Businessmirror october 04, 2017

MEMORIAL FOR DEVELOPERS OF MAKATI CBD The Zobel de Ayala family, led by Ayala Corp. Chairman Emeritus Jaime Zobel de Ayala (center), unveils the memorial in honor of Col. Joseph McMicking and Mercedes Zobel McMicking, who are credited for their significant contributions to the development of Makati’s central business district (CBD) and the rest of the country, at the Ayala Triangle Gardens. Joining the family is Ayala Land President and CEO Bernard Vincent Dy (left). The courtyard where the memorial now stands was also named the McMicking Courtyard. The memorial’s art piece, designed by Leandro V. Locsin Partners, in collaboration with Ayala Land and the Zobel family, is made of weathered steel and appears to be arising out of a shallow film of water.

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Wednesday, October 4, 2017 Vol. 12 No. 356

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EGULATING airfares in the Philippines is an “illogical” idea that not only diminishes the competitiveness of Filipino carriers against their foreign peers, but also poses a threat to the growth of the country’s aviation industry.

‘Senators will amend, not mangle, P130-B TRAIN bill’

By Butch Fernandez

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@butchfBM

enators are bent on amending Malacañang’s revenue package targeting to raise an additional P130-billion under the so-called Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (TRAIN) bill earlier passed by the House of Representatives.

This, even as Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph G. Recto said he will seek downward adjustments in proposed tax-hike targets, since the government was

underspending anyway.

But Senate President Aquilino L. Pimentel III was quick to assure that the Senate would heed Palace warnings that deviations from the House-approved version that hewed closely to the Executive’s original proposal could derail the TRAIN bill, increase public debt and hinder development projects under the Duterte administration’s “Build, Build, Build” scheme.

“We should not deviate too far away from the Executive version See “Senators,” A2

HOUSE PANEL WANTS DUTERTE TO USE EMERGENCY POWERS WHILE OVERHAULING B.O.C.

By Jovee Marie N. dela Cruz

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@joveemarie

House panel has recommended the dissolution of the Bureau of Customs (BOC) into two agencies—the Bureau of Customs Service (BCS) and Bureau of Security Control (BSC)— and asked President Duterte to seek emergency powers to ensure the country’s “first line of defense” will not be compromised further.

These recommendations are contained in the 82-page report submitted by the House Ways and Means Committee after the investigation on the P6.4-billion shabu smuggling.

Panel Chairman Rep. Dakila Carlo E. Cua of the Lone District of Quirino said a national emergency may be considered when the BOC—the country’s first line of defense—has been compromised because of the bureau’s corruption and incompetence in protecting and securing the country’s borders from the entry of illegal drugs.

The committee said the emergency power will allow Duterte to immediately take over the operations of the bureau to ensure public safety and security during an interim period of two years when the BOC’s reorganization See “Emergency powers,” A12

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Local airlines buck CAB plan to regulate airfares

By Lorenz S. Marasigan

2016 ejap journalism awards

Kung fu wisdom Teddy Locsin Jr.

Comendador: “We sent them a position paper, but they ignored it. The proposed policy ties our hands.”

free fire

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ARIA Popova observes that Bruce Lee was as good at writing as he was at kung fu. He walked out of the set of what turned out to be his last movie because they clipped his philosophy from the script. It was restored. That is what made Enter The Dragon a cultural artefact for the Library of Congress.

Despite being deregulated, sources said lawmakers have asked the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB) to “put a cap” on the maximum and minimum See “Local airlines,” A2

Continued on A11

BMReports

A surge in housing demand noted in Mindanao despite Marawi siege

By Manuel T. Cayon @awimailbox Mindanao Bureau Chief

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Conclusion

AVAO CITY—If Mindanao could hit—even surpass— its target loan takeout of P8.6 billion this year, the island would be a frontrunner in performance for the Pag-IBIG Fund.

While the amount is only 13 percent of the national target, Marilene Acosta, Pag-IBIG deputy chief operating officer on home lending operation cluster, said achieving the target would be measured with the difficult political situation of the island as backdrop. The forecast would not be without basis.

Pag-IBIG Fund said Mindanao got a slice of the total increased financing takeout nationwide last year, with a P6.6-billion loan performance, which is a 14-percent increase from the previous year’s P5.8-billion takeout. Last year’s growth helped financed the shelter requirement of 7,500 families in this southern Philippine island.

Total national loan takeout last year was also a glitter. The agency breached the P50-billion loan financing level in 35 years, posting P57.3 billion, or a growth of 30 percent,

SOLDIERS put finishing touches on one of the temporary houses as a model unit in a housing village called Bahay Pag Asa at Barangay Buadi Itowa, Marawi City. The village was inaugurated by President Duterte on October 2. The government, in partnership with the private sector, constructed 50 houses for those affected by the armed conflict in Marawi City. Despite the violence, the Pag-IBIG Fund notes the housing demand in Mindanao remains higher than expected. NONIE REYES

from P43.93 billion in 2015.

Last year’s financing level funded the housing needs of more than 77,000 families nationwide.

As of August this year, the agency has noted a loan takeout of P4.4 billion. Pag-IBIG Fund officers said Mindanao would need an

average loan availment of P1 billion monthly equivalent to the housing application of 4,951 members.

Push

ACCORDING to Home Development Mutual Fund (HDMF) CEO Acmad Rizaldy P. Moti, Mindanao

is expected to breeze through with achieving its target, citing the island’s performance during the last three years.

“Mindanao, along with the rest of the areas outside Metro Manila, now accounts for half of the Continued on A2

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Source: BSP (3 October 2017 )

BMReports BusinessMirror

A2 Wednesday, October 4, 2017

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A surge in housing demand noted in Mindanao despite Marawi siege Continued from A1

exposure of our financing,” he said. When before the regions were in the level of 47 percent to 48 percent, they are now in the range of 52 percent to 53 percent, he added.

“We see the growth in many regions because of industrialization.”

Aside from the regular and expected hike in loan applications in the major cities in Mindanao, the agency would also expect a growth in the demand from the regions on HMDF’s aggressive push on countryside housing program.

The attraction would come from the lowest interest on loans, at 5.5 percent, compared to the banks’ and the affordable payment terms, according to Moti.

“If you want more affordable terms, apply also under our countryside housing program.” Moti added the local governments outside the main cities would be assured of quality units as he disclosed of

Local airlines. . . fares of local airlines, after they were “surprised by the high fares of last-minute tickets”.

Carmelo L. Arcilla, the regulator’s executive director, confirmed that there is a draft on the guidelines for fare regulation, but stressed that nothing is final yet.

“There is a hearing ongoing about fare regulation, but it is still internal,” he said in a phone interview. “The draft is the guidelines which is subject of an ongoing hearing process.”

In its draft order, the regulator listed the “disparity in ticket prices” as one of the critical issues, as there were “allegations that airlines have been unilaterally fixing and imposing unjustifiably big fare rates, especially on last-minute passengers”.

Basically, the proposed policy will allow the regulator to issue a fare matrix, specifying floor and ceiling rates per route. The proposed floor rate will not be lower than 20 percent of the current ceil-

the disciplinary sanctions it imposed on its partner contractors. He explained the agency axed some 40 erring and corrupt developers between 2011 and 2013.

After that, he said, there are no more developers blacklisted, except in Central Luzon. He declined to elaborate on the matter.

Backlog

AN area of contention in the housing sector is determining the actual and factual basis on the backlog of housing units.

One figure advanced by a group of developers placed the number of housing backlog at 3.5 million units. Congress chalked up a higher number at 6.5 million.

The Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council, which groups the shelter-related functions of five government agencies, including the Pag-IBIG Fund, is eyeing a survey to end speculations.

“We want to know why there was a big jump on the numbers,” Moti said. “We also

Continued from A1

ing rate, while the ceiling rate will be determined by sector distance, breakeven load factors and return of investments.

“The floor and ceiling rate shall take into account factors, such as the need to protect consumers and prevent unfair pricing strategies by domestic scheduled air carriers,” the draft read.

For aviation expert Avelino L. Zapanta, such a prospect is not in line with the international practice of deregulating airline tariffs.

“I don’t see the logic. It is deregulated and airlines are competing effectively bringing the yields low,” he told the BusinessMirror. “Executives of companies have a choice to travel economy. It is their choice to travel class or cheap.”

Commercial aviation in the Philippines has been liberalized since the issuance of an executive order in 1995, after being monopolized for more than two decades.

Zapanta explained that governments around the world decided to

want to know the basis of the number [of housing backlog]; if it was based on needs or on the wants of people.”

He hopes the government would be able to commission the survey next year.

Collection

THE Pag-IBIG Fund is confident with its posturing as Moti said the agency is currently setting its eyes soon to set the target of releasing as much as P100 billion to members’ housing-loan requirement.

T here would be no problem w ith nonpayment anymore, he said, after PagIBIG corrected the payment behavior of clients. Moti said from a low-collection efficiency of 75 percent in 2012 and a nonperforming, or uncollected, loan payment of 25 percent, last year’s figure was 90.2 percent. “ That means that we only have 9 percent to work on.” In Mindanao it is Cagayan de Oro City that post a consistent high collection, he added.

liberalize their aviation industries to push for a more competitive environment, which ensured good services despite cheaper fares.

“The global aviation industry was forced to deregulate to compete and protect consumer interests. It’s going to be a throwback for everyone,” he noted.

Dexter M. Comendador, the chief executive of budget carrier Philippines AirAsia, said his group has submitted a position paper on the proposed policy, opposing the proposal because it will have an immense impact on the industry as a whole.

“We sent them a position paper, but they ignored it,” he said in an interview. “The proposed policy ties our hands.”

He said putting a limit on the minimum and maximum fares would put the riding public at risk, as it dampens competition while limiting choices.

“They want to control the prices by putting a cap on the lowest fares and the highest fares. This means that we cannot sell P1 fare,” Comendador said. “How will our

Millennials

WHILE insisting his forecast was based on a personal guess, Moti said he would not be surprised if the trend in housing in the future would be on “rental”.

“It would be a highly mobile generation in say, the next 10 years,” he said, “And people would be interested more in finding spaces for rentals.

Moti said Pag-IBIG is “already seeing it today, among the call-center industry”.

“Workers are moving around fast, changing to another workplace or company every now and then,” he said.

The future generation would be composed of more mobile people, people moving from city to city, or another province, “and investing in fixed residential unit would become unimportant”.

“People may look for what the condominiums are offering today,” he said, referring to the use of condominium units as transient accommodations where families buy units

customers afford our prices if that will be the case?”

AirAsia customers are mostly millennials and budget travelers.

He explained that the entry of low-cost carriers has enabled the market to grow by making air travel more affordable to most of the population, citing a 20-percent increase in domestic traffic in 2006 after the introduction of promo fares.

In its position paper, AirAsia sought for the clarification of the fare matrices, the basis of a ceiling rate and the reduction rate, among others.

“The impression of a floor and ceiling rate on domestic fares may unnaturally skew average domestic fare to higher levels, while fares for international flights will remain as is.

This may paint an unfavorable picture of the domestic aviation industry and affect domestic tourism, as passengers will opt to travel internationally where fares are lower,” the position paper read.

Comendador added the group finds the proposed policy af-

to suit their increasingly mobile lifestyle.

The millennials today, those aged under 29, may figure prominently in the future mobile generation. But, unfortunately, today, Moti said “they are not the buying type for residential and other housing needs”.

“They are into buying the latest edition of gadgets,” he added.

Based on the profile of the Pag-IBIG clientele, Moti said young people would only begin to consider buying, or actually applying already, for housing units when they reach the age of 30.

“But to say that they are vain and frivolous would also be incorrect. In many studies and observations, the millennials are found to be responsible, and have directions,” he said. “Many of them stay at home, in fact, than what we perceived them to be fun of the good life.”

But as to igniting their interest to invest in fixed assets as housing, especially in Mindanao, would still be a challenge.

fecting the local aviation industry, as this puts local airlines at the losing end vis-a-vis their international peers, which are currently deregulated.

“Our competitors in the international arena have a free hand, while we would not have it,” he explained.

“What we already started—stirring up travel—will be gone.”

As of the first half of 2017, a total of 130.93 million people flew in and out of different airports in the Philippines. In 2016 domestic air traffic had 267.65 million people flying locally, data from the regulator showed.

Ph i l ippi ne A i rl i nes ( PA L) Spokesman Cielo C. Villaluna said her group will also send its own position paper to the regulator, but did not disclose the carrier’s inputs for now.

“PAL is in touch with the CAB and will submit our inputs on the matter accordingly. Let it be known that our fare applications are always filed with CAB for approval,” she said.

Cebu Pacific Vice President Paterno S. Mantaring noted that

his group has also submitted its comments on the proposed policy change to the regulator.

“We have already provided our comments to the CAB. We hope that the CAB would seriously consider the points that we have raised,” he told the BusinessMirror.

Mantaring did not elaborate.

Slum problem. . .

Continued from A12

The bank said slum residents are also more at risk to disasters, as the communities are often in low-lying flood-prone areas.

“Rapid urbanization is a challenge and an opportunity. Provide low-income residents with affordable transport services or housing, so they can save for their children’s education. Ensure that social-protection programs are in place to help families cope during difficult times, such as in the aftermath of natural disasters,” Baker said.

“Solutions for inclusive urban growth are not one size fits-all, but they are practicable, effective, and necessary for the greater good,” she added.

Senators. . .

Continued from A1

because this was requested in the first place by the Executive branch,” the Senate President told the BusinessMirror on Tuesday.

“The tax-reform measure is a brainchild of the Executive branch, hence, if the Legislative branch will grant it, the Legislative branch must not mangle it too much. We may amend but not mangle,” Pimentel added.

Senate Majority Leader Vicente C. Sotto III, in a separate interview, confirmed that Senators are also keen to scrutinize the Palace money measure.

“We need to review the proposal,” Sotto said when asked if senators will accede to Malacanang’s request to pass the bill as is. “We will review it.”

But Recto confirmed to BusinessMirror he is finalizing key amendments in the Palace money measure, including downward adjustments in revenue targets from proposed rate increases in the value-added tax, among others.

Recto also indicated he is convinced that the government does not need to impose a heavy tax burden on consumers and income earners because the state cannot spend all the additional revenue it is looking to collect from the TRAIN bill.

Wondering why the government needs to impose higher taxes, Recto pointed out it is actually “underpending”.

Besides, he added, “there should be burden sharing; not all the burden should be borne by consumers.

Industry and corporations should also pay.”

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Lawyers urge SC to decide on disbarment case vs Gadon

By Joel R. San Juan @jrsanjuan1573

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WO lawyers have sought for the immediate disbarment of lawyer Lorenzo Gadon, the complainant in the impeachment case filed against Chief Justice Maria Lourdes A. Sereno.

In a five-page letter addressed to Senior Justice Antonio T. Carpio, lawyers Algamar Latiph and Musa Malayang said it’s has been more than a year since the Supreme Court ordered Gadon to comment on their disbarment complaint that they filed on April 6, 2016.

“To date, we have not received any comment from the respondent.

Or whether the case is submitted for resolution in view of respondent’s failure to file a comment assuming that he was duly served with a copy of the complaint,” the letter read.

The letter was addressed to Carpio, being the chairman of the Court’s Second Division, where the disbarment case was assigned.

Gadon is being accused of violating the Canon 1, Rule 1.01, Canon 7 and Rule 7.03 of the Code of Professional Responsibility (CPR). Canon 1 requires all lawyers to “uphold the Constitution, obey the laws of the land and promote respect for law and legal process; Rule 1.01 prohibits lawyers from engaging in unlawful, dishonest, immoral or deceitful conduct; Canon 7, on the other hand, mandates lawyers to uphold at all times the integrity and the dignity of the legal profession and support activities of the integrated bar ; while Rule 7.03 prohibits lawyers from engaging in conduct that adversely reflects on his fitness to practice law, nor behave in a scandalous manner to the discredit of the legal profession whether in public or private life.

The case stemmed from Gadon’s supposed hateful remarks uttered against the Muslim population when he was interviewed by broadcast media in his capacity as candidate for the 2016 senatorial elections to present his platform of government.

In the said interviews, Gadon said he will pulverize Muslim communities if they will not cooperate in the government’s bid to address the insurgency and rebellion problem in the region.

Gadon, in the same interviews, expressed his readiness to exterminate innocent children, women, men, including the elderlies, and burn houses if they ignore his plea to work together with the government.

“Based on the news accounts, there were other two cases filed against the respondent for the same above facts. We respectfully pray for the Honorable Court to favorably act on the complaint,” the letter read.

Meanwhile, Gadon said he was not aware of a pending disbarment complaint filed against him at the SC. “I’m sure its just a nuisance case.

