Businessmirror october 06, 2017

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Friday, October 6, 2017 Vol. 12 No. 358

Q4 inflation to accelerate on weaker peso, wage hike

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By Cai U. Ordinario

@cuo_bm

igher minimum wages and fuel prices, as well as a weak peso, could accelerate the country’s inflation rate in the last quarter of 2017, according to the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda).

The statement came on the heels of the Philippine Statistics Authority’s (PSA) announcement that inflation reached 3.4 percent in

September, the highest since April, which brought year-to-date inflation to an average of 3.1 percent.

“We still face several risks to

3.1 percent The average rate of price hikes in the January-toSeptember period

inflation, such as higher domestic fuel prices, weaker peso and minimum-wage hike that will be effective today in the National Capital Region,” Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto M. Pernia said.

Continued on A2

‘Friendlier’ Duterte ups US military engagement

By Rene Acosta

@reneacostaBM

T

he country’s joint military activities with the United States will increase next year, following an agreement between the two countries and President Duterte’s earlier pronouncement that he wanted to be“friendlier”with the Americans.

From a total of 258 joint military engagements—including training and exercises— with the US this year, next year’s activities will increase to 261, and it will even cover territorial defense, according to Armed Forces Chief of Staff Gen. Eduardo M. Año.

These activities, Año said, include humanitarian assistance, disaster response and counterterrorism. Last year the President moved for the scuttling of military exercises with the US as he steered toward China. Security officials prevailed upon him, although he took away territorial defense from the coverage of such exercises.

Recently, Duterte said he wants to be friendlier with the US, which is now helping the country deal with terrorists fighting the government in Marawi City.

Año justified the increase of military engagements with the Americans against the earlier stand of Duterte.

“That was last year, every year it changes.

As the President said: ‘I want to be friendlier to the US’. After all, the US is not our enemy, and China is also not our enemy. . .our utmost priority is the interest of the country,” Ano said on Thursday at the sidelines of China’s turnover of firearms to the Armed Forces.

Duterte, Año added, recognized that the US remains as the top ally of the Philippines, so the provisions of the defense treaty with Washington should be carried out.

Año also said that the construction of facilities under the Enhanced Defense and Cooperation Agreement for the pivoting American troops will begin next year.

At least five military camps have been identified to host visiting American troops and their assets and equipment.

Defense Secretary Delfin N. Lorenzana (from left), Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines Zhao Jianhua and Armed Forces Chief of Staff Gen. Eduardo M. Año inspect Chinese-made CQ-A5b assault rifles during the turnover ceremony on Thursday in Camp Aguinaldo. The weapons and ammunition form part of Chinese military donation to the Philippines in its fight against Muslim militants. Story on A3. AP

NREB set to present proposed rules on sourcing of renewable energy

By Lenie Lectura

T

@llectura

HE National Renewable Energy Board (NREB) will endorse to the Department of Energy (DOE) the proposed rules on renewable portfolio standards (RPS), which requires distribution utilities (DUs) to source a portion of their power supply from eligible renewable-energy (RE) sources.

“This week I will endorse it already to the secretary. Hopefully, it will be then be signed the following week to start the ball rolling,”

PESO exchange rates n US 50.9510

NREB Chairman Jose M. Layug Jr. said in an interview during an RE forum organized by the Dutch Embassy last week.

RPS is intended to contribute to the growth of the RE industry. If implemented, this will help the agency attain its goal of maintaining the RE share in the national energy mix to at least 35 percent by 2030.

Barring unforeseen events, Layug expects the implementation of the RPS policy starting next year. “Hopefully, it will

start to take effect by January 2018. RPS will definitely address issues on cost”.

The scope of proposed RPS r u les i nc lude t he fol low i ng : types of RE sources; yearly minimum RPS requirement; annual minimum incremental percentage of electricity sold by each mandated participant, which is required to be sourced from eligible RE resources and which shall, in no case, be less than 1 percent of its annual energy demand over See “NREB,” A12

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‘INFLATION REMAINS MANAGEABLE DESPITE SEPTEMBER RATE SPIKE’

By Bianca Cuaresma

Espenilla: “Firm domestic economic activity, sufficient liquidity and wellanchored inflation expectations continue to support current policy settings.”

@BcuaresmaBM

T

he increase in consumer prices in September remains manageable, even as it accelerated to its fastest pace since 2014, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) chief said on Thursday.

Following the Philippine Statistics Authority’s (PSA) announcement that the inflation rate settled at 3.4 percent in September, BSP Governor Nestor A. Espenilla Jr. expressed confidence that average inflation this year will still fall within the government’s target band of 2 percent to 4 percent.

“The BSP remains of the view that the inflation environment will continue to be manageable over the policy horizon after taking into account the latest assessment of price levels in September. Inflation is projected to settle within the national government’s target range of [2 to 4] percent in 2017 to 2019”, Espenilla said.

“Firm domestic economic activity, sufficient liquidity and wellanchored inflation expectations continue to support current policy settings,” he added.

Inflation in September hit 3.4 percent, accelerating from 3.1 per-

cent in the previous month. September’s print is also significantly higher than the 2.3 percent in the previous year.

The September inflation rate also matched the highest monthly inflation numbers of the country in March and April.

Despite the rise, average inflation in January to September remains within target at 3.1 percent.

The figure is also within the BSP’s anticipated range of inflation for the month, pegged at 2.8 percent to 3.6 percent.

ING Bank Manila economist Joey Cuyegkeng said risks to inflation moving forward are still tilted on the upside.

“We expect 2017 inflation to average at 3.1 percent. The BSP expects an average 2017 and 2018 inflation rate of 3.2 percent,” the economist said.

“We believe that there is a strong chance that inflation will accelerate to an average of 3.5 percent in 2018,” he added.

Contact-center industry seeks ways to improve graduates’ employability

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espi t e it s cont i nued growth, the country’s contact-center industry remains saddled with a talent pool that is only 10-percent readily employable up to now.

With this, the Contact Center Association of the Philippines (CCAP) is seeking more interventions in the areas of skills training and education to raise the employability rate of Filipino graduates to 15 percent.

The CCAP and Aspiring Minds of India presented on Thursday the results of the National Employability Report, which showed that two-thirds of the 60,000 college graduates surveyed do not have the proper skills to qualify for the job of their choice across industries, including business-process outsourcing (BPO).

While not disclosing the actual employability measure specifically for the BPO sector, the CCAP said Filipino graduates rank low on

10% The estimated employability rate of Filipino college graduates for contactcenter jobs

specific functions within the sector, such as in inbound customer service jobs, outbound sales and information-technology help desk.

“The employability of all these roles is below 25 percent,” according to a statement on Aspiring Minds’s study.

CCAP President Benedict Hernandez said a proof of this is the very slow improvement in the industry’s hiring rate.

See “Contact-center,” A2

n japan 0.4519 n UK 67.4999 n HK 6.5263 n CHINA 7.6538 n singapore 37.4392 n australia 40.0628 n EU 59.9184 n SAUDI arabia 13.5866

Source: BSP (5 October 2017 )

BMReports

A2 Friday, October 6, 2017

BusinessMirror

Q4 inflation to accelerate on weaker peso, wage hike

Continued from A1

The Philippines continues to import food items, such as rice and meat products. A weaker peso would make these food items more expensive.

Prior to this year, the last time inflation breached the 3-percent level was in November 2014, when inflation averaged 3.7 percent. The Neda said inflation was higher than the median market expectation of 3.2 percent.

Nonetheless, the Neda said inflation in September was still within the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’s (BSP) forecast of 2.8 percent to 3.6 percent.

“We are still positive that inflation for full-year 2017 will settle within the government’s target of 2 percent to 4 percent,” Pernia said.

In September the Neda said Typhoon Jolina and Tropical Depression Maring caused food to become more expensive. For nonfood inflation, higher prices were due to higher rent and utility prices.

Food inflation increased slightly to 3.6 percent, from the previous month’s 3.5 percent.

Faster price increases were recorded for corn, fish, vegetables, cereals, flour, bread, pasta, and oils and fats. The Neda said this may be partly due to the total reported losses from Tropical Depression Maring, which reached around P77 million.

