel, every engagement point matters. Beyond personalization, connecting with travelers in a timely and intuitive manner is equally important. While the vast majority of Filipino travelers would be interested in receiving travel recommendations from the moment they consider a trip all the way up to while they are on the trip, travel players must consider carefully how to connect with them and with what content.

Fifty-two percent of Filipino travelers prefer to receive updates and recommendations about their trip through e-mail, with only 6 percent happy to be contacted via mobile messaging services.

Recommendations that help them save money was the top choice for Filipino travelers (50 percent), while timesaving tips were less popular (12 percent). n THERE ARE MANY ASIAS WITHIN ASIA The most dominant observation from the research is that there is no consistent profile for the Asia Pacific traveler. Stark contrasts in behaviors, needs and preferences were observed across all geographic and demographic lines. For example, while 66 percent of Chinese travelers do most of their trip booking on mobile, only 36 percent of Filipinos do so. Separately, while 70 percent of Japanese travelers have never used a sharing economy service for trip accommodation, 66 percent of Filipino travelers have, and almost half of all Indians say they do so “often” and “very often.” And

while 78 percent of Pinoys think it’s important to find service staff at the destination that speak a language they understand, only half (47 percent) of Malaysians do, with Hong Kong travelers (4percent) even less likely to think the same.

ADVENTURE YOUR WAY Everyone wants to travel, but not everyone can go to a place and experience the same adventure, whether it’s because some personal or physical restrictions (or maybe financial limitations). This is what makes AXN’s new original series Adventure Your Way all the more intriguing. Instead of just watching the host—in this case Atom Araullo—talk about the place, viewers get to decide where he goes next and what challenge he should do.

For the first time, AXN invites its passionate social-media fans to help shape the itinerary of Atom Araullo as he traverses the country with only his phone as a guide. Atom starts his journey with a blank bucket list, which rapidly becomes populated with a variety of suggestions and tips, including skydiving, bungee jumping and camping on a cliff ledge under the stars.

AXN fans are encouraged to share their bucket lists by commenting on Adventure Your Way’s socialmedia pages on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter using #AdventureGoals, where they can also help Atom decide which road to take by watching out for his #TakeMeAnywhere posts.

“Viewers today want to be an active participant in their content consumption, so we’ve bridged the gap between TV and social media by putting AXN fans in direct control of Atom’s adventures. The fantastic response to Adventure Your Way indicates that there is a real appetite for viewers to get involved, have a voice, and then sit back and enjoy watching their ideas come to fruition on AXN,” said Armi Malaluan, director and business head of AXN Networks Philippines.

Adventure Your Way airs Thursday at 8:30 pm, first and exclusively on AXN. READY FOR A SAVECATION? A few years ago “staycations” were the thing and now its “savecation,” or saving up for a grander adventure, as RCBC Bank entices potential clients to open a savings or checking account to get the chance to win in their “Savecation” raffle promo.

Whether you’ve been dreaming of swimming in the world-famous beaches of Rio de Janeiro or having a gastronomic exploration of Italy, or maybe re-living some scenes from your favorite Korean drama, the campaign gives lucky depositors the chance to accomplish their travel goals.

Up for grabs are travel packages to 21 countries spanning six continents. These destinations include Sapporo, Japan; Dubai; Cape Town, South Africa; Italy; Morocco; San Francisco, USA; Greece; New

Continued on A11