At any rate I am a friend of the Muslims now. I even got more votes than the other Muslim candidates in Mindanao,” he said.

Editor: Vittorio V. Vitug • Wednesday, October 4, 2017 A3

PDEA lists ‘big 3’ international shabu suppliers for Philippines

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By Rene Acosta

@reneacostaBM

hree international drug syndicates that have established their presence in the country are the principal the sources of illegal drugs in the local market, the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) revealed on Tuesday.

Firefighters’ command center The Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI) donated state-of-the-art equipment necessary to establish a Command Operations Center where the Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) can monitor, detect and scientifically strategize firefighting activities and enable it to immediately respond, link and communicate among its network with dispatch. Photo shows BFP-National Capital Region officials with PCCI Honorary Chairman Sergio R. Ortiz-Luis Jr.; PCCI-National Center for Mediation Chairman Apolinar Aure and ICC Philippines Director General Jesus B. Varela at the launching of BFP-NCR Fire Command Operation Center on August 8 in Quezon City.

CA affirms legality of Palparan’s arrest for kidnap, disappearance of two coeds

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HE Court of Appeals (CA) has affirmed the validity of the arrest warrant issued by the Regional Trial Court (RTC) of Malolos, Bulacan against former Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan for kidnapping and serious illegal detention charges filed against him in connection with the 2006 abduction and disappearance of two University of the Philippines students.

In a 15-page decision penned

by Associate Justice Carmelita Salandanan Manahan, the CA’s Fourth Division denied the petition for certiorari filed by Palparan seeking the recall of the arrest warrant as well as the dismissal of the charges filed against him.

The appellate court did not give weight to Palparan’s arguments that the Malolos RTC disregarded his constitutional right to due process when it denied his motion to quash information and warrant of arrest on the same day it was filed on August 18, 2014.

The trial court, in denying Palparan’s motion, held that the motion was just a repetition of his earlier motion which was already denied by the trial court in its order dated April 3, 2012.

It held that the grounds and issues mentioned in the said motion to quash information and warrant of arrest were already passed upon

in its April 3, 2012 resolution.

The CA explained that an order denying a motion to quash is merely an “interlocutory,” thus, not appealable nor can be the subject of a petition for certiorari.

“Stated differently, the remedy against the denial of a motion to quash is for the movant accused to enter a plea, go to trial, and should the decision be adverse, reiterate on appeal from the final judgment and assign as error the denial of the motion to quash,” the CA said.

“The denial, being an interlocutory order, is not appealable, and may not be the subject of a petition for certiorari because the availability of other remedies in the ordinary course of law,” it added.

In order for the petition for certiorari questioning an interlocutory order to prosper, the CA said the appellant should be able to establish that the lower court issued the judgment or order without or in excess of jurisdiction or with grave abuse of discretion.

“Petitioner did not show that the trial court had no jurisdiction or exceeded its jurisdiction in denying the motion to quash, or gravely abused its discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction in its denial,” the CA noted.

Furthermore, the CA said the allegations raised by Palparan

in his petition for certiorari are factual and evidentiary in nature which should be ventilated in a full-blown trial.

Palparan was arrested by a composite team of the National Bureau of Investigation and the Armed Forces’ Naval Intelligence Group in August 2014 after three years in hiding He was arrested by virtue of an arrest warrant issued by the Malolos RTC in 2011 in connection with the kidnapping and serious illegal detention charges filed by the relatives of missing UP students Karen Empeno and Shrelyn Cadapan.

In indicting Palparan for kidnapping and serious illegal detention charges, the Department of Justice held that he had a direct hand in the detention of Sherlyn and Karen based on the testimony of Raymond Manalo, a farmer.

Manalo was was abducted and tortured by the military from February 14, 2006 and escaped on August 12, 2007.

During his detention, Manalo claimed that he witnessed the two students being tortured by their captors, believed to be Palparan’s men.

The CA had ruled in 2007 that his tesimony was “clear, consistent and convincing” as it ordered the Armed Forces to produce the bodies of the students. Joel R. San Juan

PDEA Director General Aaron Aquino listed the three transnational drug-trafficking organizations (DTOs) as the United Bamboo Gang, or the Bamboo Triad; the 14K Triad, or Hongkong Triad; and Sun Yee on Triad.

According to Aquino, the three groups are the most powerful DTOs, which are involved in the global illegaldrugs market.

“These three drug triads are making the Philippines their playground.

They are resorting to drug smuggling, either [in the form of] finished product or raw materials, and cook shabu in high seas because of the dismantling of several major shabu laboratories offshore lately,” he added.

Aquino added the Bamboo Triad, which is based in Taiwan, was formed during the 1950s. Its members are engaged in “almost every illegal activity imaginable, from prostitution, gambling and extortion to gunrunning, human trafficking and illegal-drugs smuggling on a worldwide scale.”

The triad members, he added, are actively operating in the United States, Canada, Britain, France and Australia, as well as virtually every country in Asia, including the Philippines.

On the other hand, the 14K Triad was founded in Guangzhou, China, in 1945 as an anticommunist task force.

Four years later it relocated to Hong Kong following defeat of the nationalists. Today it exerts considerable influence over West Kowloon, Yuen Long and Kwun Tong. It is engaged in large-scale drug-trafficking around the world.

The Sun Yee On Triad started in Hong Kong in 1919. Presently, it is based in Mainland China and Macau and has more than 55,000 members worldwide. The Sun Yee On Triad is said to be the most organized and wealthiest triad society.

The 14K and Sun Yee On Triads are archrivals with a propensity for violence. Both are supplying Mexico’s Sinaloa Drug Cartel, a dangerously powerful international drug-trafficking organization based in Mexico City, with raw materials needed to manufacture shabu, as demand skyrockets. Ties between these triads and Sinaloa cartel were outlined in a report by the Mexican Attorney General’s Office in 2013.

Details of the Sinaloa Drug Cartel connection in the country was discovered in the wake of the confiscation of some P420 million worth of shabu during a joint PDEA-Philippine National Police (PNP) Christmas Day

raid in 2013 at a game fowl ranch in Lipa City, Batangas. The ranch is leased

by Mexican nationals who are alleged members of the drug cartel.

Horacio Herrera Hernandez, a highranking member of the Sinaloa Drug Cartel, was arrested during a buy-bust operation in front of a restaurant along Makati Avenue, Barangay Poblacion, Makati City, on January 11, 2015.

On January 6 and 13, 2012, three clandestine shabu laboratories were dismantled in Ayala Alabang Village, Muntinlupa City. Seized during the operation were unfinished shabu and controlled precursors and essential chemicals used in producing shabu worth P53 million.

“Intelligence reports indicated the participation of 14K Triad in the dismantled shabu laboratories based on various financial documents, such as money-transfer receipts, bank accounts, deposit slips to various banks and telegraph-transfer receipts to Mexico that were recovered in the operation,” Aquino said. The three drug syndicates can ship up to 3 tons of shabu into the country, either through shipside smuggling in the high seas or airports and seaports.

“In shipside smuggling, these DTOs cook their shabu in the high seas, dumped their contrabands overboard and retrieve them afterward through nets as evidenced by the discovery of a floating shabu laboratory off the coast of Zambales on July 12, 2016.

To recall, 2 tons of cocaine bricks were reportedly thrown overboard into the waters of Eastern Samar by a Chinese vessel in 2009,” Aquino said.

The PNP leadership is unfazed that some law enforcers, who are supposedly willing to expose what they know about drug-related killings in the country, have reportedly sought protection from the Catholic Church.

Meanwhile, PNP Director General Ronald M. dela Rosa is not bothered about the report of policemen seeking protection from the church for them to talk about the drug-related killings in the country. “I hope they will not use that in any fishing expedition. If that is true…then get their affidavits and present them before the Senate, no problem with us…hopefully there will be no fishing expedition,” he said.

Report said the whistle-blowers had recently met with Archbishop Socrates Villegas and other officials of the Archdiocese of Lingayen-Dagupan to ask for protection.

LRTA 2, PNP ink crime-prevention agreement Duterte looking forward to Trump visit in November

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O secure the Light Rail Transit Line 2 (LRT 2) and its passengers, the Light Rail Transit Authority (LRTA) and the Philippine National Police (PNP) signed on Tuesday a memorandum of agreement (MOA) on information dissemination on crime prevention and immediate provision of police assistance.

LRTA Administrator Reynaldo I. Berroya, PNP Director General Ronald M. dela Rosa and National Capital Region Police Office Director Oscar Albayalde signed the

agreement at the LRT 2 Araneta Center Cubao Station.

The MOA states that the PNP will conduct quarterly emergency drills to prepare LRT 2 employees, security personnel and passengers in case of emergency situations.

A PNP Women’s Desk will also be installed at the Santolan, Cubao and Recto stations to prevent incidents of sexual harassment in LRT 2 premises.

Free rides will, likewise, be provided to policemen who are in full uniform with valid IDs while information materials

on crime prevention, as well as safety and security awareness on criminal activities will be posted inside the trains and stations.

Berroya said the partnership between the LRTA and the PNP will help ensure the safety and security of the riding public.

“Our responsibility is not only to provide an efficient and convenient mode of transportation to the riding public but also to ensure their safety and security while inside LRT 2 premises,” the LRTA chief said in a statement. PNA

I

N a sign of improving relations, President Duterte is now looking forward to welcoming US President Donald J. Trump in November for the Asean East Asian Summit in the Philippines.

“We confirm US President Donald Trump’s visit to the Philippines this November,” Presidential Spokesman Ernesto C. Abella said.

He said Trump’s visit “underscores the improving Philippines-United States ties and President Duterte is looking forward to welcoming the US President in Manila”. President Trump will join other world leaders who will attend the Asean/East Asian

ABELLA: “As host country, we hope to make the event productive and pleasant to our foreign guests.

We will let them experience our world-famous Filipino hospitality to make sure they would have good memories of their stay in the Philippines.”

Summit in the Philippines.

“As host country, we hope to make

the event productive and pleasant to our foreign guests. We will let them experience our world-famous Filipino hospitality to make sure they would have good memories of their stay in the Philippines,” Abella said.

Philippines-US relations had soured during the administration of President Barack Obama as Duterte sought to distance the country from the US and enter into friendlier relations with China and Russia.

Recently, however, Duterte said he is adopting a friendlier stance toward Washington, acknowledging that the US has also been helpful to the Philippines. PNA

Economy

A4 Wednesday, October 4, 2017 • Editors: Vittorio V. Vitug and Max V. de Leon

DTI eyes tighter inspection of all cement imports

By Catherine N. Pillas

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@c_pillas29

he Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) is eyeing to impose “equal treatment” to all imported cement, regardless if the product is brought in by a pure trader or by a manufacturer.

“We’re not going to give a distinction. Every [product] will undergo product testing, but we’ll see if we’re going to do pre-shipment or post-shipment or both. We have to balance it in a way that there’s product compliance for the benefit of consumer,” Trade Secretary Ramon M. Lopez said in an interview recently.

The DTI intends to resolve the ongoing row between cement manufacturers and importers by imposing the same testing procedure for all cement players, but have yet to decide if the procedure will mean only pre-shipment inspection (PSI) or inspection upon port of destination, or both.

The equal treatment is to avoid any accusation of favoring one party, Lopez emphasized.

According to the draft of DTI Department Administrative Orders 17-02 and 17-05, the DTI proposed a minimum requirement of PSI as a substitute for testing imported cement upon arrival.

Cement manufacturers like Eagle Cement Taiheiyo Cement Philippines Inc., Mabuhay Filcement Inc., Northern Cement Corp., Republic Cement and Cemex Philippines opposed this move and warned against relying on the PSI. They said all imported cement be tested at the port. Some of these players also have some importation requirement.

Those who are into cement trading and are pure importers undergo a more stringent importation procedure, including securing additional licenses and point-of-arrival testing. These firms favor the proposal of the DTI to just rely an PSI on order to avoid holding the shipment for long periods of time at the port and running the risk of product spoilage.

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LGUs told: Ensure viability of waste-to-energy projects

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By Jonathan L. Mayuga

@jonlmayuga

ocal government units (LGUs) were advised to refer to the guidelines on waste to energy, or better yet, consult with National Solid Waste Management Commission (NSWMC) experts before investing in waste-to-energy (WTE) projects, Eligio T. Ildefonso, executive director of the NSWMC Secretariat said.

“We don’t want LGUs wasting a huge amount of money in investing in WTE that will not work,” Ildefonso told the BusinessMirror in an interview.

Not all LGUs, he added, can solely produce enough solid waste to make WTE a viable option. As such, he said, the NSWMC is looking at the clustering of LGUs to make WTE work, such as in the province of Laguna.

He said a study conducted by the NSWMC was able to determine that Laguna’s four congressional districts have the capacity to produce waste that will sufficiently produce waste for two WTE facilities.

The Philippines is producing 40,000 tons of solid wastes every day, with Metro Manila producing about 9,000 tons a day.

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) and NSWMC are eyeing to close down more than 400 open dumps by the end of the Duterte administration in 2022, and the agency is also eyeing the establishment of more engineered sanitarylandfill facilities for the disposal of residual wastes.

Last year the Office of the Ombudsman filed charges against officials of 50 LGUs for failure to enforce Republic Act 9003, or the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000.

The law mandates LGUs to implement proper solidwaste management through recycling and composting, hauling and disposal of re-

40,000 tons

The Philippines’s daily estimated production of solid wastes, with Metro Manila producing about 9,000 tons a day sidual wastes.

“There are four congressional districts in Laguna and we were able to determine that two WTE projects are possible; two [congressional] districts, one WTE project,” Ildefonso said, referring to the province’s waste-production capacity.

To make WTE sustainable, an LGU should be producing at least 200 tons of wastes a day. With 200 tons per day, a WTE facility can generate 10 megawatts of electricity.

In operating a WTE facility, he said LGUs can enter into a public-private partnership if it is not financially capable of establishing a WTE facility.

An LGU, Ildefonso added, should have the capacity to produce solid wastes of at least 200 tons a day for WTE to work, adding that even with the WTE facility, LGUs are mandated to do proper waste management by segregating at the source and composting biodegradable wastes. Only the wastes that cannot be recycled or converted into compost materials should be converted into energy.

Davao and Cebu, he said, are producing enough wastes that will suffice to feed a WTE facility.

Both provinces, with their thickly pop-

Group issues conditional support to SSS pension-contribution hike

By Elijah Felice E. Rosales @alyasjah

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labor group on Tuesday said it will only support the proposed increase in pension contribution if workers are consulted by the Social Security System (SSS).

The Associated Labor UnionsTrade Union Congress of the Philippines (ALU-TUCP) is demanding the SSS to include labor groups in the discussion of the contribution increase. “As part of its public consultation, we expect the SSS management will consult labor groups, including the ALUTUCP, on the planned increase by next year,” ALU-TUCP Spokesman Alan A. Tanjusay said in a news statement.

The SSS is hoping Congress would pass the bill amending the SSS Charter, as provided in Republic Act 1161, or the Social Security Act, in 2018 to impose the stalled contribution-rate hike. The contribution increase, according to the SSS, is needed to maintain the pension fund’s actuarial life, following the P1,000 pension hike approved by President Duterte in February.

As for the ALU-TUCP, it said it will only support the contribution increase should workers be given a say in the public consultation.

“The ALU-TUCP will support the additional increase, only if the SSS management would be able to convince us if they have already improve its collection and have already prosecuted more delinquent employers, have done away with unnecessary trips abroad, done away with excessive bonuses of its top executives, have already improve its services to its members before we even want to hear the rationale behind how much is the increase and when is the implementation of the increase,” Tanjusay said.

He added the ALU-TUCP’s

participation in the discussion does not necessarily mean the group would back the contribution-rate hike. “If they will not be able to convince us on these very important issues, then we will not support the increase and we are going to oppose it,” Tanjusay said.

In an interview with reporters last Friday, SSS President and CEO Emmanuel F. Dooc revealed the SSS is eyeing to roll out the contribution increase in 2018, with the anticipated passage of the amendment of the SSS Charter, which is in the technical working group in the Senate. “[The proposed contributionrate hike] will no longer require a presidential decree since it is already included in the amendment. The bill is already in the technical working group of the Senate…[and], hopefully, we can have a committee report by November,” Dooc said.

Dooc added the SSS intends to implement the contribution increase in time with the enactment of the the Tax Reform for Inclusion and Acceleration. The SSS president also said the contribution-rate hike has the backing of Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III. Under the original proposal, the contribution increase of active SSS members would be collected in tranches until 2022, kicking off at 1.5-percent hike in May. Contribution-rate hike, according to the SSS, could go as high as 17 percent in 2022 from the current 11 percent.