“The accelerated adjustments in food,

Contact-center. . .

Continued from A1

“Five years ago, based on our members’ survey, the hiring rate was about 6 percent to 8 percent. Two to three years ago, this has risen to 8 percent to 10 percent. Our goal is to keep improving that because 10 percent is still not the efficient, optimal

number in our view,” Hernandez said, adding that the ultimate goal is to bring this up to 15 percent.

The CCAP head said interventions in skills training with educational institutions will go a long way in improving the employability of Filipino graduates.

For example, CCAP members conduct a Near-Hire Training Program, where applicants who have failed to secure a post in

their company may undergo training for two to three weeks, then they are asked to reapply. “What we’ve seen is that 70 percent to 77 percent [of those] who go through the added training get qualified,” Hernandez said.

Tesda has given funding support for the Near-Hire program and has given scholarship grants in support of graduates wishing to enter the BPO industry.

The Commission on Higher Education, on the other hand, worked with the CCAP in creating the service-management program.

In this program, CCAP member-companies tap universities who offer the BPO-tailored curriculum of service management for their work force. The employability of the graduates in the BPO sector from the universities with this program jumped to 30 percent to 40 percent.

particularly corn, fish and vegetables, can be partly traced to the lingering effects of Typhoon Jolina and Tropical Depression Maring, which caused damage to agriculture and fisheries in the Calabarzon region, particularly Quezon province,” Pernia said.

“Farm-gate prices of chicken may also take some time to recover, but may pick up in time for the holidays. To ensure that the country is free from the H5 bird-flu virus, the government should strictly enforce regular sanitation processes on farms,” he added.

With this, Pernia said the government must focus on programs that would increase access to technology and improve the access of agriculture products to trade partners.

He also urged the upgrade of credit programs to include crop insurance so farmers will be able to recover from losses caused by typhoons or pests.

Data from the PSA showed that nonfood inflation reached 3.1 percent, its highest since February 2013. This is due to faster year-on-year price adjustments in housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels, transport, restaurants and clothing and footwear.

“The government needs to closely monitor movements in domestic fuel prices and utility rates. Faster inflation in these sectors will negatively impact the spending capacity of lowerincome households for basic necessities, like food, and important services, such as health and education,” Pernia said.

“The significance of this study by Aspiring Minds is we can have actual data, and our interventions can become more targeted and precise,” Hernandez added.

In 2016 the BPO sector employed 1.15 million people. Of this, the contact-center space contributed 751,000. The contactcenter industry produces a net of 70,000 jobs per year, Hernandez said.

Catherine N. Pillas

news@businessmirror.com.ph

The Nation BusinessMirror

House panel finds ground to impeach Sereno, junks similar rap vs Bautista

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he House Committee on Justice on Thursday said it has found sufficient grounds to impeach Chief Justice Maria Lourdes A. Sereno, even as the same panel formally junked a similar complaint lodged against Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairman Andres D. Bautista.

Rep. Reynaldo V. Umali of the Second District of Oriental Mindoro, the panel chairman, declared the impeachment complaint’s sufficiency of the grounds against Sereno after 25 members of the committee voted in favor and two against.

Umali said the panel would proceed to the next stage, which is the determination of probable cause, after Congress’s halloween break. The break will start on October 14 and will end on November 12. “The chairman hereby declares the complaint’s [sufficiency]. The complaint alleges sufficient ground for impeachment and, thereafter, we will now move to the next stage, which is the determination of probable cause,” Umali said.

The complaint filed by lawyer Larry Gadon contains four grounds, including corruption, culpable violation of the Constitution, betrayal of public

trust and other high crimes. The complaint also alleged 27 acts constituting the offenses charged against the Chief Justice.

“In the determination of probable cause, that is when we will have to go through it more methodically and we will have to look at each and every allegation to determine its sufficiency for purpose of impeachment,” Umali added, after lawmakers asked the committee to vote the 27 acts individually during the panel’s hearing.

The same panel also approved a committee report formally junking the impeachment complaint against Bautista.

Voting 19-2, the committe approved the committee report and a resolution declaring the impeachment complaint filed by former Rep. Jacinto Paras and lawyer Ferdinand Topacio as insufficient in form. The complaint was endorsed by Deputy Speaker Gwendolyn F. Garcia, Party-list Rep. Harry L. Roque Jr. of Kabayan and Cavite Rep. Abraham T. Tolentino of the Seventh District of Cavite.

According to Umali, the report will be transmitted to the House plenary for final approval.

Complainants Paras and Topacio accused Bautista of betrayal of public trust and culpable violation of the Constitution, amid allegations of P1billion ill-gotten wealth by his wife Patricia Paz Bautista.

In the complaint, Paras and Topacio said, “Bautista culpably violated the Constitution and/or betrayed the public trust when he failed to truthfully, accurately, or completely disclose to the public his Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth as required under Section 17, Article XI of the 1987 Constitution Anti-Graft and and Corrupt Practices Act, and Code of Conduct and Ethical Standards Act.” The complainants also said Bautista also neglected his duties and responsibilities as head of the agency, particularly collecting and further processing of personal data, which led to unnecessary exposure of personal and sensitive information of millions of Filipinos, and obstructed justice when he cleared Smartmatic and Comelec informationtechnology specialists of any wrongdoing for the so-called script tweak during the consolidation/canvassing of results in the May 2016 elections, among others. Jovee Marie N. dela Cruz

Editor: Vittorio V. Vitug • Friday, October 6, 2017 A3

Poe eyes ‘tougher’ sanctions for cyber libel and fake news

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By Butch Fernandez

@butchfBM

he Senate Committee on Public Information and Mass Media is poised to pursue a probe to plug legal loopholes that allow bloggers earning undeclared income from advertisements to avoid payment of taxes.

Senate probers confided that such revenue stream should be maximized since the government is set to impose new taxes under the so-called TRAIN bill, also known as the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion, which aims to raise P130 billion to bankroll the Duterte administration’s “Build, Build, Build” projects.

Reports reaching the committee indicated that Google, Facebook and bloggers are said to split sizeable earnings from advertising revenues, also called Google ads, from which millions in revenue are derived without clear mechanisms for how recipients pay taxes.

This, after Sen. Grace Poe, committee chairman, confirmed the

panel is also mulling over tougher sanctions against fake news purveyors and cyber libel cases.

Poe, however, hastened to clarify the committee is not out to “suppress free speech”.

“As a legislator, while I am concerned about the pernicious effects of the proliferation of fake news that can destroy not just a person’s reputation but institutions, as well, I am in no way in favor of any measure that aims to suppress our freedom of speech or expression,” the senator said.

Poe added: “What I intend is to come up with a law that will increase the penalties for cyber libel caused by fake news and make public officials and employees, whether elected or appointed, hired as a consultant or adviser, paid or not, criminally liable for posting fake news online where malice is presumed.”

The senator asserted that freedom of expression “ends when libel begins”.

China turns over additional 3,000 guns to Philippines for police use

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hina continues to build its warming relations with the Duterte administration by turning over on Thursday some 3,000 additional Chinese firearms to the

Armed Forces of the Philippines.

The firearms, considered by China as “doleouts”, were received by Armed Forces Chief of Staff Gen. Eduardo M. Año, who turned them over to Defense

Secretary Delfin N. Lorenzana during a ceremony at Camp Aguinaldo. The bulk of the firearms, given in a military-tomilitary undertaking, would, however, go to the National Police, Lorenzana said.

“According to the directive of the President, they will be given to the National Police. If you remember the National Police tried to buy 26,000 firearms from a dealer with the United

States, but it has taken them too long to deliver, so we are lucky that the Chinese government provided firearms,” the defense chief said.

“The first batch, 3,000 minus 100 re-

tained by the Armed Forces, were given to the National Police immediately after we received them in June and this [batch of firearms will] also will be given to them,” he added. Rene Acosta

Economy

A4 Friday, October 6, 2017 • Editors: Vittorio V. Vitug and Max V. de Leon

BusinessMirror

PHL growth story ‘incomplete’ sans Mindanao economic devt, WB says

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By Cai U. Ordinario

@cuo_bm

ustaining the country’s recent economic success may not be possible without addressing the lack of economic development in Mindanao, according to the World Bank.