Maximum salary credit was also supposed to be augmented to P20,000 from P16,000 in May. However, Dooc said the SSS has yet to calculate the amount of the new contribution increase, as the pension fund would need to catch up with the foregone revenues it could have earned if the hike was implemented on schedule.

ulated cities, are producing an average of 500 tons of waste a day, Ildefonso added.

“We are encouraging other provinces to cluster,” he said., adding that the 10-year solid waste-management plan submitted by LGUs will help determine whether a WTE is a viable option based on the kind of waste it produces.

Ildefonso was part of a 15-man delegation from the Philippines who visited WTE facilities in Japan last month to learn about various WTE technology options for the Philippines.

The Philippines, through the DENR and the NSWMC, is collaborating with counterparts in the Government of Japan to pilot-test two WTE projects in Quezon City and Davao City.

The DENR has adopted NSWMC Resolution 669, entitled “Adopting the Guidelines Governing the Establishment and Operation of Waste to Energy Technologies for Municipal Solid Wastes”, in June last year.

The NSWMC provides technical support to LGUs in coming up with its 10-year solid waste-management plan as it pushes for the closure of open dumps or its conversion into engineered sanitary landfills. It also provides technical support to LGUs in the establishment a material-recovery facility as required law.

WTE technologies allowed under the guidelines are “no-burn” technologies. Under the guidelines, WTE is defined as the process of converting nonrecyclable waste materials into usable energy, such as heat, electricity or fuel.

‘Liberalizing retail trade not a govt priority’

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rade Secretary Ramon M. Lopez said the government can look into other sectors that can be opened to foreign investors, instead of liberalizing retail trade.

In a chance interview on Tuesday, Lopez told the Philippine News Agency that liberalizing retail trade is not a priority for the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI).

“For DTI, it is not a priority,” Lopez said in Filipino.

“There are still other sectors that need investments that can be liberalized ahead and to update some laws like on public utilities,” he added.

Under the 10th foreign investment negative list (FINL) signed by former President Benigno S. Aquino III, retail-trade enterprises with paid-up capital of less than $2.5 million is one of the 11 economic activities with no foreign equity is allowed.

On Monday Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto M. Pernia said liberalizing retail trade and construction sectors are being considered to be included in the 11th regular FINL, which will also be the first FINL of the Duterte administration.

Pernia mentioned that economic managers are looking into lowering the minimum paid-up capital from $2.5 million to $200,000 for foreign retail enterprises to operate in the Philippines.

“The purpose is to make the consumers happier,” he said.

Lopez also echoed consumers will have better choices if the country will open further its retail-trade sector to foreign players.

The DTI chief, likewise, said Filipino small and medium enterprises (SMEs) will be able to compete even if the government will liberalize retail trade, noting that even with the entry of foreign brands like H&M and Forever21, among many others, local retail enterprises were still able to compete.

“There’s competition. Consumers already enjoyed many products,” he added.

Moreover, the trade chief mentioned that opening up retail-trade activities to foreign players could be an opportunity for local SMEs, as they can be suppliers to these international brands. PNA

Agriculture/Commodities BusinessMirror

news@businessmirror.com.ph

Editor: Jennifer A. Ng • Wednesday, October 4, 2017

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PHL seen importing more US poultry

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By Jasper Emmanuel Y. Arcalas @jearcalas

he volume of poultry products that the Philippines would import from the United States this year would likely exceed 90,495 metric tons (MT), according to the USA Poultry and Egg Export Council (USAPEEC).

USAPEEC Vice President of Marketing Greg Tyler said the increase in demand for US poultry during the holidays would allow American exporters to surpass their shipments last year. Shipments of US poultry to the Philippines hit a record high of 199.508 million pounds (lbs), or about 90,495 MT, in 2016.

“In the last quarter you will see a big push for our exports, especially during the holiday season”, Tyler told the BusinessMirror in an interview.

The latest data from the US Depa r t ment of A g r ic u lt u re’s (USDA) Economic Research Service showed that US broiler meat exports to the Philippines in January to July reached 136.845 million lbs (62,071 MT), 23.53 percent higher than last year’s 110.777 million lbs (50,247 MT).

90,495 MT The volume of broiler meat imported by the Philippines from the US last year Tyler said the 23.53-percent hike in shipments in the sevenmonth period could be attributed to the favorable price of chickenleg quarters.

“We have a very good outlook for our broiler exports. As long as the price is good, we think that our exports will continue to grow as leg quarters is one of our biggest exports to the Philippines,” he said.

“Also, the US is [now an] avian influenza-free country. So we are exporting more to our markets

SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg

and that’s part of the increase as well,” Tyler added.

Last year the Philippines purchased a total of 199.508 million lbs (90,495 MT) of broiler meat from the US, 26 percent higher than the 158.093 million lbs (71,709 MT) recorded in 2015.

“We see that the Philippines would remain as a top 10 market as far as our broiler exports are concerned.

The meat-processing association in the Philippines continues to develop new products, so we see growth in these markets,” Tyler said.

Govt constructs fish-processing center for farmers in Camarines Norte

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he Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) recently turned over a smoked fish-processing facility to producers belonging to the Asosasyon ng SamaSamang Kababaihan Tungo sa Kaunlaran (Asska) in Mercedes, Camarines Norte.

DAR Provincial Agrarian Reform Program Officer Roseller R. Olayres said the smoked fish-processing center aims to increase the income of farmers by providing them with a facility to process and add value to their fish products, like the smoked fish, locally called tinapa.

“This tinapa food-processing facility is perfect for the

farmers because Mercedes is a coastal municipality and fishing, apart from farming, is another source of income for them,” Olayres said in a statement.

Officers and members of Asska underwent various training and seminars about business and product development before the DAR’s turned over the facility to them.

The training and seminars were facilitated by the DAR, in partnership with the departments of Trade and Industry, Science and Technology and the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources.

“With the processing

facility and the farmers’s learning food processing and entrepreneurship, they can now compete in the commercial market,” Olayres added.

The construction of the processing center is a joint project and effort of the local government of Mercedes, through Mayor Alexander L. Pajarillo, and DAR-Camarines Norte under the Village Level Processing Center Enhancement Project (VLPCEP).

VLPCEP is a partnership program that empowers farmers by providing them appropriate knowledge and skills, as well as provide them assistance for the necessary facilities and infrastructures. Jonathan L. Mayuga

He added the Philippines is a $70-million broiler market for the US and accounts for at least 3 percent of its total annual shipments.

The USAPEEC is a nonprofit association that is an advocate for the American poultry industry on trade-policy issues. Because of its status as a not-for-profit entity, USAPEEC said it does not lobby, but it can and does act as intermediary with the USDA, both in Washington and at embassies and Agricultural Trade Offices around the world.

The US continues to be the

Philippines’ number one supplier of agricultural products, and the Philippines is its 10th largest market in the world.

According to the USDA, the Philippines is the second largest market for US soybean meal (SBM), next to Mexico. Driven by a strong feed demand from the domestic hog and poultry industries, the USDA projected that SBM imports in 2017/2018 would reach 2.85 million MT (MMT).

The Philippines is also the top destination of fresh or chilled potatoes from the US. Data from the USDA showed that American

producers exported nearly $6.6 million of fresh or chilled potatoes to the Philippines in 2016.

Other American products that are shipped to the Philippines include pet food and processed food and beverages. In a previous Global Agricultural Information Network report, the US is projected to increase its shipments of pet food to the Philippines by nearly 10 percent to $28.8 million this year, from $26.2 million a year ago.

“Exports of US dog and cat food to the Philippines more than tripled over the past 10 years and reached $26.2 million in 2016, up 10 percent over the previous year,” the report published on July 27 read. “The booming economy and higher disposable income contributed to the healthy export performance.”

The Philippines also exports farm products to the US, such as coconut oil, dried mangoes, pineapple, and tuna.

Last year data from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) showed the Philippines continued to purchase more food from abroad, as agricultural imports rose 10.6 percent to $12. 52 bi l l ion , f rom $11. 32 bi l l ion recorded in 2015.

Data from the PSA showed the increase in food imports widened the country’s agricultural trade deficit to $7.24 billion in 2016, from $6.17 billion in 2015.

The country’s top 5 imports included wheat, soya bean oil/cake meal, milk and cream products, coffee and frozen meat of bovine animals.

DA to build ₧302-million biotech center in Nueva Ecija T he Department of Agriculture (DA) will construct a P302-million biotechnology center in Nueva Ecija, which will allow the government to improve crop productivity and create new crop varieties.

Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice), an attached agency of the DA, said the bulk of the funding, or about P277 million, would be sourced from the Public Law (PL) 480 of the United States. The remaining P25 million would be shouldered by the PhilRice.

“The goal of constructing this center is to generate improved technologies, increase productivity and enhance commercial value of the DA’s priority crops, such as rice,

abaca, coconut, white and yellow corn, cotton, cassava, sweet potato, yam, tomato and eggplant,” Roel R. Suralta, head of the DA’s Crop Biotechnology Center, said in a statement on October 3.

“Our submitted proposal was recommended by the DA and we were able to get P277 million for this project from the US food-aid program. The remaining P25 million came from PhilRice,” Suralta added, saying the Nueva Ecija facility would be the DA’s biggest biotechnology center.

Suralta, who is also the team leader of the Golden Rice project, added the budget will cover the construction of new buildings, purchase of state-of-the-art biotechnology

equipment and laboratory furniture, and monitoring and evaluation of the project in coordination with the Philippine Council for Agriculture and Fisheries.

“The center will not only provide equipment and facilities, but also training and support to Filipino researchers who will venture in the field of biotechnology. It also aims to build a network among local and international researchers to sustain and continually advance biotechnology in the Philippines,” he said.

Enacted in 1954, the PL 480 refers to a US legislation, which mandates the US to use its agricultural productivity to enhance the food security of developing countries. Jasper Emmanuel Y. Arcalas

US adds wine to its growing list of trade disputes with Canada

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Bloomberg

onald J. Trump is pairing a fresh trade challenge over Canadian wine with his administration’s ongoing dairy dispute.

The US filed a second complaint on Monday with the World Trade Organization (WTO) against Canada over British Columbia’s (B.C.) restrictions on wine sales. The US alleges the province’s regulations discriminate against imports by only allowing B.C. wine to be sold on regular grocery-store shelves and has requested WTO consultations on the matter, the trade organization said in a statement.

The wine dispute—initiated in the last days of the previous administration—comes as negotiators from the US, Canada and Mexico try to hash out a revamp of the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta). In the lead-up to those talks, which intensified

during a third round last week in Ottawa, the president took issue with Canada’s dairy industry and promised US farmers his administration would intervene to restore exports of American milk.

“We’re not sure why they’re picking on B.C.,” said Miles Prodan, president and CEO of the Kelowna-based British Columbia Wine Institute. “The Americans have got a huge foothold in the Canadian wine sector.”

T he Pacif ic-coast prov ince changed its rules in 2015 to allow grocery stores to sell local wine on regular shelves. Other wines and spirits are sold in a “store-withina-store” through separate cashiers.

Wine is expected to arise during Nafta talks and the timing of the WTO request may signal the US is trying to put pressure on Canada, Prodan said. To date, less than 20 of the province’s 1,300 retail

outlets have shelves where only locally produced wine is sold, he added. American wine producers currently have about 14 percent of the Canadian market, while B.C. producers account for roughly 10 percent, Prodan said.

The US has grown a significant wine-trade surplus of C$450.6 million ($360.2 million) with Canada since free trade was negotiated in 1989, according to the Canadian Vintners Association.

“I suspect it’s a bargaining position,” Prodan said by telephone.

For me r P re s id e nt B a r a c k Obama’s administration filed an initial trade complaint in January over British Columbia’s rules, which it claimed limit sales opportunities for US producers and provide a substantial competitive advantage for B.C. wine, according to a Januar y statement. Bloomberg News

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Wednesday, October 4, 2017

The World BusinessMirror

Trump admin no clear path to nuke deal with N. Korea

briefs Abe support falls as Koike steals spotlight before polls

Support for Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe fell in two polls released on Monday, three weeks before a general election where Tokyo Gov. Yuriko Koike’s new Party of Hope threatens to eat into his majority.

The premier’s approval rate dropped below his disapproval rate in polls by Kyodo News and the Asahi newspaper. Almost 46 percent of respondents to the Kyodo survey said they saw Abe as an appropriate person to be prime minister, compared with 33 percent who chose Koike, whose power base is largely in and around the capital.

About 24 percent said they’d vote for Abe’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party with nearly 15 percent opting for Koike’s party in the proportional representation section of the October 22 election. Forty-three percent said they hadn’t decided.

Bloomberg News

U.K. minorities less likely to have job or own home

Black and Asian Britons are less likely to have a job and own their own home than whites, an audit commissioned by Prime Minister Theresa May has found.

May ordered the review of data, published on Tuesday, after she took office in 2016. She said she hoped the findings would help the government address inequality.

The prime minister is trying to use her Conservative Party’s conference this week to talk about things other than Brexit.

“My most fundamental political belief is that how far you go in life should be based on your talent and how hard you work and nothing else,” May said in an e-mailed statement.

“Britain has come a long way in my lifetime in spreading equality and opportunity, but this audit will be definitive evidence of how far we must still go in order to truly build a country that works for everyone.”

The audit found the unemployment rate for working-age people from minority groups was 8 percent, compared with 4.6 percent for whites. Two thirds of white British householders own their own home, against two in five from other ethnic groups. But among children attending state-run schools, whites had the lowest university entry rate.

Bloomberg News

Toyota plant closure latest step in Australian ‘Carmageddon’

SYDNEY—After looming for four years, “Carmageddon” has hit the Australian auto industry. Toyota closed its factory in Melbourne on Tuesday, ending 54 years of production by the Japanese firm in Australia, the first country outside of Japan where the company made cars.

Iconic local brand Holden plans to shutter its factory in Adelaide on October 20, ending car manufacturing in Australia. Ford Motor Co., which pioneered Australian-based auto making in 1925, heralded its end in 2013 by announcing it would close its last two Australian manufacturing plants in 2016. Toyota Motor Corp. has been Australia’s biggest auto manufacturer for the past decade, with 70 percent of its cars exported, mostly to the Middle East. Output at the Melbourne plant peaked in 2007, when it made 149,000 cars.

Facebook estimates 10M saw Russia-linked ads

WASHINGTON—Facebook says ads that ran on the company’s socialmedia platform and have been linked to a Russian Internet agency were seen by an estimated 10 million people before and after the 2016 election.

In a new company blog post, Facebook’s Elliot Schrage says the ads appeared to focus on divisive social and political messages, including lesbian, gay, bisexual and transexual issues, immigration and gun rights. Fewer than half of the ads were seen before the election, with 56 percent of them seen after the election. Some of the ads were paid for in Russian currency. AP

www.businessmirror.com.ph

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In this August 14, 2015, photo, a US flag flies at the US embassy in Havana, Cuba. The Associated Press has learned that frightening attacks on US personnel in Havana struck the heart of America’s spy network in Cuba, with intelligence operatives among the first and most severely affected victims. AP/Desmond Boylan

US to ask Cuba to cut embassy staff by 60%

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ASHINGTON—The Trump administration is preparing to ask Cuba to withdraw 60 percent of its diplomats from Washington, United States officials said on Monday, in response to last week’s US move to cut its own embassy staff in Havana by a similar amount.

T he US request m a rk s yet a not her m ajor setbac k for re l at ions bet ween t he US a nd Cuba , t wo cou nt r ies t h at on ly recent ly renewed d iplom at ic re l at ions a f ter a h a l f - cent u r y of host i l it y.

It comes as the US seeks to protect its own diplomats from unexplained attacks that have harmed at least 21 Americans in Havana with ailments that affected their hearing, cognition, balance and vision.

The State Department is expected to announce the decision on Tuesday, officials said, though they cautioned no decision was formalized until publicly announced. The officials weren’t authorized to discuss the plan publicly and requested anonymity.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson discussed the plan on Monday with President Donald J. Trump, one of the officials said.

Cuba has denied involvement in the attacks. Though Havana is likely to view the move as unwarranted retaliation, US officials said the goal wasn’t to punish the communist-run island, but to ensure both countries have a similar number of diplomats in each other’s capitals.

The US will formally ask Cuba to pull the diplomats, but won’t expel them forcefully unless Havana refuses, the officials said.

Tensions bet ween the t wo neighbors have been escalating amid serious US concern about the unexplained attacks on Americans in Havana.

On Monday The Associated Press reported that US spies were among the first and most severely affected victims.

Though bona fide diplomats have also been affected, it wasn’t until US spies, working out of the embassy under diplomatic cover, reported hearing bizarre sounds and experiencing even stranger physical effects that the US realized something was wrong, several individuals familiar with the situation said. The mysterious “health attacks” started within

21

The estimated number of Americans in Havana, who suffered ailments that affected their hearing, cognition, balance and vision owing to unexplained attacks

days of Trump’s election in November, the AP has reported. But it wasn’t until last Friday that the US ordered more than half its embassy staff to return home.

Delivering a one-two punch to US-Cuba relations, the US last week also delivered an ominous warning to Americans to stay away from Cuba, a move that could have profound implications for the island’s travel industry.

The US said that since some workers had been attacked in Havana hotels, it couldn’t assure Americans who visit Cuba that they wouldn’t suffer attacks if they stay in hotels there.

Cuba had blasted the American move as “ hast y” and lamented that it was being taken without conclusive investigation results. But several US lawmakers had said that move by Washington didn’t go far enough, because President Raul Castro’s government was being permitted to keep all of its diplomats in the US. Sen. Marco Rubio, Republican-Florida, had called the onesided action “an insult” in an AP interview. There was no immediate reaction from Cuba’s Embassy in Washington late on Monday after word emerged that the US

planned to ask Cuban diplomats to leave. Yet, the move will bring the two countries closer to the chilly state of relations they endured for decades until 2015, when they restored formal ties and reopened embassies in Havana and Washington.

The US previously had roughly 50 American workers at its embassy in Havana, so the 60-percent reduction will bring the figure down to roughly 20. It wasn’t immediately clear late on Monday how Cuban diplomats will have to leave Washington to bring the two countries’ rosters to parity.

In Friday’s travel warning urging Americans not to visit Cuba, the State Department confirmed earlier reporting by the AP that US personnel first encountered unexplained physical effects in Cuban hotels.

While American tourists aren’t known to have been hurt, the US said they could be exposed if they travel to the island.

“Because our personnel’s safety is at risk, and we are unable to identify the source of the attacks, we believe US citizens may also be at risk and warn them not to travel to Cuba,” the warning said.

At least 21 diplomats and family members have been affected.

The department said symptoms include hearing loss, dizziness, headache, fatigue, cognitive issues and difficulty sleeping.

Until last Friday, the US had generally referred to “incidents.”

Tillerson‘s statement ended that practice, mentioning “attacks” seven times; the travel alert used the word five times.

Still, the administration has pointedly not blamed Cuba for perpetrating the attacks, and officials have spent weeks weighing how to minimize the risk for Americans in Cuba without unnecessarily harming relations or falling into an adversary’s trap.

I n 2015 P resident B a rac k Obama and Cuban President R au l C a st ro re store d d iplo matic ties, ordered embassies reopened and eased travel and commerce restrictions.

Tr u mp h a s reversed some changes but has broadly left the rapprochement in place.

To medical investigators’ dismay, symptoms have varied widely. In addition to hearing loss and concussions, some people have experienced nausea, headaches and ear-ringing. The Associated Press has reported some now suffer from problems with concentration and common word recall.

Though the incidents stopped for a time, they recurred as recently as late August. AP

OKYO—For those worried about a nuclear war between North Korea and the United States, the weekend disclosure by Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson that the two nations were in direct communication was a rare glimmer of hope that a diplomatic resolution to the standoff might be possible.

But President Donald J. Trump’s public rebuke of Tillerson’s efforts—he said the nation’s top diplomat was “wasting his time”—was a sharp reminder of how difficult it will be for the two sides to reach an agreement even if they begin serious talks.

Apart from conflicting messages from Trump and his aides about their willingness to enter negotiations, the hurdles to a meaningful dialogue with North Korea are high, and it will be even more difficult to reach a deal with the North than it was with Iran, analysts said.

The key difference, of course, is that North Korea has already developed nuclear weapons, even if it has not yet demonstrated that it can hit the US with one.

The US has repeatedly said it is not willing to start negotiations unless North Korea agrees in advance that the goal should be the elimination of its nuclear arsenal.

North Korea appears determined to press ahead until it can mount a nuclear warhead on an intercontinental ballistic missile that can reach the US. “I think the problem we have right now is no one wants to blink or look weak in any way,” said Melissa Hanham, a senior research associate at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in Monterey, California.

She added: “The positions of the United States and North Korea are extremely far apart.”

“If it were easy,” she said, “we would have done it already.”

Bridging that gap has fallen largely to Tillerson, a former chief executive of the oil giant Exxon Mobil, with no experience in diplomatic negotiations or with North Korea in particular.

He must contend not only with the North’s brash 33-year-old leader, Kim Jong Un, but also a US president prone to issuing impromptu threats.

Speaking in Beijing last Saturday, Tillerson said he was trying to cool the bellicose rhetoric over the standoff but skirted any direct criticism of Trump.

“I think everyone would like for it to calm down,” he said.

The president undercut Tillerson the next day, belittling his efforts to start a dialogue.

But State Department Spokesman Heather Nauert asserted again on Twitter later in the day that, “Diplomatic channels are open for #KimJongun for now.”

She added, “They won’t be open forever.”

The North has shown little interest in starting talks, at least not if giving up its weapons is the price of admission.

Some analysts argue the North may

be waiting until it has finished building a nuclear missile that can hit the US, which would allow it to negotiate from a much stronger position.

In a personal response to Trump’s speech to the UN General Assembly last month, Kim said the president’s threat to “totally destroy” North Korea had “convinced me, rather than frightening or stopping me, that the path I chose is correct and that it is the one I have to follow to the last.”

Many analysts say Washington will have to give up its demand that Pyongyang abandon its nuclear weapons program to get negotiations started.

“If our opening bid is denuclearization, that just seems like a Western fantasy at this point,” said Vipin Narang, an associate professor of political science at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

“What incentive does Kim have to give them up at this point? If that’s our only acceptable end point, I don’t see any way that he willingly gives up his nuclear weapons.”

A more realistic opening goal would be to negotiate a freeze in missile and nuclear tests, said Suzanne DiMaggio, a director and senior fellow at the New America research group who has been involved in unofficial talks with North Korea. DiMaggio said that such a freeze could be an interim step.

“This way it implies that there will be more agreements to come,” she said.

In exchange, DiMaggio suggested, the US could discuss scaling back the joint military exercises it holds with South Korea, which are scheduled to resume again in the spring. The North considers these war games threatening, particularly components that target the country’s leadership in the event of war.

The US could also offer to send fewer B-1B long-range bombers on patrols near the Korean Peninsula, to withdraw certain sanctions or to open an embassy in Pyongyang.

But the Trump administration does not appear willing to discuss such concessions without a commitment by Pyongyang to dismantle its nuclear program. North Korea wants the US to acknowledge that it is a nuclear state, a demand that analysts say would be difficult for any US president to accept.

“That is so inimical to US national security interests,” said Daniel R. Russel, who served as assistant secretary of state for East Asia during the Obama administration. “It would have such a devastating effect on both the international nonproliferation system and on the credibility of the US as an ally, not to mention our relationships with South Korea and Japan, that I view it as unimaginable.”

Russel argued that the US should continue to apply pressure through sanc tions on Nor th Korea until Kim concludes he has no choice but to negotiate.

New York Times News Service

May’s Brexit budget offer said to be conditional on trade

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he United Kingdom will leave a €20-billion ($23-billion) hole in the European Union’s budget unless the bloc agrees to give Prime Minister Theresa May the sweeping Brexit trade deal she wants, according to senior British officials.

Britain won’t fulfill May’s offer to cover the UK’s share of the EU budget through 2020 without a broader Brexit deal, said the officials, speaking on condition of anonymity. The UK also hasn’t accepted that it’s liable for a share of the pensions of EU staff, they said.

The comments from officials in May’s administration help clarify the premier’s intentions, which she laid out last month in a speech in Florence.

In an attempt to unblock stalled talks, May said the UK would honor its financial obligations and keep paying into the EU budget. “I do not want our partners to fear that they will need to pay more or receive less over the remainder of the current budget plan as a result of our decision to leave,” she said.

A spokesman for the Brexit Department said the financial settlement should be “in accordance with law and in the spirit of the UK’s continuing partnership with the EU.”

Talks unlocked

May is negotiating with Brussels while struggling to keep a united front within

her Cabinet, whose members have differing ambitions for what Brexit should look like.

May got some relief from the infighting late on Monday, when Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said he was behind “every syllable” of his boss’s Brexit plan, falling into line after weeks of insubordination.

Johnson, a leading Brexit campaigner and longtime leadership candidate, speaks to the party’s conference in Manchester, England, on Tuesday.

While May’s speech in Florence divided Conser vatives at home, it did help unblock negotiations in Brussels, the thorniest element of which is the financial settlement, or how much money the UK will pay toward the EU’s ongoing liabilities when it leaves in 2019.

Talks ended acrimoniously over the issue in August, but May seemed to have spurred progress with her offer. She proposed a transition phase lasting around two years after Brexit day in 2019, and said that during that period Britain would continue to pay its full share of the EU’s budget.

On Monday Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond also qualified May’s offer on the transition. He said at the conference that transition was a “wasting asset,” suggesting that the longer it takes to secure, the less it’s worth to the UK. “Our European interlocutors know that,” he said, amid calls from business to lock down the deal by year-end. Bloomberg News

www.businessmirror.com.ph

The World BusinessMirror

Wednesday, October 4, 2017

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Catalonia urges mediation with Spain in secession dispute

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A R C E L ONA , S p a i n — C a t a l a n separatists called for international mediation with the Spanish government as they pushed ahead on Monday with plans to declare unilateral independence this week, after a violent police crackdown scarred a disputed secession referendum.

The referendum debacle only deepened Spain’s most serious political crisis since democratic rule was restored in 1978. The violence last Sunday in the prosperous northeastern region left more than 890 civilians and 430 police injured when antiriot squads moved into polling stations and dispersed voters.

Shocking videos and photos of police dragging people by the hair and kicking them were flashed around the globe, leading some European leaders to warn about any further escalation of violence.

Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont said a regional parliamentary commission would investigate why Spain’s antiriot squads fired rubber bullets, smashed into polling stations and beat protesters with batons to disperse voters in the independence referendum that Spain opposed.

He also urged the 5,000 strong contingent of special Spanish police forces deployed in Catalonia to leave immediately.

Puigdemont called on Monday for the European Union “to stop looking the other way” and urged Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy to accept international mediation in the crisis. He urged the EU to view Catalonia’s desire to break away from Spain as a Europe-wide issue.

“This is not a domestic issue. The need for mediation is evident,” Puigdemont said.

Calls for restraint came from across Europe, including EU chief Donald Tusk, who appealed to Rajoy to “avoid further escalation and use of force” while agreeing that the independence vote was invalid.

Several human-rights organizations called for an impartial investigation into the violence.

Of the 893 civilians injured in the melee, two suffered serious wounds, Catalan health authorities said. The Interior Ministry said 39 police received immediate medical treatment and 392 others had scrapes and bruises.

But Spanish authorities commended the police, saying their response to the voting was professional and proportionate.

And Spain’s interior minister said the 5,000 extra officers deployed to Catalonia would stay as long as necessary.

“I don’t think there was such a heavy hand, but in any case, they had to react,” said Spanish Foreign Minister Alfonso Dastis, calling the police reaction videos “a matter of interpretation.”

Speaking in Rome, Dastis said “some of the pictures are real, some of them are not real” but that police had simply responded when people prevented them from doing their job.

Catalan officials say an overwhelming majority of the 2.26 million who voted suppor ted independence from Spain—they said 90 percent—but the central government in Madrid has repeatedly condemned the referendum as unconstitutional and invalid.

The Catalan president said the regional parliament will be asked to declare independence this week after final results are announced—and plenary sessions are scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday.

The euro and Spanish stocks fell on Monday as investors tried to gauge what the weekend unrest in Catalonia means for the future of Spain and European unity.

The referendum fiasco brought Spain and Catalonia closer to a potentially disastrous showdown as each side said last Sunday’s events proved them right.

Rajoy met with his conser vative Popular Party members before seeking a parliamentary session to discuss how to confront Spain’s most serious political crisis in decades. He also met with the leaders of the opposition Socialist and Citizens parties to discuss Spain’s options, although no immediate consensus emerged.

The impasse developed after Catalan authorities decided to go ahead with last Sunday’s referendum, even after Spain’s Constitutional Court suspended it while assessing the claims by Rajoy’s government that the vote was illegal. The court has previously ruled against unilateral secession attempts. Amnesty International said the Spanish police used “excessive and disproportionate” force against people “passively resisting” a judge’s order to impede the referendum.

United Nations Human Rights chief Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein called on Spain’s g o ve r n m e n t t o e n s u re “ t h o ro u g h , independent and impartial investigations” of the violence.

Some Catalans said both sides bore some responsibility.

“I think both sides involved committed grave mistakes,” said Eric Tigra, 56. “But we must also highlight that if the people of Catalonia go out in the streets and you don’t listen to them, then something is not working right.”

In an editorial, the Spanish daily El Pais blamed the Catalan government for last Sunday’s “shameful” events but also criticized the Spanish government for its inability to tackle the crisis that began about seven years ago.

So far, most European governments, the United States and most international bodies have backed Spain in its stance against Catalan independence, fearing that Catalonia could unleash a wave of secessionist movements.

French President Emmanuel Macron called Rajoy on Monday to offer support.

“These are times for unity and stability,” EU Spokesman Margaritis Schinas said, urging all sides in Spain to move from confrontation to dialogue.

Catalonia, with the vibrant city of Barcelona as its capital, represents a fifth of Spain’s economy. Polls consistently show that, while most of its 7.5 million inhabitants favored a referendum, they are roughly evenly split on independence from Spain. Those in favor of secession argue that the region contributes more to the national government than it receives in return.

Catalans already enjoy a wide measure of autonomy but the central government still controls taxation and other financial levers, as well as infrastructure projects. AP

Many Puerto Ricans angry over Trump’s comments on island

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AN JUAN, Puerto Rico—Outside of official events, many Puerto Ricans say they won’t be welcoming President Donald J. Trump with open arms during his visit to the storm-wracked island on Tuesday.

People in the US territory were angry or dismissive on Monday when asked about Trump’s description of some Puerto Ricans who have criticized the US government’s aid after Hurricane Maria as “ingrates” and about his assurances that the relief effort is going well.

“He’s a piece of trash,” Rachel Cruz, a linguist, said as she head home after buying groceries in the capital, San Juan.

“He makes a fool out of himself and a fool out of his country.”

Cruz added Puerto Ricans are furious with power still cut off on most of the island, schools and many businesses closed and much of the countryside struggling to find fresh water and food, but she said even the angriest were unlikely to openly insult the man ultimately responsible for helping them.

“The majority of people here feel that way, but we have to be more balanced because we need help,” she said.

Even those happy with the federal aid effort for the US territory’s 3.4 million people said they resented Trump’s tweets about some Puerto Ricans being lazy and ungrateful.

“We appreciate all the help that we’ve received, but his comments are not true,” said Nancy Rivera, a private-school principal who was out buying bread. “We don’t deserve that.”

Rivera and her husband live in the north coastal town of Toa Baja, which was one of the hardest hit by Maria and where dozens of people had to be rescued from rooftops amid widespread flooding. The couple has moved temporarily to their son’s apartment in San Juan.

Gov. Ricardo Rossello, however, praised federal and state officials for the resources and help they have provided, but he also noted that Puerto Rico has long been struggling because of its territorial status. AP

A wounded woman is moved outside the Tropicana during an active-shooter situation on the Las Vegas Strip in Las Vegas, on October 1. Multiple victims were being transported to hospitals after a shooting late last Sunday at a music festival on the Las Vegas Strip. Chase Stevens/Las Vegas Review-Journal via AP

‘I’m going to die’: Fear grips Vegas strip; gunman kills 59

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AS VEGAS—The rapid-fire popping sounded like firecrackers at first, and many in the crowd of 22,000 country music fans didn’t understand what was happening when the band stopped playing and singer Jason Aldean hustled off stage.

“That’s gunshots,” a man could be heard saying emphatically on a cell-phone video in the nearly half-minute of silence and confusion that followed. A woman pleaded with others: “Get down!

Get down! Stay down!”

Then the pop-pop-pop noise resumed. And pure terror set in.

“People start screaming and yelling and we start running,” said Andrew Akiyoshi, who provided the cell-phone video to The Associated Press. “You could feel the panic. You could feel like the bullets were flying above us. Everybody’s ducking down, running low to the ground.”

While some concertgoers hit the ground last Sunday night, others pushed for the crowded exits, shoving through narrow gates and climbing over fences as 40to 50-round bursts of fire rained down on them from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay casino hotel.