In its Philippine Economic Update, the World Bank said peace can be achieved if the government addressed historical injustices and recognized cultural minorities.

However, there are development issues, such as land rights and displacement of people, which require the creation and implementation of economic policies. “ Though the long-standing armed conflicts affecting parts of Mindanao can only be resolved by a political solution, economic policies can help reduce conflict,” the report stated.

The World Bank explained that, while land disputes in the region stemmed from armed conflict, different land laws and the lack of coordination among agencies that implement land laws exacerbate the situation.

In Mindanao, the bank said, there are many overlapping land-law frameworks that largely affect the Moros and the indigenous peoples in the region.

The Washington-based lender said the original inhabitants of Mindanao lost their lands because of the Spanish rule from 1898 to 1946; the third republic until the late-1960s; the martial-law years

until the mid-1980s; and the comprehensive agrarian reform, which is being implemented until today.

The report stated the “dispossession” of land by the original inhabitants of Mindanao disregarded traditional institutions established under communal ownership of land.

This has also contributed to the high poverty incidence in the area.

The bank said about 63 percent of people in areas affected by conflict live below the poverty line. The Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) has the highest poverty rate in Mindanao.

“The magnified effects of overlapping land legal frameworks grew from Mindanao’s unique sociogeology that creates multiple rights over the same plot,” the report stated.

“The Philippines has eight separate land laws, with significant overlaps and no clear rules of precedence, which are the responsibility of five offices in four agencies, often without coordination,” it added.

W hi le d isplacements were caused by conflict, the sheer number of displaced persons create civil-registry issues, as well as concerns about their nationalities and employment opportunities.

Citing data from the United Na-

tions High Commissioner for Refugees, the World Bank said there were around a million internally displaced persons in Mindanao. Also, around 41 percent of the population in mainland ARMM have been displaced at least once.

The displacement of some have become “permanent” in the sense that they already migrated to safer areas elsewhere in the archipelago and Sabah in Malaysia. The World Bank said the Malaysian government estimates there were 470,000 Filipinos in Sabah in 2015.

“Unofficial sources put this number at about a million, of which 25 percent were considered ‘stateless’, i.e., they did not have birth certificates or passports to prove their nationality, which reduces their access to jobs and services and increases their vulnerability to exploitation,” the World Bank said.

The slower than expected implementation of the government’s infrastructure projects has forced the World Bank to cut its growth forecast for the Philippines this year and next year.

In the East Asia Pacific Economic Update, the World Bank said it has tempered its growth forecast to 6.6 percent this year and 6.7 percent for 2018, from the April estimate of 6.9 percent for both years.

The Washington-based lender also said the economy is on track to post a growth of around 6.7 percent in 2019.

Based on World Bank data, the Philippines’s economic growth will be higher than the expected average in Developing East Asia Pacific region of 6.4 percent in 2017; 6.2 percent in 2018; and 6.1 percent in 2019.

Compared to the average growth in Developing Asean countries, the Philippines will still grow faster, since the group is projected to grow 5.1 percent this year and 5.2 percent in 2018 and 2019.

The bank said, among developing Asean economies, Cambodia is expected to post the fastest growth in 2017 and 2018, while Lao PDR and Myanmar are expected to share the top spot with a growth of 6.9 percent in 2019.

The magnified effects of overlapping land legal frameworks grew from Mindanao’s unique sociogeology that creates multiple rights over the same plot.

The Philippines has eight separate land laws, with significant overlaps and no clear rules of precedence, which are the responsibility of five offices in four agencies, often without coordination.”­—World Bank

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House panel okays VAT exempt for system-loss charge in electricity bills

By Jovee Marie N. dela Cruz @joveemarie

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he House Committee on Ways and Means has approved a measure exempting system loss on electricity from value-added tax (VAT).

Par t y-list Rep. Carlos T. Isagani Zarate of Bayan Muna, pr incipa l author of the bil l, said House Bil l 1616 was approved by the committee on Wednesday. “ This is, indeed, a positive development, especially since the prices of basic commodities and services like electricity are skyrocketing.

If enacted, this bill will give a welcome relief to consumers,” Zarate added.

“This bill also seeks to address the injustice in charging and taxing consumers for something that they did not use,” he said.

The bill seeks to amend the National Internal Revenue Code of 1997, as amended by Republic Acts 9377 and 10378, by exempting the systemloss charge component in the electricity bills from the coverage of the VAT. Zarate, citing an Ibon Foundation study, said the system-loss charge is 8 percent of the total electricity bill, and its reduction would be good for consumers.

“A s a consumption ta x, VAT ought to be imposed upon the goods and ser v ices people actua l ly buy and consume. By its ver y definition therefore, the imposition of VAT upon this system-loss charge is

As a tax on consumption, VAT ought to be imposed upon the goods and services people actually buy and consume. By its very definition, therefore, the imposition of VAT upon this system-loss charge is unfounded and illegal, as the people are taxed for goods/services they have not actually consumed.”

—Zarate

unfounded and il lega l,” he added.

System-loss charge is that a component of the monthly electric bill representing the cost of electricity lost during transmission, pilferage and due to technical and administrative inefficiency.

“Even pilfered power and the electricity used by the distribution companies and electric cooperatives are passed on to consumers. Thus, the people are made to pay more than the cost of electricity they have actually consumed,” he said.

Faeldon, other respondents seek dismissal of drug smuggling raps

By Joel R. San Juan @jrsanjuan1573

F

ORMER Bureau of Customs (BOC) Commissioner Nicanor E. Faeldon is asking the Department of Justice (DOJ) to dismiss the string of criminal charges filed against him and several other former Customs officials and employees for allegedly conspiring to smuggle into the country a shabu shipment worth P6.4 billion in May. During Thursday’s preliminary investigation on the complaint filed by the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA), Faeldon argued that the Office of the Ombudsman (OMB), and not the DOJ, has the jurisdiction to investigate the complaint filed against him.

In his motion, Faeldon cited as basis the Sandiganbayan law, which holds that, for an official to be under the DOJ’s jurisdiction, the following requisites must exist: 1. The public officer or employee occupies the position corresponding to salary grade (SG) 27; and 2. The crime is committed by the public officer or employee in relation to his office.

Faeldon said he had a SG of 30 as Customs commissioner.

“Indisputably, therefore, Mr. Faeldon, being an SG 30, belongs to a class of public officers whose alleged offenses, if any, are within the primary and exclusive jurisdiction of the OMB, for the purpose of preliminary investigation, and the Sandiganbayan, in the event an information is filed by the OMB, for trial on the merits,” the motion added.

Faeldon also said that the OMB and the DOJ has signed a memorandum of agreement on April 19, 2012, where they agreed that the former will have “primary jurisdiction in the conduct of preliminary investigation over complaints for crimes cognizable by the Sandiganbayan”.

He noted that even Sen. Panfilo M. Lacson Sr. was fully aware that it was the OMB who has jurisdiction over him when he filed charges against him before the latter.

Aside from Faeldon, also named as respondents in the PDEA complaint were Customs Intelligence and Investagion Service (CIIS) chief Neil Anthony Estrella; former BOC director Milo Maestrecampo; intelligence officers Joel Pinawin and Oliver Valiente; Manila International Container Port district collector lawyer Vincent Phillip Maronilla; Faeldon’s fiancee, lawyer Jeline Maree Magsuci; and BOC employees Alexandra Ventura, Randolph Cabansag, Dennis Maniego, Dennis Cabildo and John Edillo have been summoned to appear during the proceedings and answer the allegations against them.

In the same complaint, the PDEA filed illegal drug-importation charges under Republic Act (RA) 9165 against importers and facilitators of the shabu shipment—Chen Ju Long, Chen Rong Juan, Manny Li, Kenneth Dong, Mark Taguba II, Teejay Marcellana, Eirene May Tatad, Emily Dee, Chen I-Min and Jhu Ming Jyun.

It also included in the charge sheet the directors and officers of Hong Fei Logistics Inc., the warehouse where the shabu shipment was seized, Genelita Arayan, Dennis Nocom, Zhang Hong, Rene Palle, Richard Rebistual and Mary Rose de la Cruz.

Meanwhile, officials of the CIIS who led the seizure of the P6.4 shabu shipment in May condemned the latest attempt of the Taguba camp to weaken the drug cases filed against him by presenting a witness claiming to be the bagman of the CIIS officials.

It was Taguba who brokered the entry into the country of the said shipment.

The CIIS officials said they will

file perjury, libel and other applicable criminal cases once the cases are filed against them.

Former CIIS Chief Col. Neil Anthony Estrella said May Escoto, who claimed before the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee hearing on Tuesday that she had received payoffs from Mark Taguba for Estrella and CIIS Acting Division Chief Joel Pinawin, is “a fake witness” with close ties to the Taguba camp who was allegedly tapped to destroy the credibility of the CIIS officials responsible for the drug bust.

“Ms. Escoto has never been our bagman, since we have never received payoffs from Mark Taguba. She is a tool of the Taguba camp to peddle their fake news against us so that the drug-smuggling and conspiracy cases against Mark Taguba would be fatally weakened,” Estrella said.

Estrella said Escoto is the common-law wife of Ricky Carvajal, a bodyguard of the Tagubas and a columnist in the Customs News newspaper. Mark admitted in the Senate hearings this is owned by their family.

“They must destroy our credibility to weaken the case against Mark. That, aside from vengeance, is his motivation for his malicious lies against us,” Estrella added.

In its complaint, the PDEA sought the indictment of Faeldon and his co-respondents for alleged conspiracy to import illegal drugs and protecting or coddling of drug traffickers under RA 9165.

The PDEA also accused them of obstruction of justice under Presidential Decree 1829, by “harboring or concealing, or facilitating the escape” of the persons behind the shabu shipment.

Faeldon and other respondents were also accused of negligence and tolerance under Article 208 of the Revised Penal Code.

Treasure hoard A junk-shop utility worker arranges a pile of discarded carton boxes onboard a light truck for transport to a recycling plant in Manila. ALYSA SALEN

Teco head says now is ‘best time’ for PHL, Taiwan to strengthen ties

By Recto Mercene @rectomercene

T

he head of the Taiwan Economic and Cultural Office (Teco) in the Philippines, Representative Dr. Gary Song-Huann Lin, said his country will fully support the Manila’s 10-point economicgrowth agenda and national development plan.

“This is the best time for our two nations to strengthen our relationship. You have [a] 10-point economic agenda, and also you have a national development plan. Likewise, our new Southbound policy echoes, I will say coincides with our national development plan,” Dr. Lin said at the Taiwan Expo Philippines 2017 last week.

The largest exposition held outside of Taiwan, the event attracted

more than 200 locators at the SMX Arena in Pasay City.

Dr. Lin added that, because of its policy to be a more inclusive government “by 2022 the Philippines will be an upper middle-income level country enjoying prosperity and good lifestyle.”

Speaking before a crowd of Filipino and Taiwanese businessmen and government officials, Dr. Lin said since our two countries are the closest of neighbors, “it’s but natural that we are close friends”.

“Definitely, through our partnership and common effort, the Philippines and Taiwan will not only be close neighbors, but also closest friends,” he said.

Noting the vibrant trade between the two countries, Dr. Lin added, the Philippines is one of the top 10 trading partner of Taiwan. “Taiwan

is Philippines No. 8 trading partner, last year our two-way trade amounted to $10. 8 billion.”

He said that from January to the end of September this year, Filipinos who visited Taiwan had increased to 182,000, compared to last year’s 170,000.

He estimated that following this tread, there would be a 75percent increase in Filipinos going to Taiwan next year, noting that there are 200 flights between Taipei and Manila.

“But although we are close, there’s still room and potential to be much, much closer, that’s why we have the Taiwan expo here today,” Dr. Lin said.

The good news, he added, is that Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen, have announced the new Southbound policy of a visa-free entry of Filipinos to his country.

Agriculture/Commodities BusinessMirror

news@businessmirror.com.ph

Editor: Jennifer A. Ng • Friday, October 6, 2017

A5

Corn output likely to hit 7.6 MMT

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By Jasper Emmanuel Y. Arcalas

@jearcalas

avorable weather conditions will drive corn production this year to reach 7.6 million metric tons (MMT), 5.26 percent higher than the 2016 record of 7.22 MMT, according to the Philippine Maize Federation Inc. (PhilMaize).

Bloomberg

PhilMaize President Roger V. Navarro said corn production would have been higher if some farmers did not shift to planting other crops, such as pineapple and cacao, because of low corn prices.

The Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) had projected that corn output for 2017 would reach 8.01 MMT. “[The forecast] is not attainable. The best the sector can do is around 7.6 MMT,” Navarro told reporters in an interview at the sidelines of the Asean Agriculture Summit held on October 4.

Last year’s corn output of 7.22 MMT was 4 percent lower than the 7.52 MMT produced in 2015, data from the PSA showed.

Navarro noted that the farmgate price of yellow corn in Region 2, one of the country’s top corn-producing regions, is currently at P11/kilogram. “This means that the price is low compared to that in Cagayan de Oro, where corn is now at P13.50.”

“The factors affecting [price] include the high carryover volume from last harvest. The price of yellow corn during the previous

harvest was also low,” he added.

According to Navarro, the decline in the farm-gate price of yellow corn in Regions 2 and 3 may also be attributed to the recent importation of corn and feed wheat.

“Around 250,000 metric tons [MT] of corn and almost 2 MMT of feed wheat were recently imported,” he said. “This dampened the farm-gate price of yellow corn.”

Navarro said he expects the current farm-gate prices of corn to remain until the first quarter of next year.

“The problem here is that it is the small farmers who are greatly affected because they may decide not to plant, thus, supply may be affected,” he added.

In Central Luzon Navarro revealed that the farm-gate price of yellow corn has started to recover and has touched the P12/kg mark this week, from the previous week’s P10/kg. “The price in Bulacan has somehow recovered and now ranges from P11.80 to P12/kg”.

E a r l ie r Nav a r ro tol d t he BusinessMirror that the farmgate price of corn in Central Luzon two weeks ago has gone down to below P10/kg, as some poultry growers in the region are hesitant to restock their flocks.

To stabilize farm-gate price, Navarro urged the National Food Authority (NFA) to intervene and step up its purchase of yellow corn in Central Luzon. The NFA is mandated to ensure the stability of supply and prices of staple cereals in the farm and consumer levels.

“The NFA should intervene now so the price would normalize.

Because if they do it now, then the farmers would be encouraged to plant again in the next cropping season,” he said.

Weaker peso boosts earnings of mango exporters Groups ask Congress

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he weakening of the peso against the dollar has allowed mango growers to earn more from their mango shipments, according to the chief of the Philippine Mango Exporters Federation Inc. (PMEFI).

“It’s good that the peso weakened [as] it helped us. But the opportunity to move a bigger volume [is not there]”, PMEFI President Roberto C. Amores told reporters in an interview at the sidelines of the opening of AgriLink 2017 on October 5 in Pasay City.

“The value of mango [exports] increased because the selling price increased. In terms of value, our year-to-date sales rose by around 25 percent,” Amores added.

He noted that mango shipments have declined by more than 30 percent due to lower domestic production.

“Even the biggest processors 7D and Profoods, they saw their shipments decline by 20 percent to 30 percent in terms of volume,” Amores said.

Major buyers of Philippine f resh mangoes inc lude Hong Kong, China, South Korea and Japan. Processed mango products, such as puree and concentrates, are shipped mostly to the United States, South Korea, Japan, China, the United Kingdom, Brazil, Russia and India.

“Thailand, Vietnam and Mexico have filled up the volume we cannot ship. Philippine mango is of premium variety but, despite that, other countries are taking up the gap in volume,” Amores said.

Data from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) showed that export receipts from fresh mangoes in January to July reached

$13.708 million, 70.14 percent higher than the $8.057 million recorded a year ago.