By Monday afternoon, 59 victims were dead and 527 injured in the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.

“You just didn’t know what to do,” Akiyoshi said. “Your heart is racing and you’re thinking, ‘I’m going to die.’”

The gunman, identified as Stephen Craig Paddock, a 64-year-old retired accountant from Mesquite, Nevada, killed himself before officers stormed Room 135 in the gold-colored glass skyscraper.

The avid gambler, who, according to his brother, made a small fortune investing in real estate had been staying there since last Thursday and had busted out windows to create his sniper’s perch roughly 500 yards from the concert grounds.

The motive for the attack remained a mystery, with Sheriff Joseph Lombardo saying: “I can’t get into the mind of a psychopath at this point.”

Paddock had 23 guns—some with scopes—in his hotel room, authorities said. They found two gun stocks that allow the shooter

527 The number of concertgoers injured in the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history

to replicate fully automatic fire, and are investigating whether weapons used in the massacre had those modifications, according to a US official briefed by law enforcement who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is still unfolding.

At Paddock’s home, authorities found 19 more guns, explosives and thousands of rounds of ammunition. Also, several pounds of ammonium nitrate, a fertilizer that can be turned into explosives, such as those used in the 1995 Oklahoma bombing, were in his car, the sheriff said.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) said it found nothing so far to suggest the attack was connected to international terrorism, despite a claim of responsibility from the Islamic State (IS) group, which said Paddock was a “soldier” who had recently converted to Islam.

In an address to the country, President Donald J. Trump called the bloodbath “an act of pure evil” and added: “In moments of tragedy and horror, America comes together as one. And it always has.” He ordered flags flown at half-staff.

With hospitals jammed with victims, authorities put out a call for blood donations and set up a hotline to report missing people and speed the identification of the dead and wounded.

They also opened a “ family

reunification center” for people to find loved ones. More than 12 hours after the massacre, bodies covered in white sheets were still being removed from the festival grounds.

T he shooting began at 10:07 p.m., and the gunman appeared to f ire unhindered for more t han 10 minutes, accord ing to rad io traf f ic. The police frantically tried to locate him and determine whether the gunfire was coming from Mandalay Bay or the neighboring Luxor hotel.

At 10:14 p.m., an officer said on his radio that he was pinned down against a wall on Las Vegas Boulevard with 40 to 50 people.

“We can’t worr y about the victims,” an officer said at 10:15 p.m. “We need to stop the shooter before we have more victims.

Anybody have eyes on him...stop the shooter.”

Near the stage, Dylan Schneider, a country singer who performed earlier in the day, huddled with others under the VIP bleachers, where he turned to his manager and asked, “Dude, what do we do?” He said he repeated the question again and again over the next five minutes.

Bodies were lying on the artificial turf installed in front of the stage, and people were screaming and crying. The sound of people running on the bleachers added to the confusion, and Schneider thought the concert was being invaded with multiple shooters.

“No one knew what to do,” Schneider said. “It’s literally running for your life and you don’t know what decision is the right one. But like I said, I knew we had to get out of there.”

He e vent u a l ly pu shed h i s way out of the crowd and found ref uge in the nearby Tropicana hotel-casino, where he k ic ked in a door to an eng ineer ing room and spent hours t here w it h ot hers who fol lowed him.

The shooting started as Aldean closed out the three-day Route 91 Harvest Festival. He had just begun the song “When She Says Baby,” and the first burst of nearly 50 shots crackled as he sang, “It’s tough just getting up.”

Muzzle flashes could be seen in the dark as the gunman fired away.

“It was the craziest stuff I’ve ever seen in my entire life,” said Kodiak Yazzie, 36. “You could hear that the noise was coming from west of us, from Mandalay Bay. You could see a flash, flash, flash, flash.”

The crowd, funneled tightly into a wide-open space, had little cover and no easy way to escape.

Victims fell to the ground, while others fled in panic. Some hid behind concession stands or crawled under parked cars.

Faces were etched with shock and confusion, and people wept and screamed.

Tales of heroism and compassion emerged quickly: Couples held hands as they ran through the dirt lot. Some of the bleeding were carried out by fellow concertgoers. While dozens of ambulances took away the wounded, some people loaded victims into their cars and drove them to the hospital. People f leeing the concert grounds hitched rides with strangers, piling into cars and trucks.

Some of the injured were hit by shrapnel. Others were trampled or were injured jumping fences.

The dead included at least three off-duty police officers from various departments who were attending the concert, authorities said. Two on-duty officers were wounded, one critically, the police said.

L a s Veg a s M ayor C a roly n Goodman said the attack was the work of a “crazed lunatic full of hate.”

The sheriff said authorities believe Paddock acted alone. While Paddock appeared to have no criminal history, his father was a bank robber who was on the FBI’s most-wanted list in the 1960s.

As for why Paddock went on the murderous rampage, his brother in Florida, Eric Paddock, told reporters: “I can’t even make something up. There’s just nothing.”

Hours after the shooting, Aldean posted on Instagram that he and his crew were safe and that the shooting was “beyond horrific.”

“It hurts my heart that this would happen to anyone who was just coming out to enjoy what should have been a fun night,” the country star said.

Before Sunday, the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history took place in June 2016, when a gunman who professed support for Muslim extremist groups opened fire at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, killing 49 people.

A suicide bombing at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, England, killed 22 people in May. Almost 90 people were killed in 2015 at a concert in Paris by gunmen inspired by IS. AP

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Banking&Finance BusinessMirror

Wednesday, October 4, 2017 • Editor: Jun B. Vallecera

news@businessmirror.com.ph

Final months seen posting slightly higher inflation

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By Bianca Cuaresma @BcuaresmaBM

nflation was seen trending back to the 3-percent territory in the final few months of the year as consumption quickens and the local currency continues to show weakness against the dollar, according to the DBS Bank.

In his latest assessment of the local inflation dynamics, DBS Bank economist Gundy Cahyadi said the headline print could hit 3.1 percent again in September.

I f t h i s proves t r ue, Se ptember will be the second consecutive month that inf lation averages 3.1 percent, f rom on ly 2.8 percent in Ju ly a nd 2.7 percent in June.

“ Two factors may be behind the gradual rise in core inf lation. First, domestic demand remains firm even as it moderates. Private consumption growth is still trending circa 6 percent, while total investment growth is likely to come in near 10 percent this year,” Cahyadi said.

“Second, a weakening peso is likely to have fueled inflationary expectations in the economy.

The peso is the worst-performing currency in Asia this year, having weakened by some 3 percent against the US dollar this year,” he added.

The weakness of the local currency was flagged in an earlier report on the manufacturing sector.

Following his commentary on subdued Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) in August, IHS Markit economist Bernard Aw said the weakened peso pos-

Some banks abandon TDFs for 5-year bonds

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ome of the banks and trust units have found the term-deposit facility (TDF) of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) already unappealing on Tuesday and redeployed a portion of their assets to the Bureau of the Treasury (BTr) where their presence was betrayed by a surfeit of bids for five-year Treasury bonds (T-bonds).

At its latest auction, the BTr awarded in full the P15 billion on offer upon seeing the investors that used to exploit the rich rewards presented by the BSP’s TDF were, instead, looking to invest in risk-free government securities.

According to National Treasurer Rosalia V. de Leon, the turnout of bids at Tuesday’s auction may be traced to the reduction in the BSP’s 28-day TDF from P110 to just P100 billion.

“I guess everybody’s flocking the government securities market. And the offering today is something that caters to their appetite given that [interest rates are] in the belly of the curve,” de Leon told financial reporters.

T he BTr received tenders a lmost twice the full subscription amounting to P29.951 billion that forced the committee to reject P14.952 billion.

The five-year T-bond rate now averages 24.7 basis points lower to 3.979 percent, from 4.226 percent set at an earlier auction.

The reissued T-bonds have a remaining life of four years and three months.

“We’re happy with the participation of the GSEDs [government securities eligible dealers]. I suppose that’s because they want to improve their respective performance. Sometime before the end of the year we’ll also be selecting our market makers,” she added.

Data from the BSP showed the 28-day TDF in August attracting tenders totaling only P103.33 billion, equal to only 73.8 percent of the P140 billion offered for the week.

The BSP kept the volume deposit minimum unchanged at P40 billion for the seven-day TDF and P140 billion for the 28-day TDF, with the volumes having

been in place since May 2017.

De L eon sa id t he gover nment is focused on the planned panda bond issu a nce seen issued by November this year.

The Department of Finance earlier said the BTr tapped the Bank of China and Standard Chartered Bank as lead issuers for the $200-million sale exercise.

“For now we’re just focused on the panda market. [It will be issued] onshore,” she said.

Panda bonds are renminbi-denominated securities from a non-Chinese issuer but sold in the People’s Republic of China. Rea Cu

Case clippings

By Justice S J Ranada Jr.

TRADEMARKS–dominancy test The dominancy test focuses on the similarity of the prevalent features of the competing trademarks that might cause confusion and deception. If the competing trademark contains the main, essential and dominant features of another, and confusion or deception is likely to result, likelihood of confusion exists. The question is whether the use of the marks involved is likely to cause confusion or mistake in the mind of the public or to deceive consumers.

Nestlé v. Puregold GR 217194 06 Sept 2017 Carpio, J

PHL fully backing AIIB, ‘Belt and Road’ initiative

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HANGHAI—Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III has assured China of the Philippines’s full cooperation with the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and the Belt and Road program, both of which, he said, will “bring lasting benefits to all countries of this region”, as these “will set the conditions for more comprehensive trade” in this part of the world.

Dominguez, at the same time, thanked China for its generosity in supporting the Duterte administration’s ambitious infrastructure-modernization program, noting that, “Over the past few years, we have developed numerous bilateral mechanisms that will allow closer coordination between our two countries across a broad range of issues and concerns.”

“These bilateral mechanisms are the scaffoldings helping us build a truly functional, bilateral relationship,” Dominguez said at a briefing on the Philippine economy organized by the Bank of China at the Pudong Shangri-La, here.

Given the “great strides” that have been achieved toward building a common market among the Philippines and the other member-economies of the Asean, which will create a large enough market to make their industries achieve economies of scale, Dominguez added the Philippine economy can “perform as a gateway to a very large and increasingly prosperous Southeast Asian regional market”.

Dominguez said he believes the comprehensive cooperation between the Philippines in China, while currently only in its early stages, will “function as a driver of growth in the region” over the next decade.

“We are grateful for the enthusiastic support China has offered to help

us grow our economy rapidly. I am sure there are many complementary points that will ensure the sustained growth of an inclusive economy in the Philippines,” Dominguez said.

“There is much to look forward to in our trade and investment partnership. There is much ground for optimism in the vitality of this partnership,” he added.

Dominguez said that, while the Philippines and China have been good friends historically, their development ties “may be said to have blossomed only recently” following two significant initiatives from Beijing, namely its effort to build a distinct financial community for the region via the AIIB and the Belt and Road initiative, “which might be considered the largest and most comprehensive cooperation project of this century”.

“The Philippines is happy to cooperate with both the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the Belt and Road program.

Both initiatives will bring lasting benefits to all countries of this region. Both will set the conditions for more comprehensive trade among the countries in this part of the world,” he added.

Dominguez said China has shown “immense goodwill” to the Philippines by offering to build two bridges in the Manila area—the Binondo-Intramuros Bridge and the Estrella-Pantaleon Bridge—that will both help ease traffic congestion in these areas.

He likewise noted that the Philippine economy benefits from numerous investments committed by Chinese enterprises, the increased tourist flow from China and the expanding bilateral trade between the two countries.

Bilateral trade between Manila and

Beijing amounted to $12.32 billion in 2011, which grew dramatically to $21.6 billion in 2016.

In 2011 the Philippines received 243,137 tourists from the People’s Republic of China, which ballooned to 675,663 visitors in 2016.

“In a couple of years, we expect China to become our most important partner in trade. The benefits to both our economies are enormous,” Dominguez said.

He added the Philippine economy has become “an engine of growth” in Asia, with its second quarter GDP expanding by 6.5 percent, which is well on track in meeting the full-year target growth rate of 6.5 to 7.5 percent.

An even more significant development is that GDP growth was led by the industry sector at 7.3 percent, and agriculture at 6.3 percent, which is a “departure from the earlier pattern where growth was led by the services sector”, Dominguez said.

Overseas Filipino worker remittances, meanwhile, accounted for about a tenth of the GDP and the country’s high domesticconsumption demand, while government spending sped up by 7.1 percent year-onyear during the second quarter.

He cited the economy’s low interestrate environment, benign inflation rate, lightening public-debt load, the government’s continuing efforts to improve the ease of doing business by cutting red tape, curtailing corrupt practices and limiting its negative list for foreign investments, and training the country’s young and talented work force to be more globally competitive, as among the factors that would keep the economy on its high-growth path and haul in more long-term investments.

es problems for the sector and partly to blame for the lack luster g row th during the month.

The peso failed to boost exports and its weakened state has raised the cost of imports.

The higher cost of imported raw materials for manufacturers due to the cheap peso led to high vendor prices as manufacturers upped the charges and passed on comparably higher overheads to consumers.

Given this and the anticipated price impact of t he proposed ta x-refor m package, the Singapore-based econo-

mist said the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) should soon respond to inflationary pressures and drop broad hints as to where moneta r y pol ic y is headed.

“Expect the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas to turn more hawkish in the coming meetings.

We maintain our call for a 25-basispoint rate hike in the Philippines in each of fourth quarter of 2017 and first quarter of 2018,” Cahyadi said.

In its rate-setting meeting on September 21, the Monetary Board once again agreed to keep policy levers where they are, saying inflation risks have moderated enough such that consumer prices should prove within target this year and the next.

The Philippine Statistics Authority is scheduled to report the September inflation data on October 5.

UnionBank has lock-card feature to secure client accounts

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ard fraud remains one of the biggest concerns faced by cardholders and banking institutions today. As Filipinos become more dependent on banking for many of their financial needs—cash safety, shopping transactions, bill payments and the like—scammers are presented with more opportunities to carry out malicious activities targeting cards.

To increase the level of security against this threat, UnionBank’s EON recently rolled out a lock-card feature to help its cardholders prevent unauthorized individuals from accessing accounts through card fraud.

The new lock-card feature allows users to lock their cards any time they want. This prevents criminals from accessing the accounts of users through cards that are stolen or skimmed.

Card skimming is an attack vector wherein the perpetrator uses small devices called skimmers to capture the data in a user’s card. Criminals secretly place a skimmer in the card slot of a machine used for card transactions, such as automatic teller machines and point-of-sale systems (card-swiping devices used by retail cashiers) that captures user data, as well as a hidden camera that captures the unwitting victim’s personal identification number or PIN. Using the data obtained in this way, the perpetrator creates a replica of the card and then uses it and the PIN to steal money from the account.

The lock-card feature is designed to deter fraudsters from stealing money from a user’s account via card fraud. The card itself may be lost, but the cardholder’s money remains safe as long as the feature is active.

On top of being able to lock the card, cardholders will be sent an e-mail and a text message informing them that a transaction was attempted while the lock is active. With this feature, an EON Account becomes safer to use.

The lock-card feature can be accessed through the EON App. “The lock-card feature for EON Accounts is just one of the many ways UnionBank empowers its customers with complete control over their accounts,” UnionBank President and COO Edwin Bautista said. “With this, they won’t have to worry about card fraud anymore.”

Add-on vs effective interest rate

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s medium-term financing becomes more readily available, particularly in the case of auto loans where the standard repayment period is five years or 60 months, it is always good to know how much you are actually paying in interest cost. Typically, most banks and financing companies will quote you an add-on interest rate, which is the gross interest rate per year multiplied by the number of years of the loan.

This add-on interest is added to your principal loan amount and divided by the number of repayments, which is equal to your amortization. As an example, if your wanted to borrow P500,000 to buy a car for a period of five years, with an add-on interest rate of 10 percent per annum, the total amount you would have to repay back is the principal plus 50 percent, which is 10 percent multiplied by five, which is the loan tenor.

This will amount to a total of P500,000 plus P250,000 for a total of P750,000. Assuming you have to make a monthly amortization payment, this will be a total of 60 months, which is 12 months multiplied by five years.

Therefore your monthly amortization is P12,500. While most consumers will not think too much of paying 10 percent, you have to remember that, as you pay down your principal every month, this 10-percent interest is still being applied to the original principal amount. The effective interest rate on the other hand is the true interest rate you are paying based on the outstanding loan amount calculated after each principal repayment is deducted from your outstanding loan.