Revenues from mango exports during the seven-month period, according to PSA data, have already surpassed last year’s total receipt of $13.319 million.

Last year local growers shipped a total of 14,343 metric tons (MT) of fresh mangoes, 10.5 percent higher than the 12,981.3 MT exported in 2015.

In January to June, the local mango sector produced 654,100 MT, 9.76 percent lower than the 724,870 MT recorded in the same period last year.

Total mango production in the six-month period was valued at P25.258 billion at current prices, higher than the P20.035 billion recorded a year ago.

PSA data also showed that the

country produced 814,055.41 MT of mangoes last year, 9.83 percent lower than the 902,739.40 recorded in 2015.

The PMEFI chief said the government should roll out interventions, such as providing mango growers with fertilizer and pruning equipment, to help them increase their output. “[We need] fertilizer and pruning equipment. Production cost should also be lowered. These interventions will allow us to bring back output to 1 million metric tons”, Amores said, adding that the sector’s production has recently fallen to below 600,000 MT. The Department of Agriculture said earlier that it is currently crafting a five-year mango road map that would address the loca l sector’s production woes. Jasper Emmanuel Y. Arcalas

Ben & Jerry’s agrees to improve conditions for farmworkers

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URLINGTON, Vermont—Icecream maker Ben & Jerry’s promised on Tuesday to improve the pay and working conditions of laborers hired by the farms that provide milk for the Vermont-based company’s quirky flavors while promising to pay the farmers who employ the workers more.

The “Milk with Dignity” agreement was signed by Ben & Jerry’s CEO Jostein Solheim and members of the group Migrant Justice. It assures the human rights of the workers and ensures better relations with farmers because workers will do a better job, said Enrique “Kike” Balcazar, a 24-year-old farmworker from Tabasco, Mexico, who has worked in Vermont for seven years and is now a leader of Migrant Justice.

“And Ben & Jerry’s wins...because they will sell a product that assures the human rights of the workers so the consumers will receive a just product. That is milk with dignity,” Balcazar said.

Solheim said the agreement is the first of its kind in the dairy industry in the United States and possibly the world.

“It’s an agreement that puts the worker in charge of workers’ rights,” he said. “It’s a worker-led movement, but it’s a very clever system. It’s a system that really does create a win, win, win.”

About 85 percent of the milk Ben & Jerry’s uses in its ice cream made in North America comes from about 80 Vermont dairy farms, many of which rely on immigrant labor.

In this March 5, 2009, file photo, a Hispanic worker watches the milking operation at a farm in Fairfield, Vermont. AP Photo/Toby Talbot, File

Balcazar said a survey of workers found 40 percent didn’t get a day off and 40 percent weren’t paid

a minimum wage. Most farms provide housing and the workers need a minimum housing standard. AP

anew to ban aerial spraying of pesticides

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multisectoral group consisting of various non-governmental organizations on Thursday revived the call to ban the aerial spraying of pesticides on local banana plantations.

The Mamamayan Ayaw sa Aerial Spraying (MAAS), Interface Development Interventions Inc., Philippine Misereor Partnerships Inc. and the Sentro ng Alternatibong Lingap Panlegal (Saligan) again called on lawmakers to ban aerial spraying.

Aerial spraying of pesticides is a common practice in agricultural plantations. In banana-producing provinces in Mindanao, aerial spraying protects banana trees from being wiped out by various pests and diseases.

Proposals to ban the use of aerial spray have been filed by several lawmakers at the House of Representatives since the 14th Congress. But these measures failed to make it past the committee level.

The ban on aerial spraying of harmful chemicals can be imposed by the Department of Agriculture (DA) through the Fertilizer and Pesticide Authority (FPA), Saligan’s Juan Karlo Silva told the BusinessMirror at the sidelines of a forum held in Quezon City.

The group will troop to the House of Representatives to hold a dialogue with several lawmakers to revive their campaign.

Dagohoy P. Magaway of MAAS said communities in banana plantations, particularly in the Davao region, are adversely affected by aerial spraying.

He himself claimed to have been affected by aerial spraying.

“I have a liver problem now. I have to undergo dialysis twice a week because of my illness,” Magaway said.

Aerial spraying of pesticides is the

fastest and efficient way of ridding plantations of pests. However, the group noted that the practice poses risks to farmers’s health, livelihood and to the environment.

According to Saligan, while agricultural plantations may have contributed to the economy, “it should not be at the expense of people’s lives and the environment”.

He noted that local governments, like Davao City, have tried to curtail the practice through an ordinance.

However, after nine years of legal battle, the Supreme Court declared the Davao City Ordinance to be unconstitutional.

“While we respect the decision, it rendered the local governments powerless to respond to the issue. It is now, therefore, up to Congress to address this,” Silva said.

The Pilipino Banana Growers and Exporters Association (PBGEA) earlier said aerial spraying is a “generally accepted agricultural practice” by the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) under certain limitations, which the banana industry is strictly adopting.

“A multisectoral monitoring team that is focused on banana plantations oversees the compliance of these regulations,” PBGEA Executive Director Stephen Antig said in July 2015.

Antig issued the statement in reaction to the House Committee on Ecology’s review of House Bill (HB) 3857, which called for a ban on aerial spraying.

PBGEA claimed that a fact-finding investigation conducted by Davao City officials in 2009 concluded that there was no scientific evidence to support the ban against aerial spraying in banana plantations in Davao City. Jonathan L. Mayuga

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Friday, October 6, 2017

The World BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Damage from US hurricanes to blur Friday’s Sept jobs report

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In this September 2 photo, a worker stacks crates at the Yanbian Shenghai Industry and Trade Co. Ltd., which hires some North Korean workers to process seafood in the city of Hunchun in northeastern China’s Jilin province. AP/Ng Han Guan

N. Korean workers prepare seafood going to US stores

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UNCHUN, China—Americans buying seafood for dinner may inadvertently have subsidized the North Korean government as it builds its nuclear-weapons program, an Associated Press (AP) investigation has found. Their purchases may also have supported forced labor.

At a time when North Korea is banned from selling almost anything, the country is sending tens of thousands of workers worldwide to bring in an estimated $200 million to $500 million a year. That could account for a sizable portion of North Korea’s nuclear-weapons and missile programs, which South Korea says have cost more than $1 billion.

While North Korean workers have been documented overseas, the AP investigation reveals that some products they make go to the United States. AP also tracked products made by North Korean workers to Canada, Germany and elsewhere in the European Union.

In response to the investigation, Senate leaders said on Wednesday that the US needs to keep products made by North Koreans out and get China to refuse to hire North Korean workers. “ T he [Tr u mp] ad m i n ist ration needs to ramp up the pressure on China to crack down on trade with North Korea across the board,” top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer said.

At Chinese factor ies, Nor th Korean workers aren’t a l lowed to leave their compounds w ithout per mission, and must step from housing to factor ies in pa irs or g roups, w it h Nor t h Korean minders.

They receive a fraction of their salaries, while the rest—as much as 70 percent—is taken by the North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s government.

John Connelly, president of the National Fisheries Institute, urged its 300 members, including the largest seafood importers in the US, to “ensure that wages go to the workers and are not siphoned off

$500M The maximum amount North Korean workers worldwide are estimated to bring to the country annually to support a dangerous dictator.”

Besides seafood, AP found North Korean laborers making wood flooring and sewing garments in Chinese factories. Those industries also export to the US, but AP did not track specific shipments except for seafood.

American companies aren’t a l lowe d to i mp or t pro duc t s made by North Korean workers anywhere in the world, and companies doing business with them could face criminal charges for using North Korean workers or materially benefiting from their work. (The AP employs a small number of support staff in its Pyongyang bureau under a waiver granted by the US government to allow the f low of news and information.)

US Customs and Border Protection, responsible for enforcing the law, did not respond to requests for comment. “ T his is a state-sponsored scheme to export folks who are in bonded labor,” said Luis CdeBaca, former US ambassador for human-trafficking issues. “It’s supporting a repressive regime.”

Western companies involved that responded to AP said forced labor and potential support for North Korea was unacceptable

in their supply chains. They said they’d investigate, and some said they’d already cut off ties with suppliers.