Using my trusty HP 12C to calculate the effective interest, this comes out to 17.2737 percent per annum. This is really how much interest rate you are paying for availing of the 10-percent add-on rate.

In comparison, when banks give you their interest rate on your savings account or time deposit you are being quoted an effective interest rate. So is this bad news for the consumer? Not necessarily, after all, the effective interest rates on credit cards and pawn shops are typically in the

finex free enterprise George S. Chua lower range of 3.0 percent a month, or 36 percent per annum.

The important thing is for the consumer to be aware of the effective interest rate they are really paying for. While many consumers tend to find low down-payment options appealing, what they do not realize is that they are actually paying more in interest, since the principal amount becomes larger. To minimize your cost, you really should minimize your loan amount and your tenor. It really does not make sense to keep money in your savings account or time deposit and end up borrowing more money from the bank or financing company. With savings or current accounts paying you as little as zero-percent interest rate and time deposits paying you no more than 2.0 percent less the 20 percent withholding taxes, it absolutely does not make sense to borrow money at 17.2737 percent.

Of course, if you don’t have the money to begin with, you will need to borrow as much as you can and have the longest repayment terms possible. In this situation, with an effective interest rate of 17.2737 percent, there is very little margin for missing out on making an amortization payment. I guess this is the primary reason that the highest auto-loan default rates are those that have the lowest down payments with the longest terms. In this case, before you get into trouble, you should ask yourself if you really needed that car so badly that you would be willing to take on such a risk.

Comments may be sent to georgechuaph@ yahoo.com

ExportUnlimited BusinessMirror

Editor: Efleda P. Campos • Wednesday, October 4, 2017 A9

MARKET DEVELOPMENT UPDATE CREATE PHL, CECP poised to elevate PHL What’ s next for the Asean Roro? as Asia’s next creative powerhouse F

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HE Creative Economy Council of the Philippines (CECP) aims to turn the country into one of the big players in the global creative-industry scene. The CECP is a participant of the maiden edition of CREATE Philippines.

The Center for International Trade Expositions and Missions (Citem), the export promotions arm of the Department of Trade and Industry, is the proud organizer of CREATE Philippines, the first-ever international creative-industry trade event in the country.

Happening from October 20 to 22 at the World Trade Center and the Philippine Trade Training Center in Pasay City, CREATE Philippines will showcase the Philippines’s creative and content industries to an international market.

It is where creative professionals gather, connect and identify new business ideas and collaborations.

The event will focus on fast-growing creative sectors, such as visual arts and graphic design, advertising content and production, film and animation, digital games and apps and music and the performing arts.

Creative industries all over the world have generated 29.5 million jobs (or 1 percent of the world’s population) in 2015. The visual-arts sector contains the largest number of employees (6.73 million).

The Philippines, a heritage-rich nation, is home to talented individuals in creative sectors, such as fashion, graphic and product design, advertising, animation, architecture, arts and crafts, music and the performing arts and visual arts.

The CECP is working with CREATE Philippines to help propel the country’s creative industry toward global recognition in the coming years.

The CECP, a private think tank strategist, is comprised of members from different creative sectors who all want the Philippines to be in the top creative economies in Asia Pacific by 2030. Founder Paolo Mercado described the CECP members as “the

avengers of the creative industry”.

“We’re putting together a group in order to say, ‘Okay, how do we win in the creative economy?’ And by win, I mean how do we win in the national market? We’re setting a high goal,” Mercado said.

Out of 128 economies surveyed in 2016, the Philippines ranked 96th from being 101st in 2015 in terms of creative outputs. Digital marketing and advertising are high-potential markets in the country, thanks to the high number of Filipino Internet users.

In 2016 there were 44 million Filipinos who went online every day, and that percentage is expected to surge to 69.3 million by 2018. Internet access in the Philippines has grown by 500 percent, one of the fastest growth rates in the whole Southeast Asia.

China, India, Japan and South Korea are already in the top 4 creative economies in Asia. Mercado said the Philippines should beat the likes of Indonesia and Singapore for that last, highly coveted spot.

The Philippines’s annual revenue from its video-game industry amounts to $100 million, and the government and the private sector are teaming up to drive that revenue up. For example, the Game Development Association of the

Philippines recently participated at Gamescom, Europe’s biggest platform for video games, to promote its services and attract investors from Europe’s $18.4-billion video-gaming industry.

“What we’re contributing to CREATE Philippines is the perspective of the private sector. Encourage them to share their ideas on how to become a powerhouse in terms of the international creative economy,” Mercado said.

He added the CECP aims to prove the Philippines can be a lucrative and competent player in the international creative industry. To do that, the country’s creative marketplace must be certain of what it excels at and develop those skills.

Mercado said the Philippines’s advertising, animation and digital sectors are all promising, and those sectors can be further developed by adding key people that can succeed internationally. The CECP’s goals don’t just stop at chasing individual success stories; they also want to develop business models that will take the Philippines higher up the ladder in the creative sector.

The CECP is not biased toward a particular creative industry. The group is collaborating with all the local creative sectors and unifying them in the process.

OLLOWING the successful launch of the Asean Roro (roll-on, roll-off) shipping service between Davao, General Santos and Bitung (DGB) on the eastern part of Indonesia, what’s next for the Asean Roro?

While the establishment of the Asean Roro was considered a major accomplishment of the Philippine government in its chairmanship of the Asean this year, the government and private stakeholders are faced with challenges in sustaining the route, such as low load factor and regulatory constraints.

However, the Interagency Task Force on Roro, spearheaded by the Department of Transportation and composed of government agencies involved in transportation and trade (the Department of Trade and Inustry [DTI], Mindanao Development Authority, etc.) are continuously working in making the route sustainable.

One such initiative was the trade mission to Jakarta and Manado from September 4 to 8 organized by the Davao Chamber of Commerce, the Indonesian Consulate in Davao and strongly supported by DTI Davao Region 11 and the Foreign Trade Service Corps.

T he Ph i l ip pi ne bu si nes s delegation composed of government representatives and local entrepreneurs in Davao focused on building networks and partnerships with Indonesian companies in the areas of trading, joint-venture agreements, joint-production schemes and other forms of strategic partnerships in a bid to sustain the DGB Roro operations and expand trade with Indonesia.

DTI Trade and Investments Promotion Undersecretary Nora K. Terrado said, “Sustaining the Roro

By Alma F. Argayoso Trade Service Officer, PTIC Jakarta

operations, launched in April by President Duterte and Indonesian President Joko Widodo, is high on the agenda of the DTI.” “We want to see the sustained operations of the shipping service so our local entrepreneurs, particularly our small and medium enterprises in Mindanao, could begin to reap the gains from enhanced connectivity between Mindanao and Sulawesi, and the greater Brunei Darussalam-Indonesia-Malaysia-Philippines-East Asean Growth Arearegion,” Terrado said.

Among the companies that joined the delegation were Eagle Multi Purpose Cooperative, Mindanao Agriplus Corp., Certuso Structural Speacialists Corp., Halal Business Council, Aleson Shipping Lines Inc. and Fastcargo Logistics Corp.

Business-to-business meetings and networking sessions, site visits in Bitung Port, as well as market and company visits were included in the mission’s itinerary.

The interagency task force also met with their Indonesian counterparts in Jakarta on the second week of September to discuss remaining regulatory constraints and focus on efforts to sustain the operations.

Once the DGB route truly becomes operational, the government can then focus on the next route to be formed for the international network envisioned by our Asean leaders in the Master Plan on Asean Connectivity, or MPAC 2025.

Taiwan entrepreneurs urged to invest in PHL biz ventures

By Roderick L. Abad Contributor

T

PHL ENDORSES CONTINUING ASEAN-RUSSIA GROWTH STORY

Following the June visit of President Duterte in Russia, the Philippines successfully concluded a trade and investment scoping mission in Russia, as well as actively participated in the Eastern Economic Forum (EEF) on September 6 and 7. The country promoted trade and investment opportunities to Russian importers and buyers of food products, government representatives of the Primorsky Territory, officials and members of the Primorsky Chamber of Commerce and Industry, officials of the commercial port of Vladivostok and the Far Eastern Development Corp. Leading the Philippine delegation was Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Undersecretary Rowel Barba (fifth from right), with Philippine Ambassador to Russia Carlos D. Sorreta (sixth from left), Philippine Economic Zone Authority (Peza) Director-General Charito B. Plaza (fifth from left), Philippine-Russian Business Assembly Inc. Armi Lopez Garcia (seventh from right) and Cagayan Economic Zone Authority (Ceza) Administrator Raul Lambino (sixth from right). Other officials were from DTI, the Department of Agriculture, the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s Philippines-Russia Business Council and the Mindanao Banana Farmers and Exporters Association. Barba also served as panel speaker during the EEF’s Russia-Asean Dialogue, where he underscored the latest developments and business opportunities in the Philippines and Asean. He also encouraged private sector members to do business in the Philippines, given that among the Asean countries, the Philippines is consistently among the fastest-growing economies.

PHL IT-BPM companies talked biz with Korean ICT delegates

By Maria Luz S. Medialdia Supervising TIDS, DTI-EMB

T

HE Philippine Department of Trade and Industry-Export Marketing Bureau (DTIEMB), together with Korea Association for information and communications technology (ICT) Promotion (KAIT), conducted an Inbound Business Matching Mission (IBMM), a strategic EMB program to maximize the opportunities of partnering and doing business with foreign counterparts.

KAIT led a group of 13 Korean ICT companies that came to meet with the Philippine companies for a possible collaboration and partnership in the area of ICT. This undertaking was part of the continuous support of EMB to promote the Philippine IT BPM sector through a showcase of the country’s IT offerings during the conduct of the business-to-business (B2B) meetings, as well as to develop the network of collaboration with KAIT member-companies.

The IBMM was a two-day activity, entitled “2017 Philippines-Korea ICT Partnership Program”, aimed to provide a venue for the ICT companies of both countries to exchange business experiences and develop possible business relationships between the Philippines and Korea in the area of ICT. The B2B event was an opportunity for the Philippine ICT companies to expand their network

REPRESENTATIVES of Philippine information and communications technology (ICT) companies meet with their counterparts from 13 Korean firms during an Inbound Business Matching Mission (IBMM) with the Korea Association for ICT Promotion (KAIT) sponsored by the Department of Trade and Industry, on September 7 and 8.

of contacts in Korea, as well.

The first day focused on the business matching, scheduled on September 7 at Makati Shangri-La Hotel. On the second day, September 8, company visits and focused discussions were conducted with the two major telecommunication companies of the Philippines, Globe and PLDT. The main areas for business opportunities

among Philippine ICTs and the 13 Korean delegates covered digital advertising solution, IoT cloud-platform provider, smart-center platform solution, database-encryption solution, geographic-information system, education technologyand software digital-signage solution, among others.

The Philippine companies that met with Korean delegates were Alliance Software Inc., IQOR, Collabera, Northstar Solutions Inc., Dynaquest Technology Services Inc, Personiv, DTSI Group, CPI Outsourcing, CAI-STA Philippines Inc., ADEC Innovations, Xurpass Enterprise, Global Outsourcing, Red Core Solutions, Ammex iSupport Worldwide, Jones Lang LaSalle Philippines Inc., Lares Inc., Robinsons Land Inc. and Learning Development.

The DTI-EMB and KAIT’s collaboration aimed to explore and gain valuable business leads and partnership among and between the Philippines and Korean companies in the area of telecommunications and IT-related technology. With the onset of 4G technology, the Philippines was identified by KAIT as one of the targeted countries to engage with for their future plans for convergence of ICT services in the Asian region.

The event was coorganized by the EMB, the Korea Ministry of Science and ICT, through its National IT and Promotion Agency, supported by the Philippine Software Industry Association.

AIWANESE enterprises are encouraged to do business in the Philippines to further strengthen the economic and bilateral ties of two allied and close neighbors.

“Now is the best time and the best opportune moment to nourish our friendship and to work together to strengthen our relations and broaden multifaceted cooperation, so as to create a win-win situation eventually mutually beneficial for us,” Taiwan Association Inc. (TAI) President Allan Lin said during the opening ceremonies of the Taiwan Expo 2017 held in Pasay City over the weekend.

In support of Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen’s New Southbound Policy, the top executive called for potential Taiwanese investors to venture in various Philippine industries, including agriculture, fisheries aquaculture, technology, small and medium enterprises, information and communications technology, green technology, climate change, education and culture.

“Also, as the Philippines’s infrastructure and public facilities have been continuously improved over the years and the efficiency of operations at ports has also been increasing, I will urge more Taiwanese entrepreneurs to diversify their investments to the Philippines,” he added.

Since the Philippines has become the forefront and gateway of Taiwanese investors to Southeast Asia, Lin urged more Filipino entrepreneurs to engage potential partners from Taiwan in agribusiness, manufacturing, banking, transport and communications, infrastructure and real estate, and tourism and logistics.

The competitive advantages of the Philippines as a preferred investment destination, he said, include strong

Now is the best time and the best opportune moment to nourish our friendship and to work together to strengthen our relations and broaden multifaceted cooperation, so as to create a win-win situation eventually mutually beneficial for us.”—Lin

macroeconomic fundamentals, an English-speaking population, a vast pool of talented professionals and a young consumer market with increased purchasing power.

“All of these above-mentioned factors explain why the Philippines has been selected as one of the most important countries to be prioritized by Taiwan to carry out the New Southbound Policy. If we work in partnership, I am sure our two countries will benefit from it,” Lin added.

Taiwan has very close economic relationship with the Philippines, with the latter being its 10th-largest trading partner. The former is the 12th-largest foreign investor in the Philippines, with total investments reaching $2.3 billion last year.

“I believe that our two countries will continue to strengthen cooperation and deepen bilateral substantive relations based on the existing solid foundation,” Lin said. “With your help, our cooperation, partnership and substantial bilateral relations will grow from strength to strength in the years to come.”

A10 Wednesday, October 4, 2017 • Editor: Angel R. Calso

Opinion BusinessMirror

editorial

Food insecurity in PHL

T

he Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) released last week the 2017 Global Food Security Index (GFSI) that provided a worldwide perspective on which countries are most and least vulnerable to food insecurity and how resource risks increase vulnerability. The GFSI, developed by the EIU and sponsored by chemical and seeds firm DuPont, considered three core pillars of food security—affordability, availability and quality and safety— across 113 countries. It also included a new category on natural resources, which measured a country’s exposure to the impacts of a changing climate, its susceptibility to natural resource risks and how a country is adapting to these risks.

The GFSI model defined food security as the state in which people, at all times, have physical, social and economic access to sufficient and nutritious food that meet their dietary needs for a healthy and active life. The EIU said this framework is based on the internationally accepted definition established at the 1996 World Food Summit.

Out of the 113 countries ranked by the EIU, the Philippines garnered a score of 47.3 and placed 79th. The country trailed behind other poor countries, including Guatemala, Honduras, Ghana and Pakistan. In Asia Pacific out of the 23 countries assessed by the EIU, the Philippines landed on 17th place. Poor countries in Asia Pacific, such as Sri Lanka and Pakistan, obtained higher scores and fared better than the Philippines.

In terms of the three pillars of food security, the Philippines ranked 77th on affordability, 80th on availability and 69th in quality and safety. The country’s ranking in the new natural resources and resilience category was dismal at 101st. Among the subcategories, the Philippines ranked first in only one— nutritional standards.

The index, which also included year-on-year trends, showed that in the last five years, the Philippines had never garnered a score higher than 50. From 2012 to 2017 the index showed that the Philippines’s average score declined by 2.6 points. Among Asia-Pacific countries surveyed by the EIU, the Philippines and Tajikistan performed poorly in the last five years. However, this is not unique to the Philippines and other countries that have seen their scores decline. According to the EIU, more than 60 percent of countries in the GFSI saw their scores deteriorate in the past year.

According to the GFSI, the major challenges that the Philippines needs to address to boost food security are the minimal public expenditure on agricultural research and development (R&D) and corruption. Out of 100, the Philippines scored zero in these two indicators. This means that government spending on agricultural R&D and efforts to eliminate corruption are not enough.

Governments can take a cue from Ireland, which has overtaken the United States, at the top of the GFSI. Its continued economic rebound after the Irish banking crisis of 2008-2010, and as its high public investment in R&D have enabled Ireland to take the top spot in this year’s GFSI. Unfortunately, GFSI experts noted that austerity remains the norm across advanced economies and many emerging economies, including the Philippines.

Aside from putting more money into agricultural R&D, the government should reach out to the private sector and find ways to boost food supply.

Data from the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) showed the R&D expenditures of both the private and public sectors in the Philippines have not even reached 1 percent of GDP. While the absolute values grew over the years, the DOST said the equivalent shares to GDP remained constant at 0.14 percent.