Meanwhile, as many as 100,000 Nor th Koreans continue to work in construction in the Gulf states, shipbuilding in Poland, logging in Russia and on fishing boats in Uruguay.

New United Nations sanctions bar countries from expanding their North Korean work force.

Despite the pay and restrictions, the jobs abroad are highly coveted among North Koreans. Roughly 3,000 North Koreans are believed to work in Hunchun, a Chinese industrial hub near the North Korean and Russian borders.

At some factories, laborers work hunched over tables as North Korean political slogans blasted from loudspeakers.

When a reporter approached a group of North Koreans—women in tight, bright, polyester clothes preparing a meal at a garment factory—one confirmed that she and some others were from Pyongyang, the North Korean capital.

Then a minder arrived, ordering: “Don’t talk to him!”

It’s unknown what conditions are like in every factory, but AP reporters saw North Korean laborers living and working in several facilities, including joint venture Hunchun Dongyang Seafood Industry and Trade Co. Ltd. and Hunchun Pagoda Industry Co. Ltd., distributed globally by Ocean One Enterprise; Yantai Dachen Hunchun Seafood Products; and Yanbian Shenghai Industry and Trade Co. Ltd. They’re getting their seafood from China, Russia and the US. Despite AP seeing North Korean workers, Hunchun Dongyang’s manager Zhu Qizhen denied that they hire them and refused to give details. The other Chinese companies didn’t comment.

Shipping records show more than 100 cargo containers of seafood were sent to the US and Canada this year from the factories where North Koreans were working in China, including packages of snow crab, salmon fillets and squid rings. One importer, The Fishin’ Company in Munhall, Pennsylvania, said it cut ties with Hunchun processors

and got its last shipment this summer. Seafood can remain in the supply chain for more than a year.

Often, the fish arrives in generic packaging. But some were already branded in China with familiar names like Walmart or Sea Queen, which is sold exclusively at A ldi supermarkets. There’s no way to say where a particular package ends up, nor what percentage of a factory’s products wind up in the US. Walmart Spokesman Marilee McInnis said company officials banned their suppliers from getting seafood processed at a Hunchun plant a year ago after an audit revealed potential issues with migrant workers.

“Combatting forced labor is a complex problem that no one company, industry or government can tackle alone,” she added.

Aldi did not comment.

Some US companies had indirect ties to North Korean laborers in Hunchun. Customs records indicate that Chicken of the Sea, owned by Thai Union, did business with sister companies of the Hunchun factories in another part of China.

Thai Union said the sister company they do business with meets all of their fair labor standards, and should not be penalized just because they have the same owner.

Boxes at the factories also had markings from several major German supermarket chains and brands. Rewe Group, which owns Rewe markets and the Penny chain, said their contract has expired with Hunchun Dongyang.

All the companies that responded said suppliers were forbidden to use forced labor.

Shipments also went to two Canadian importers, Morgan Foods and Alliance Seafood, which did not respond to requests for comment about who processes their seafood in China.

As the late summer chill set in one evening, a dozen or so women from Hunchun Pagoda played volleyball in the quiet road in front of the compound’s gate.

A train horn blew. The women shouted to one another. A car with a foreigner drove by. One laughingly called out: “Bye-bye!” AP

ASHINGTON—Damage from two catastrophic hurricanes means that the government’s September jobs report being released on Friday will provide a blurrier-than-usual snapshot of the economy.

With Harvey and Irma having inflicted destruction on Florida, Texas and other parts of the Southeast, thousands of businesses had to shut their doors and leave many people temporarily out of work.

Yet, the decline in employment should be short-lived. A hiring rebound is expected for October or November.

The likely tepid job gain in the government’s September jobs figures was foreshadowed by a report on Wednesday from Automatic Data Processing (ADP), a payroll processor. ADP said its monthly survey showed that private businesses added 135,000 jobs last month, far fewer than the 228,000 added in August.

If September’s job gain does prove artificially low as a result of the hurricanes and October’s or November’s artificially high, economists and the Federal Reserve (the Fed) may find it hard to assess the state of the economy with any precision over the next couple of months.

Even so, most Fed watchers expect the central bank to raise its benchmark interest rate when it meets in December.

Excluding the hurricanes’ effect on the monthly hiring data, a number of barometers suggest that the economy and job market remain in solid shape.

Economists have forecast that the government’s jobs report being released Friday will show that employers added just 80,000 jobs in September, barely half the 156,000 for August, according to data provider FactSet. It would be the fewest job gains since March.

The storms likely depressed job growth because of their effects on hourly workers.

If hourly employees miss a paycheck because of a hurricane, they aren’t counted as employed in the government’s jobs figures, even if they return to work after the storms.

In addition, the hurricanes likely forced the delay of some job interviews and applications, thereby reducing actual hires.

Harvey caused about $76 billion to $87 billion in economic losses, according to Moody ’s Analytics, an economic consulting firm. The estimate includes damage to homes and businesses, as well

as lost business and economic output.

That calculation would make Harvey the second-worst US natural disaster, after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Irma will likely end up having caused $58 billion to $83 billion in economic losses, Moody’s forecasts. Maria, which hammered Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, could cost $45 billion to $95 billion, though that is a preliminary estimate.

There are signs, though, that the US economy is already rebounding.

On Wednesday, a sur vey of ser vices firms—covering restaurants, construction companies, retail stores, banks and others—found that they expanded in September at their fastest monthly pace since 2005.

That report “is a clear sign that the economy is recovering quickly from any hurricane-related disruption and that the underlying pace of growth remains strong,” said Michael Pearce, an economist at Capital Economics.

And auto sales, which had been lackluster this year, jumped 6.1 percent to more than 1.5 million in September from a year ago, according to Autodata Corp., as Americans began to replace cars destroyed by the storms. That should soon force automakers to step up production.

Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, which helps compile ADP’s data, said the storms probably cost 50,000 to 60,000 jobs. Without the hurricanes, job gains would have been closer to the average monthly pace of the past two years—a healthy 185,000.

Job growth at that level is enough to reduce the unemployment rate over time.

The unemployment rate in August was 4.4 percent, near a 16-year low.

US factories are growing at a solid pace, supported by a healthy global economy and a decline in the value of the dollar, which makes US goods less expensive overseas.

A survey of manufacturers showed that factory activity expanded at its fastest pace in more than 13 years. New orders, production and employment all rose.

Construction companies may already be staffing up for rebuilding and recovery from the hurricanes. They added 29,000 jobs in September, ADP said, the most in six months.

The ADP figures exclude government employees and often diverge from the government’s own job figures. AP

White House seeks $29 billion for disaster aid, flood insurance

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A S H I N G TO N —T h e Tr u m p administration on Wednesday asked Congress for $29 billion in disaster aid to cover ongoing hurricane relief and recovery efforts and to pay federal flood-insurance claims. The request comes as the government is spending almost $200 million a day for emergency hurricane response and faces a surge in flood claims for federally insured homes and businesses slammed by hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria.

White House budget director Mick Mulvaney told lawmakers in officially submitting the request that the federal flood-insurance program “is not designed to handle catastrophic losses like those caused by Harvey, Irma and Maria. The NFIP [National Flood Insurance Program] is simply not fiscally sustainable in its current form.”

Mulvaney proposed a package of changes to the flood-insurance program that, among others, would protect lowincome policyholders from big rate hikes, allow the government to drop from the program properties that have been repeatedly flooded and phasing out policies on new homes in flood zones.

In the meantime, Wednesday’s request proposal would provide $16 billion to pay those flood claims, along with $13 billion for Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) disaster-relief efforts. Federal firefighting accounts would receive $577 million as well to replenish them after a disastrous season of Western w i l d f i r e s . The Senate’s top Democrat quickly backed the aid request, but signaled opposition to the administration’s proposed restrictions on flood insurance.

“This funding request is a good start, but those affected by Maria, Harvey, Irma and wildfires still have a long and

difficult road ahead,” said Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, Democract-New York. “We should act on this supplemental quickly, but it should be just the beginning of Congress’s efforts to aid in rebuilding.”