For a country that is highly vulnerable to climate change, low government spending on R&D is unacceptable. The Philippines must not just rely on the kindness of its neighbors and other advanced countries to develop the technologies needed to increase food production. Instead of spending taxpayers’s money on projects that do not benefit many Filipinos, such as the construction of basketball courts, the government should just channel funds to more R&D activities that will improve the country’s food supply.

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Art Amansec

All About Social Security

T

he Social Security Commission works as the policy-making body of the Social Security System (SSS). It acts collegially. It checks the decisions and recommendations of SSS vice presidents and department managers, who constitute the management. Major management decisions, especially those requiring financial allocations, cannot be implemented without the approval of the Commission.

The present Commission is chaired by former University of the East dean, lawyer Amado D. Valdez.

Former Insurance Commissioner lawyer Emmanuel F. Dooc is the president. In order to facilitate its policy-making and related functions, the Commission has activated seven working and research committees, notably, the Investments Oversight Committee, chaired by Commissioner Pompee La Viña, a successful businessman and social-media wizard; the Information Technology (IT) Committee, which is principally tasked to make the SSS IT-savvy and chaired by Commissioner Di-

ana Pardo-Aguilar; the Media Affairs Committee, also chaired by Commissioner Pompee La Viña; the Audit Committee, chaired by Commissioner Anita Bumpus-Quitain; the Membership Committee, chaired

by Comm. Gonzalo Duque; the Risk Management Committee, chaired by Commissioner Michael Regino; and the Governance, Organization and Appointments Committee (GOAC) chaired by yours truly.

Ideally, all management policies and decisions regarding facets of administration, including the movements, notably, appointments, promotions and discipline

of employees are reviewed by the GOAC before they are confirmed by the Commission en banc.

The chairman of the GOAC and the other committees were handpicked by Valdez. On the other hand, memberships in the committees are determined on a volunteer basis. A Commissioner is given the privilege to choose the committee he or she wants to be a member of.

I willingly accepted the chairmanship of the GOAC, secretly admiring Valdez about his psychic ability to have perceived my interest in the handling of matters and concerns relating to employment. But maybe, just maybe, he chose me to be chairman of the GOAC because of my long stint as labor arbiter of the National Labor Relations Commission, where I resolved dismissal and money-claims cases filed by workers against their employers.

As GOAC chairman, the first thing that came to my mind was the millions of SSS members, particularly those disabled and nearretirees who need all the empathy of the SSS public servants. Are we serving our members well enough?

Why do I hear complaints about long delays in the processing of death claims? Why do I hear about rude SSS personnel?

As GOAC chairman, I was burdened to think of ways of improving SSS services. A visiting friend from the United States advised me, “Arch, why don’t you render your service to your members with a smile? It will cost your employees nothing, but it will gain for the SSS a lot of goodwill,” she told me. Her name is Hatima Saul Centi, who works as a nurse in New Jersey.

She was right.

So, with all good intention in mind and in heart, in aid of policymaking, I decided to check on the SSS branches, nearly 200 of them, scattered all over the archipelago.

My first target branch was SSS Guadalupe, headed by Hoechst Potato.

I ordered two of my staff to go undercover and check the services of the branch. I was impressed with the report of my staff. The counter employees of the branch were all cordial and friendly, entertaining the needs and plaints of the members. Everyone was friendly and smiling as they talked with SSS clientele. When the report reached Valdez, he readily promised to give the branch a personal reward donation of P5,000.

The same went true with my second target branch, the Malolos See “Amansec,” A11

Martin Frankel: A story of insurance fraud

T. Anthony C. Cabangon

Editor in Chief

Senior Editors

The shadow of their smiles

Dennis B. Funa

INSURANCE FORUM

T

he story of Martin R. Frankel (born 1954) is the story of the biggest and most notorious insurance fraud in the history of the United States. Frankel was a con man who was eventually sentenced to 16 years in prison. A second-year college dropout from the University of Toledo, Ohio, Frankel was a securities trader who set up the “Frankel Fund” and stole money from his investor clients. He would use the shareholder accounts for his personal expenses. The fund was eventually closed down in 1992, and the Securities and Exchange Commission fined him $1 million and forever banned him from trading in securities.

With a ban in place, Frankel then operated under assumed names (he used several aliases, such as James Spencer, David Rosse and Mike King) and operated unregistered securities.

He set up the Thunor Trust based in Franklin, Tennessee. Using this trust and $71 million, he gained an 83-percent control of a holding company, the Franklin American Group, which held interests in various southern insurance companies, such as the Franklin American Life Insurance Co. International Financial Services Life Insurance Co. and other small insurance companies in

such states as Colorado, Mississippi, Virginia and Alabama. It was never established where the $71 million came from.

He also acquired the Protective Services Life Insurance Co. in 1994.

He targeted struggling southern insurance companies. Eleven in all.

There is a perception that regulations in these states were lax. These companies mostly sold funeral insurance. His modus would be to acquire insurance companies and then loot the reserves and the premiums paid.

Of course, the purchase price is much lower than the pile of money with the

Eventually, in April 1999, the insurance regulator of Mississippi became suspicious of investments being made overseas through a purported Vatican-connected religious foundation. He had established the Saint Francis of Assisi Foundation as a way to launder money, hoping that the Vatican connection would lend credibility. On the contrary, it only aroused the suspicion of the Mississippi regulator.

insurance companies because monies will have to be paid out to the policyholders. He would even use these reserves to acquire other insurance companies in a seeming Ponzi scheme.

He tapped into these reserves without being noticed. More than $208 million would be stolen from these insurance companies in a decadelong scam.

Frankel would take over the reserves of the holding company and its subsidiaries on the pretext that these will be invested. Instead of being legally invested in government bonds, most of the investments were made in Frankel’s own shell companies, such as the Liberty National Securities, which operated from his living room, and where the funds would be siphoned off in Swiss bank

accounts. Frankel presented bogus financial statements that showed high returns on investments.

Eventually, in April 1999, the insurance regulator of Mississippi became suspicious of investments being made overseas through a purported Vatican-connected religious foundation. He had established the Saint Francis of Assisi Foundation as a way to launder, money hoping that the Vatican connection would lend credibility. On the contrary, it only aroused the suspicion of the Mississippi regulator. Specifically, the insurance commissioner wanted to know why $600 million was moved from a Vatican-linked foundation in Italy to a Catholic charity in the British Virgin Islands and then to a trust that controlled a group of Mississippi insurance companies.

The state insurance commissioner ordered Frankel to place several million dollars on deposit with a reputable Mississippi bank. He made an escape to Rome in May 1999, but was eventually arrested on September 4, 1999, in a Hamburg, Germany, hotel. In 2004 he was sentenced to 200 months in prison. He was released on October 27, 2016.

Lawyer Dennis B. Funa is the current insurance commissioner. Funa was appointed by President Duterte as the new insurance commissioner in December 2016. E-mail: dennisfuna@yahoo.com.

opinion@businessmirror.com.ph

Opinion

Kung fu wisdom

The EU and the Philippines

BusinessMirror

Teddy Locsin Jr.

Free fire Continued from A1

L

ee died before the movie’s release. Here is one reflection, written in a small notebook, in his small neat hand. “The power of will is the supreme court over all other departments of my mind. I will exercise the power of will daily for when I need the urge to act. I will form the habit, at least once daily, to bring the power of my will into action.”

What he is saying is that none of this is instinctive. If anything is instinctive, it is lack of will or enervation.

Here’s another. “My emotions often err in their overenthusiasm. My faculty of reason often is without the warmth of feeling necessary to enable me to combine justice with mercy in my judgments. I will encourage my conscience to guide me as to what is right and what is wrong, but I will never set aside the verdicts that conscience renders, no matter the cost of carrying them out.”

What he is saying is that even feelings need to be trained to respond to situations and often the

response is excessive or too little, badly calibrated with the nature of the occasion calling them forth. Even conscience needs to be prodded into working. Most of the time, we are conscienceless. And even after our conscience is awakened and arrives at the right judgment, yet another act of will is needed to abide by the ruling of conscience.

What he is saying is that, by nature, man is lazy and the closest of his evolutionary companions is the sloth.

All that from a real kung fu master and not an animation though nothing tops Kung Fu Panda’s words, “Enough talk, let’s fight.”

Gun massacres won’t stop until voters demand action

I

n the immediate aftermath of a mass shooting in America, the usual response is twofold: Mourn the victims and wait for the facts. It’s getting increasingly hard to justify the second.

In other realms of public debate, the facts can be used to guide an analysis of any proposed policy response. The problem is that dispassionate analysis of gun-safety laws, no matter how long delayed, never penetrates the panic room in which politicians hide out from their responsibilities.

After a deranged young man used his mother’s readily accessible firearms in 2012 to shoot schoolchildren and educators in Newtown, Connecticut, issues, such as proper gun storage and the challenges of balancing legal gun rights and mental-health risks, were frighteningly obvious.

Nothing happened in Congress.

Instead, the gun lobby and the extremist movement it has long nurtured went on a legislative rampage through conservative states —pushing for guns in churches, in bars, on playgrounds and on campus, concealed and open. Right now, Republicans in the House of Representatives are focused on legislation to make crime more convenient by ending regulations on silencers and enabling concealed guns to be carried in places where they are expressly unwanted, and by people with no training or background check.

With each massacre—from a church in Charleston, South Carolina, to a club in Orlando, Florida

Amansec. . .

continued from A10

Branch. The branch recently won the five-star distinguished service award from the Civil Service Commission, thanks to its branch manager, Francisco Paquito L. Lescano, and the employees therein who are caring and compassionate to members, particularly the senior citizens, the mayayabang and the makukulit ones.

My third target branch was a disaster. Due to complaints I had personally received that the counter employees in this branch were not friendly to inquiring members and the general public, I ordered two of my staff to go undercover and check on the veracity of the complaints. Nobody was smiling, my staff reported. My female staff was even reported as mayabang. My

—and with each pointless, preventable shooting in which a child picks up a loaded firearm left by a reckless adult, the gun lobby and its culture warriors issue the same sick call: to counter the effect of too many guns with a rash of more guns, and fewer restrictions on using them. In Las Vegas, one of the National Rifle Association’s favorite maxims—the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun—was exposed yet again as not just false but tragically absurd.

If the gun debate in the US appears stalled, it is because argument in the absence of reason and facts is circular. Thus a White House spokesman for President Donald J. Trump, who previously called himself the NRA’s “true friend”, said it’s inappropriate to discuss remedies to gun violence so soon after a mass incidence of gun violence.

There are legitimate disputes about the scope of the Second Amendment, the efficacy of specific gun regulations and the right to selfprotection. None of these is debated in Congress, and few in statehouses, because too many politicians subscribe to aphorisms and claptrap in lieu of an honest reckoning that more guns, and less regulation, is a recipe for mayhem. This cycle of preventable violence and pointless debate will not end until more political leaders, and responsible gun owners, acknowledge the obvious: that sensible restrictions on gun possession and use are both constitutional and necessary. Bloomberg View order to her was really to act mayabang to provoke the counter employees to see if they were understanding enough to accommodate the mayayabang and makukulit inquirers.

Will I go on with my mission?

Will I just be courting the ire of managers and employees who do not want to freely give their smile or leave its shadow to foul-smelling widows in dirty slippers and dusters who braved sun and rain to inquire about the delayed death benefit of their deceased husbands?

The wit that concocted the sign “Bawal Ang Nakasimangot” certainly knows the comforting effect of a smile, especially coming from a civil servant. Indeed, the smile will linger in the member’s mind, its shadow becoming an unforgettable and memorable embrace of love and compassion for a more positive SSS image.

Edgardo J. Angara

T

rade Secretary Ramon M. Lopez and I led a Philippine delegation to the European Union (EU) in Brussels, Belgium last week.

We had extensive discussions with EU officials on a range of concerns from the drug war, to Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, to Generalized Scheme of Preferences Plus (GSP+) and the free trade agreement (FTA), to President Duterte’s invitation to the United Nations Human Rights Council and EU Subcommittee on Human Rights to open in Manila a human-rights monitoring center, to EU request to allow Senator Leila M. de Lima to attend Senate sessions and exercise her parliamentary

duties when the Senate is in session.

We met with the EU commissioner of trade (equivalent to minister of trade), members of EU parliament (MEP) chairing Southeast Asia, the Committee on Human Rights, the Committee on Trade in charge of GSP+ and FTA, the committee in charge of Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA) on grants, and the head of the EU Commission Secretariat.

The meetings were all generally pleasant, open and civil. All

Wednesday, October 4, 2017 A11

praised the Philippines’s openness to dialogue and warmly welcomed Duterte’s initiative allowing the setting up in Manila of a monitoring center and his invitation to President Donald J. Trump to attend the Leader’s Summit in Manila in November.

The human-rights issue needs to be confronted head on because it is inextricably linked to and cannot be separated from our trade relations with the EU. Philippine exports to the EU already amounted to €6.2 billion, or P317 billion, in 2016. Up to €213 million, or P12.7 billion, fall under the GSP+, a privilege the EU granted to the Philippines in December 2014.

Under the GSP+, the Philippines can export to the EU at zero-tariff up to 6,200 products, including our most prized exports, like fruits, coconut oil, fish and textiles. The Philippines became eligible and the EU accorded us the special preferential trade deal given that the Philippines had ratified and

implemented various international conventions on human rights and labor rights, the environment and good governance. The main beneficiaries include entrepreneurs from Mindanao exporting tuna and fish products to the EU. The President’s initiative and the visit of a high-level delegation possibly turned the once frosty relations and, sometimes, angry exchanges to a new and cooperative mood. “Let’s continue to engage each other,” “How can we help?” were expressions often uttered by key EU executives.

I believe strongly we should take aggressive measures to seize the changing political atmosphere: a more unified action in diplomacy and trade, a proactive Senate participation, and a more enlightening and less combative messaging.

The EU can be one of our most effective partners in peace making and development in Mindanao.

E-mail: angara.ed@gmail.com, Facebook and Twitter: @edangara

Martin Frankel: A story of insurance fraud Michael Makabenta Alunan

on the contrary

T

he story of Martin R. Frankel (born 1954) is the story of the biggest and most notorious insurance fraud in the history of the United States. Frankel was a con-man who was eventually sentenced to 16 years in prison. A second-year college dropout from the University of Toledo, Ohio, Frankel was a securities trader who set up the “Frankel Fund” and stole money from his investor clients. He would use the shareholder accounts for his personal expenses. The fund was eventually closed down in 1992, and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) fined him $1 million and forever banned him from trading in securities.

With a ban in place, Frankel then operated under assumed names (he used several aliases, such as James Spencer, David Rosse and Mike King) and operated unregistered securities. He set up the Thunor Trust based in Franklin, Tennessee. Using this trust and $71 million, he gained an 83-percent control of a holding company, the Franklin American Group, which held interests in

various southern insurance companies, such as the Franklin American Life Insurance Co., International Financial Services Life Insurance Co. and other small insurance companies located in such states as Colorado, Mississippi, Virginia and Alabama.

It was never established where the $71 million came from.

He also acquired the Protective Services Life Insurance Co.

in 1994. He targeted struggling southern insurance companies.

Eleven in all. There is a perception that regulations in these states were lax. These companies mostly sold funeral insurance. His modus would be to acquire insurance companies and then loot the reserves and the premiums paid. Of course, the purchase price is much lower than the pile of money with the insurance companies because monies will have to be paid out to the policyholders. He would even use these reserves to acquire other insurance companies in a seeming Ponzi scheme. He tapped into these reserves without being noticed.

More than $208 million would be stolen from these insurance companies in a decadelong scam.

Frankel would take over the reserves of the holding company and its subsidiaries on the pretext that these will be invested. Instead of being legally invested in government bonds, most of the investments were made in Frankel’s own shell companies, such as the Liberty National Securities, which operated from his living room, and where the funds would be siphoned off in Swiss bank

The philosophical assault on Trumpism David Brooks

new york times

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stablishment Republicans have tried five ways to defeat or control Donald J. Trump, and they have all failed. Jeb Bush tried to outlast Trump, and let him destroy himself.

That failed. Marco Rubio and others tried to denounce Trump by attacking his character. That failed. Reince Priebus tried to co-opt Trump to make him a more normal Republican. That failed.

Paul Ryan tried to use Trump; Congress would pass Republican legislation and Trump would just sign it.

That failed. Mitch McConnell tried to outmaneuver Trump and Trumpism by containing his power and reach. In the Senate race in Alabama last week and everywhere else, that has failed.