Congress last month approved a $15.3-billion aid package that combined community development block grant rebuilding funds with emergency money for cleanup, repair and housing. The federal flood-insurance program is on track to run out of money to pay claims during the week of October 23. Mulvaney said more than 20,000 federal workers have been deployed by various agencies to help in the hurricane-recovery effort.

The “burn rate” of almost $200 million a day is requiring an infusion of cash into Fema coffers. The request would bring the price tag for this year’s costly hurricane season to about $44 billion—and that’s before rebuilding efforts get under way in earnest.

A final estimate is a ways away, since damage assessments of Puerto Rico may take some time, but Mulvaney said the administration will submit assessments in time for a hoped-for budget agreement later this year.

The year-end package would rebuild infrastruc ture, help people without insurance restore their homes, and, perhaps, help Puerto Rico reconstitute its shattered electrical grid.

“The hundreds of thousands of people affected by Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria have suffered enough. Congress must provide whatever is necessary to get these families back on their feet and to rebuild their communities,” said House Appropriations Committee Chairman Rodney Frelinghuysen, Republican-New Jersey. “This will be a long process, and this next round of funds certainly won’t be all that is needed.” AP

The World Friday, October 6, 2017

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Vegas’s gun-culture tourism thrives with gambling, shows

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t was business as usual on Monday at Battlefield Vegas, a shooting range where guests can fire all manner of automatic weapons and even drive a tank over a car.

Employees in military fatigues escorted guests. A group of Asian tourists took photos of themselves manning the gun of an armored personnel carrier. Three patrons, holding targets riddled with bullet holes, declined to chat about their experience as they left.

“We booked this a long time ago,” one said.

Establishments like those in Las Vegas, where tourists and locals can shoot militarygrade weapons, underscore how deeply the gun culture is embedded with many Americans and the challenges President Donald J. Trump and other politicians face when they try to change gun laws.

US Rep. John Lewis, the Georgia Democrat, and former congresswoman, Gabby Giffords, a gunshot victim, are among those who called for tighter regulation.

“If you want to add to your once-in-lifetime experiences, put Battlefield Vegas on your ‘Bucket list,’” Anthony W., a

$29

The amount gun enthusiasts have to pay for the chance to shoot a 50-caliber machine gun as advertised on a billboard in Las Vegas visitor from Oak land, California, raved on Yelp.com last month. He chose the “D-Day package”, which included firing a Thompson submachine gun, and said, “I’ll be going back soon for another experience.”

About 3.5 miles away from Battlefield Vegas, a gunman wielding high-powered weapons opened fire last Sunday night on an outdoor concert from the 32nd floor of a Las Vegas casino. He killed 59 people

and wounded more than 500.

Trump visited the city on Wednesday to offer support for the victims, the police and paramedics, and to survey the scene.

“We will be talking about gun laws as time goes by,” he said on Tuesday. At a news conference on Wednesday at a Las Vegas hospital, he declined to comment further.

50-caliber

A billboard for Battlefield Vegas offers enthusiasts the chance to shoot a 50-caliber machine gun for $29. Machine Guns Vegas promises the best shooting deal in town, from $99 for its “Urban Assault Experience”, which includes firing the Colt Commando, the Heckler & Koch MP5 submachine gun and a Glock 17 handgun.

Machine Gun Helicopters takes the show into the air, letting patrons fire automatic weapons from a chopper in what it calls a “true door gunner experience.” A video clip shows the customer cutting down a couple of human dummies perched on a sofa out in the desert.

“We believe, as we always have, that there should absolutely be more stringent control on the types of firearms private individuals can own and the processes they must go through in order to own those firearms,” Machine Guns Vegas said in an e-mailed statement.

Glock-9mm Bloomberg

“There were many factors contributing to this tragic event, but there is no doubt that the shooter’s ability to inflict so many casualties was heavily due to the types of weapons he had access to.”

T he ot he r s de c l i ne d to comment or didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Sales rise

“ T ypically, a f t e r m a s s shootings, gun sales go up,” said Avery Gardiner, copresident of the Brady Campaign, a group that seeks to reduce gun

deaths. “I would guess that activity at shooting ranges follows that pattern, too.”

Some advocates, like Gardiner, argue ranges provide a valuable service for responsible firearm owners, giving them a place to learn how to use weapons safely and responsibly.

Nevada is far from the only state where enthusiasts can shoot high-caliber weapons on a range. Businesses in Kentucky, Arizona and Georgia advertise similar experiences.

Las Vegas may be unique, though, in both the number of

establishments and their proximity to one of the world’s largest tourist destinations.

“You see all those ads all over Las Vegas,” said Rommel Dionisio, an industry analyst at Aegis Capital Crop. in New York. “On billboard and magazines, that’s what they say, the ability to shoot automatic weapons.”

Restrictions on private ownership of automatic weapons date back to the Prohibition era, according to the Brady Campaign. The National Firearms Act of 1934 didn’t outlaw such guns, but it made them hard to get.

Sales were recorded in a national registry.

Owners underwent a background check and had to meet certain requirements.

Additional restrictions passed in 1968 barred the sale of imported weapons “with no sporting purpose” to civilians, and automatic weapons were determined to fall in that category.

The Firearms Owners Protection Act of 1986 banned civilian from possessing machine guns made after May 19 of that year, limiting ownership to older models. An assault weapons ban passed in 1994 expired 10 years later.

Nevada has long been associated with the Wild West and gun culture. The Nevada State Museum, just a few blocks from the capitol in Carson City, has an extensive firearms collection on display, everything from blunderbusses to Gatling guns.

“Nevada has some of the most lax gun laws in the nation,” Gardiner said.

Bloomberg News

Gunman’s secret life thwarts investigators’ hunt for motive L

A S V EG A S —T he g u n man behind the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history led a secret life that has so far thwarted investigators trying to figure out a motive for the attack.

In an effort to try to crack Stephen Paddock ’s state of mind, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) spent hours on Wednesday inter viewing his longtime girlfriend, who returned on Tuesday from a weeks-long overseas trip and said she had no inkling of the massacre he was plotting when he sent her to see her family in native Philippines.

“He never said anything to me or took any action that I was aware of that I understood in any way to be a warning that something horrible like this was going to happen,” Marilou Danley, 62, said in a statement read by her lawyer outside FBI headquarters in Los Angeles.

Clark County Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said it’s difficult to believe Paddock acted alone in the attack last Sunday that killed 58 and injured nearly 500 people at a country music concert on the Las Vegas Strip.

“Maybe he’s a super guy,” Lombardo said before catching himself and calling it the wrong word. “You know, a super yay-hoo that was working out all this on his own. But it would be hard for me to believe that.”

Danley, whom authorities had prev iously called “a person of i nterest,” h ad been ex pected to prov ide insight into the mind of Paddock, a fr ustratingly opaque figure who carried out his high-rise

massacre without leaving the plain-sight clues often found after major acts of bloodshed.

Lombardo said on Wednesday that Paddock had 1,600 rounds of ammunition and several containers of an explosive commonly used in target shooting that totaled 50 pounds (23 kilograms) in his car. But it wasn’t clear what, if anything, Paddock planned w ith the ex plosives, he said.

Paddock, who set up surveillance cameras in his room and to see anyone approaching outside, also had an escape plan, Lombardo said, though he fatally shot himself as police closed in on his lu xur y suite on the 32nd f loor of the Mandalay Bay resort casino. Lombardo declined to say what led authorities to believe he planned an escape.

T he prev ious weekend, Paddock had rented a highrise condo in a building that overlooked the Life is Beautiful alternative music festival featuring Chance the R apper, Muse, Lorde and Blink-182, said Lombardo, who offered no other details about what led Paddock there.

On September 28 the 64-year-old high-stakes gambler and real-estate investor checked into Mandalay Bay and specifically requested an upper-f loor room with a view of the Route 91 Harvest music festival, according to a person who has seen hotel records turned over to investigators.

P a d d o c k w a s n’t a b l e t o move into the room until last Sat u rd ay, sa id t he person, who was not author ized to

as a “ kind, caring, quiet man” and hoped they would have a future together. She said she was devastated by the carnage and would cooperate with authorities as they struggle to get inside Paddock ’s mind.