Trumpist populist nationalism is still a rising force within the GOP, not a falling one. The Bob Corkers of the party are leaving while the Roy Moores are ascending. Trump himself is unhindered while everyone else is frozen and scared.

As a result, the Republican Party is becoming a party permanently associated with bigotry. It is becoming the party that can’t govern. And as a bonus, Trumpish recklessness could slide us into a war with North Korea that could leave millions dead.

The only way to beat Trump is to beat him philosophically. Right now the populists have a story to tell the country about what’s gone wrong. It’s

a coherent story, which they tell with great conviction. The regular Republicans have no story, no conviction and no argument. They just hem and haw and get run over.

The Trump story is that good honest Americans are being screwed by aliens.

Regular Americans are being oppressed by a snobbish elite that rigs the game in its favor. White Americans are being invaded by immigrants who take their wealth and divide their culture.

Normal Americans are threatened by an Islamic radicalism that murders their children. This is a tribal story.

The tribe needs a strong warrior in a hostile world. We need to build walls to keep out illegals, erect barriers to hold off foreign threats, wage endless war on the globalist elites.

Somebody is going to have to arise to point out that this is a deeply wrong and un-American story. The whole point of America is that we are not a tribe. We are a universal nation, founded on universal principles, at-

tracting talented people from across the globe, active across the world on behalf of all people who seek democracy and dignity.

The core American idea is not the fortress, it’s the frontier. First, we thrived by exploring a physical frontier during the migration west, and now we explore technological, scientific, social and human frontiers. The core American attitude has been looking hopefully to the future, not looking resentfully toward some receding greatness.

The hardship of the frontier calls forth energy, youthfulness and labor, and these have always been the nation’s defining traits. The frontier demands a certain sort of individual, a venturesome, hardworking, disciplined individual who goes off in search of personal transformation. From Jonathan Edwards to Benjamin Franklin, Abraham Lincoln to Frederick Douglass, Americans have always admired those who made themselves anew.

They have generally welcomed immigrants who live this script and fortify this dynamism. The Republican Party was founded as a free labor party. It believed in economic diversity, cultural cohesion and national greatness. The entrepreneurial economic philosophy was highly individualistic, but strong local communities built a web of nurturing relationships and shared biblical morality helped define common standards of character.

This American vision champions social mobility. The original Republicans were not for or against government, they were for government that sparked mobility; they were against

accounts. Frankel presented bogus financial statements that showed high returns on investments.

Eventually, on April 1999, the insurance regulator of Mississippi became suspicious of investments being made overseas through a purported Vatican-connected religious foundation. He had established the Saint Francis of Assisi Foundation as a way to launder money hoping that the Vatican connection would lend credibility. On the contrary, it only aroused the suspicion of the Mississippi regulator. Specifically, the insurance commissioner wanted to know why $600 million was moved from a Vatican-linked foundation in Italy to a Catholic charity in the British Virgin Islands and then to a trust that controlled a group of Mississippi insurance companies.

The state insurance commissioner ordered Frankel to place several million dollars on deposit with a reputable Mississippi bank. He made an escape to Rome in May 1999 but was eventually arrested on September 4, 1999, in a Hamburg, Germany hotel. In 2004 he was sentenced to 200 months in prison. He was released on October 27, 2016.

government that enervated ambition.

These Americans heavily invested in schools at a time when other nations were investing heavily in welfare states.

These Americans built railroads and roads to increase mobility. They tore down social, racial and legal barriers to give poor boys and girls an open field and a fair chance.

Today, the main enemy is not aliens; it’s division—between rich and poor, white and black, educated and less educated, right and left. Where there is division there are fences. Mobility is retarded and the frontier is destroyed.

Trumpist populists want to widen the divisions and rearrange the fences. They want to turn us into an old, settled and fearful nation.

The Republican Party is supposed to be the party that stokes dynamism by giving everybody the chance to venture out into the frontier of their own choosing—with education reform that encourages lifelong learning, with entitlement reform that spends less on the affluent elderly and more on the enterprising young families, with regulatory reform that breaks monopolies and rules that hamper startups, with tax reform that creates a fair playing field, with immigration reform that welcomes the skilled and the hungry.

It may be dormant, but this striving American dream is still lurking in every heart. It’s waiting for somebody who has the guts to say no to tribe, yes to universal nation, no to fences, yes to the frontier, no to closed, and yes to the open future, no to the fear-driven homogeneity of the old continent and yes to the diverse hopefulness of the new one.

2nd Front Page BusinessMirror

A12 Wednesday, October 4, 2017

www.businessmirror.com.ph

PHL earns ₧146B from inbound tourism in H1 with Taiwanese as top spenders

By Ma. Stella F. Arnaldo

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@akosistellaBM Special to the BusinessMirror

HE Department of Tourism (DOT) has finally released its first-half visitor receipts for 2017, showing an increase of almost 15 percent to P146.34 billion.

Visitor receipts refer to the income earned by the country f rom tou r i sm ac t iv it ies. O n its web site, the DOT said the month of May recorded the biggest earnings at P27.86 billion, as well as the highest growth of

39.62 percent, year on year.

For June 2017 alone, earnings jumped 30.7 percent to P27.1 billion, from the P20.8 billion in June 2016. The average spending by tourists in the Philippines every day was P6,229.27, an increase of

₧6,229.27

The average daily spending of tourists in the country in June 20.26 percent from June 2016.

Under the National Tourism Development Plan of 2016-2022, the Duterte administration aims to generate P407 billion in inbound visitor receipts from a targeted 6.5 million foreign tourists for 2017. This year’s inbound visitor-receipts target is up 15.3 percent, from P353 billion in 2016, which was earned from 5.9 million foreign tourists.

This developed as Tourism Secretary Wanda Corazon T. Teo

instructed all DOT regional directors “to submit reports of visitor receipts, weekly”, according to a highly placed source in the agency. The source said this was in response to insistent queries on the delay in releasing the visitorreceipts data.

In a separate interview, Undersecretary for Tourism Development Planning Benito C. Bengzon, who now oversees the statistics division of the DOT, explained the delay to difficulties in collecting data from tourism establishments.

“You must remember, these data are collected from third parties [hotels, restaurants, travel agents, etc.],” he said.

He underscored that, in comparison, v isitor-arrivals data

PPA seeks justice for slain member, better protection for pharmacists

Geronimo was a good pharmacist and she was just doing her job to protect the health and welfare of patients, as mandated by the Pharmacy Act of 2016, when she was killed by her customer.

PPA officials, including its President Dr. Yolanda Robles, former President Leonila Ocampo and Board of Directors Reynaldo Umali and Mercelinda Gutierrez, also asked the authorities to speed up their investigation on the case and arrest the stillunidentified suspect.

The officials said G eronimo was a good pharmacist, and she was just doing her job to protect the health and welfare of patients, as mandated by the Pharmacy Act of 2016, when she was killed by her customer.

The officials also explained that a pharmacist is very different from being an ordinary vendor, while antibiotics are not ordinary medicine, that’s why customers need to present prescription before they can be allowed to buy them.

Robles stressed that prescriptions from doctors are important to make sure that the medicines being given to the patients are fit to cure their illnesses and avoid any complication that may cause harm to their health.

Ocampo, for her part, noted that a pharmacist is a friend and not an enemy, while Umali said that what happened to Geronimo was the worst form of harassment against a pharmacist because it resulted in her death.

Gutierrez, meanwhile, appealed to authorities to give protection to pharmacists and other health workers in the country who are only doing their job.

almost P5.25 billion, the United States with P2.62 billion, Taiwan with P2.14 billion and Japan with P2.13 billion.

Among the top 20 source markets of tourists for the Philippines, the DOT said Taiwan registered the highest per-capita expenditure for two consecutive months. Each visitor from Taiwan spent an average of P116,443.45 while in the country. Visitors from Vietnam came in second with a per-capita spend of P97,440.99; followed by South Korea at P80,722.99; China at P79,420.88; Norway at P59,981.81; and Malaysia at P59,883.58.

The Duterte administration aims to generate P922 billion in inbound visitor receipts by the end of its term in 2022.

URBAN SLUM PROBLEM WORSENING ON LACK OF AFFORDABLE HOMES

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he Philippine Pharmacists Association (PPA) has appealed to authorities to immediately arrest a man who shot and killed one of their members just for refusing to sell him antibiotics after he failed to present a doctor’s prescription.

In a news conference in their office, the PPA has denounced the killing of their member Loigene Geronimo, 40, a pharmacist and drugstore owner in San Jose del Monte, Bulacan.

Geronimo was killed by a lone gunman on September 26 inside her drugstore after she refused to sell antibiotics to the suspect due to lack of prescription from a doctor.

were sourced directly from arrival and departure cards of the Bureau of Immigration.

Under the previous administration, a visitor-receipts report was usually released together with the monthly visitor-arrivals report.

But, in the past months, the DOT had failed to do so, prompting questions from the media why it was now taking longer for the agency to release visitor-receipts data.

Meanwhile, the DOT said foreign tourists stayed an average of 10.04 nights in the country in June 2017, longer by 5.02 percent from the average length of stay in June 2016.

South Korea was the top spending market in June 2017, with receipts amounting to about P8.75 billion, followed by China with

By Cai U. Ordinario @cuo_bm

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MID-AUTUMN FESTIVAL A giant moon cake is displayed at the second level of Lucky Chinatown Mall as part of its celebration of the MidAutumn Festival, one of the most important events for the Chinese. Lucky Chinatown Mall has lined up several activities from September 25 to October 8 to celebrate the event, such as colorful and spectacular performances, a culinary showdown and fun games. ALYSA SALEN

Emergency powers. . . is being undertaken.

The Ways and Means Committee recommended the abolition of the BOC and have it replaced by the BCS and BSC. “The replacement of the present bureau with two new bureaus is no easy task. The complexity of the current system and the difficulty of the entire transition process can give rise to unforeseen difficulties. As such, this committee recommends a two-year transition process to establish a fully operational system,” the report said.

“It is clear that the concentration of powers into a single agency inevitably breeds a culture of corruption. A bureau that is already drenched in a culture of corruption is difficult, if not impossible, to reform.”

For the Federation of Philippine Industries (FPI), which has been on the forefront of the fight against smuggling because of its ill effects on domestic manufacturers, the solution lies in the system and the dedication of the people that will enforce the corrective measures.

“Will dividing the BOC solve the problem of technical smuggling in its various forms?

Will it solve smuggling through the special economic zones or formula of manufacture?

Don’t reinvent if it is not broken; the problem is with the system,” FPI Chairman Jesus L. Arranza said.

Arranza noted that the FPI has been forwarding numerous ways to combat smuggling in its various modes, like the publication of updated reference values per commodity and use of compulsory acquisition and forward manifests. These, however, have fallen on deaf ears.

The House Committee on Ways and Means said due to corruption, incompetence of the bureau and manipulation of the system, the safety of the general public was put to risk, and the government lost P43.8 billion in revenues from July 2016 to July 2017.

The committee also recommended that the

Continued from A1

two new bureaus only hire highly qualified, competent and experienced personnel with proven integrity.

It said the new BCS should be under the Department of Finance, while the BSC will be under the Department of Interior and Local Government, in close coordination with the Philippine National Police, Philippine Drugs Enforcement Agency, Maritime Industry Authority, Philippine Coast Guard and other enforcement agencies.

The service bureau will be primarily tasked to assess and collect import duties and taxes. It shall adopt a modern customs-control system and be allowed to privatize nonsovereign functions that are more efficiently and effectively performed by private individuals.

“This committee recommends considering the European customs administration and case study conducted by the World Bank on Peru in designing and structuring this new bureau. In said study, it was found that most countries with privatize customs administration achieved higher revenue collection and better trade,” it said.

The panel said these functions are recommended to be in addition to the usual mandate of gathering and publishing values of commodities imported into the country; monitoring implementation of rules and regulations governing assessment, end processing of goods for exports, warehousing and support operations and auction and disposal activities; maintaining an accounting of revenues collected; and providing information and analysis of collection statistics, and audits of liquidated entries and bonds.

On the other hand, the security-control bureau shall exercise police authority at all ports, take charge of customs border control, port security and communication, as well as inspection and monitoring of cargoes. It shall gather intelligence information related

to customs and economic activities, conduct internal inquiry and investigation and perform necessary and related police functions.

Besides the emergency powers, the committee also recommended the immediate execution of these interim measures: abolish the Command Center for being contrary to existing laws and for being a conduit of corruption; immediate revocation of invalid Customs Memoranda, Orders and/or Regulations; and immediate dismissal from public service of the bureau personnel, and conduct investigation against involved bureau and nonbureau personnel.

It also recommend to reorganize the bureau’s organizational structure and align its ranks to their respective qualifications; implement the National Single Window Program; and upgrade and fully implement the automation of Bureau’s Information Technology System.

The committee also asked the Bureau of Internal Revenue to assess and collect the necessar y taxes due from EMT Trading’s Shipments; and the Commission on Audit to conduct an audit on the revenues assessed and collected by the BOC. It also called for the full and faithful implementation of the Customs Modernization and Tariff Act; relocate bureau offices and improve the bureau’s infrastructures and facilities to ensure transparency; consider expanding the coverage of the port-load survey to containerized cargoes; review the process of accreditation to eliminate the use of alter-ego’s or consignees-for-hire and revisit the Attrition Act of 2005.

Meanwhile, the committee also recommended that investigation be conducted by the National Bureau of Investigation, Department of Justice, Office of the Ombudsman or Civil Service Commission for the determination of possible violations committed by the bureau personnel and private individuals and initiate the filing of appropriate criminal, civil or administrative charges against them.

ilipinos living in stilt houses and makeshift dwellings in cemeteries and railways are among the country’s 17 million urban slum dwellers, according to the latest report from the World Bank.

In the East Asia Pacific (EAP) report, titled “Expanding Opportunities for the Urban Poor”, the Philippines has the third-largest slum population in the region.

China and Indonesia have the largest number of urban slum dwellers at 191.1 million and 29.2 million, respectively. The entire region has some 75 million people living in slums.

“First of all, people living in slums are not necessarily poor. I think slums, at it’s very basic root, is a failure of urban land markets”, EAP Urban and Disaster Risk Management Sector Manager for Transport Abhas Jha said in a videoconference with journalists in the region.

Judy Baker, World Bank lead economist, noted that since not all poor people live in slums, this also reflects the shortage of affordable housing in Asia’s rapidly growing megacities, which includes Metro Manila.

In the Philippines alone, the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC) estimates that there are will be about 1.4 million informal settler families (ISFs) nationwide, of which 40 percent live in Metro Manila.

The World Bank said in the report that the HUDCC projected that the total housing units needed this year will reach 6.3 million. By 2030 the private sector estimated that the required housing units would reach 12.5 million.

“This reflects a shortage of affordable housing for the lower middle class. This is a problem across the region,” Baker said. “[The] challenge of cities growing so fast [is] not being able to keep up with the housing demand.”The report noted that the expansion of slum areas in the Philippines also stemmed from poor urban planning and the lack of coordination in housing policies by cities and municipalities.

In Metro Manila, the report stated, there were 85 municipalities and cities that have their own housing policies and city-planning efforts. These are not coordinated with other local governments and the national government.

Jha and Baker said one factor

17million The number of urban slum dwellers in the Philippines, according to the World Bank that makes this more difficult is incity migration. But, no matter what governments do, they will not be able to stop migrants from being attracted to the economic and social opportunities offered by cities.

However, once they reach cities, migrants are confronted not only by skyscrapers but also skyrocketing housing prices, as well as problems, such as poor public transport and the lack of jobs.

“Each municipality is independently managed, and all work on various issues related to decreasing the incidence of urban poverty.

Strategies to facilitate land acquisition, opportunities for tenure and zoning are disconnected, and many go unfunded”, the report read.

According to the report, the region’s average annual urbanization rate of 3 percent has helped lift 655 million people out of poverty in the last two decades.

But the region also has the world’s largest slum population: 250 million people with poor-quality housing, limited access to basic services and at risk to hazards, such as flooding.

The bank said the failure to expand oppor tunities for the urban poor impacts the countries’ growth potential. In highincome countries, such as Japan and Korea, “inclusive urbanization” created the space for higher economic growth.

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s Singapore’s economy grew at an average of 8 percent annually, largely due to an urban-planning strategy that delivered effective infrastructure, affordable housing and social services. Among the challenges faced by the urban poor is the lack of access to jobs, public transport and other infrastructure and affordable housing.

In Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, lowincome commuters can spend as much as 36 percent of their monthly expenses on bus fare, due to inefficient public transportation. In Indonesia and the Philippines 27 percent and 21 percent of the urban population, respectively, have no access to effective sanitation facilities.

See “Slum problem,” A2