W hile Paddock had a passion for highstakes gambling at Nevada casinos, his game of choice was video poker, a relatively solitary pursuit with no dealer and no humans to play against. And while neighbors described Paddock as friendly, he wasn’t close to them.

“He was a private guy. That’s why you can’t find out anything about him,” his brother Eric Paddock said from his home in Florida. As for what triggered the massacre, the brother said, “Something happened that drove him into the pit of hell.”

Paddoc k had no k now n cr imina l histor y. Public records conta ined no ind ication of any f inancia l problems, and his brot her descr ibed him as a wea lt hy rea l- estate investor.

President Donald J. Trump and first lady Melania Trump met privately with victims at a Las Vegas hospital on Wednesday and then with police officers and dispatchers, praising them and the doctors who treated the wounded.

“Our souls are stricken with grief for every American who lost a husband or a wife, a mother or a father, a son or a daughter,” he said. “We know that your sorrow feels endless. We stand together to help you carry your pain.” AP

This undated photo provided by Eric Paddock shows his brother, Las Vegas gunman Stephen Paddock. On October 1 Stephen Paddock opened fire on the Route 91 Harvest Festival, killing dozens and wounding hundreds. Eric Paddock via AP

speak publicly and disclosed the information to the Associated Press on condition of anony mity. T he room, which goes for $590, was g iven to Paddoc k for f ree because he was a good customer who wagered tens of t housands of dol lars each time he v isited

t he casino, t he person sa id.

Paddock wired $100,000 to the Philippines days before the shooting, said a US official who was not authorized to speak publicly because of the continuing investigation.

Investigators are tr ying to trace that money.

Danley, who was overseas for more than two weeks, said she was initially pleased when she was wired money from Paddock to buy a house for her family in the Philippines. But she later feared it was a way to break up with her.

She said she loved Paddock

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The World BusinessMirror

Friday, October 6, 2017

www.businessmirror.com.ph

US wins S. Korea’s nod to amend free-trade deal

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he United States has won South Korea’s agreement to amend their trade deal, overcoming previous reluctance to change the five-year-old pact, which the US blames for increasing its trade deficit. South Korea plans to start the necessary process for amendment, the nation’s trade ministry said in a statement after the second round of talks concluded in Washington.

US Trade Representative Rober t Lighthizer said he will work to “resolve outstanding implementation issues, as well as to engage soon on amendments that will lead to fair, reciprocal trade.”

No announcement was made regarding how the deal might be amended. The first set of talks ended in stalemate in August, with the US calling for revisions to the agreement and the South Koreans balking and instead proposing a study on its economic impact.

The trade friction comes as the military allies try to find ways to increase strategic cooperation in response to an increasingly aggressive North Korea.

President Donald J. Trump has threatened to withdraw from the deal, known as Korus, if South Korea doesn’t agree to terms that would reduce America’s growing trade

As Spanish stocks sink

Catalan officials mull over independence B Spanish stocks sank as the country grappled with its most serious national crisis in decades.

Catalan President Carles Puigdemont again urged the government to accept mediation in the political deadlock between Spain’s authorities and the leaders of the wealthy northeastern region of some 7.5 million.

The yearslong tension peaked last Sunday, when the police used force to disperse voters in a referendum that Spain’s Constitutional Court had ordered shelved while assessing its legality.

Pol it ic i a ns i n ot her pa r t s of Spain and a handful of civil groups have offered to try to bridge the divide between the two sides, but Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy says no dialogue can take place outside of the countr y’s constitution, which doesn’t include provisions for a region to secede. “ Mr. P u igdemont h a s been out side of t he l aw for way too long ,” R ajoy ’s de put y, Soray a Saenz de Sa nta ma r ia, sa id, re spond ing to t he remark s Pu igdemont m ade i n a te le v i sed add ress l ate on Wed nesd ay.

European leaders have sided with Spain and, amid fears that Catalonia’s secession bid could find echoes elsewhere on the continent, the European Union has so far refused to step in.

European Commission Vice

7.5M

The population of Catalonia

President Frans Timmermans stressed on Wednesday the need for Spain and Catalonia to talk with each other, but said there is a “general consensus that regional government of Catalonia has chosen to ignore the law when organizing the referendum.”

P u i g d e m o nt w i l l a d d r e s s t he re g io n a l p a r l i a me nt o n Monday to rev iew the disputed vote —a session t h at h i s pa r l i a ment a r y suppor ters i n t he rad ic a l C U P g roup i n its Spa ni sh i n it i a l s, or Popu l a r Un it y C a nd id ac y i n Eng l i sh t ra ns l at ion, say t he y w i l l consider the independence dec laration.

“We held the referendum amid unprecedented repression, and in the following days we will show our best face to apply the results of the referendum,” Puigdemont said on Wednesday.

His telev ised address mirrored a speech 24 hours earlier

by Spanish King Felipe VI. Accusing him of follow ing Rajoy’s “catastrophic” policies toward Catalonia, Puigdemont

Bloomberg News

May flunked leadership test as rivals emerge battle-scarred

A man waves an estelada, or Catalonia independence flag, as he walks along the Ramblas in Barcelona on October 4. Catalonia’s regional government is mulling when to declare the region’s independence from Spain in the wake of a disputed referendum that has triggered Spain’s most serious national crisis in decades. AP/Francisco Seco

ARCELONA, Spain—Catalonia’s regional government on Wednesday mulled over when to declare the region’s independence from Spain, with some lawmakers saying it would happen on Monday.

deficit with the country, though he hasn’t made any concrete proposals.

The US is South Korea’s second-largest trading partner and this push to alter the deal comes at a difficult time for Seoul.

Relations with its largest export market, China, have soured over the decision to allow the US to deploy a missile shield south of Seoul, and there is no sign that North Korea or the US are interested in trying to negotiate an end to the current tensions.

The US efforts to narrow its trade gap will probably focus heavily on the auto industry, meaning the administration may push to increase the number of Americanmade cars that can be sold in South Korea, Troy Stangarone, senior director of congressional affairs and trade at the Korea Economic Institute in Washington, said before the talks.

Autos are a source of tension, given that the US has an $18.8-billion trade deficit in vehicles. The US also could pressure South Korea to accelerate the reduction of agricultural tariffs, many of which are being phased out slowly over 10 years or longer, David Salmonsen, senior director at the American Farm Bureau Federation, told Bloomberg BNA prior to the meeting.

addressed the king directly, telling him: “You have disappointed many Catalans.”

Rajoy’s conservative government has declared the referendum illegal and invalid, and pledged to respond with “all necessary measures” to counter Catalan defiance, without revealing how it intends to do so.

Led by losses for the two main Catalan banks, Spain’s main stock market index lost almost 3 percentage points in Wednesday’s trading, amid uncertainty over how the secession bid will proceed.

Other Spanish banks, telecommunications giant Telelefonica, fashion retailer Inditex and leading energy companies Repsol, Iberdrola and Gas Natural also suffered significant losses.

The crisis in Spain came last Sunday, when some 900 people needed medical attention after police cracked down to try to prevent the vote. Over 400 police also had bruises.

On Tuesday huge crowds held street protests in Catalonia, and unions staged a strike to protest the police’s actions.

It’s anybody’s guess what might happen if the prosperous northeastern region does actually try to secede.

Spain could intervene to take over the regional government; it could even declare a state of emergency and impose martial law.

In a nationally televised address on Tuesday night, King Felipe VI came out strongly against Catalan authorities, criticizing their “irresponsible conduct.”

The Spanish state, he went on, needed to ensure constitutional order and the rule of law in Catalonia, the richest region of Spain.

Catalan authorities say some 2.3 million people—less than half the region’s electorate—

voted in the referendum last Sunday. Many of those opposed to independence are thought to have stayed at home after the referendum was ordered suspended by a Spanish court.

Of those who voted, some 90 percent backed independence, according to Catalan officials.

The route to becoming independent won’t be easy for Catalonia. The region doesn’t have any power over defense, foreign affairs, taxes, ports or airports, all of which are in the hands of the Madrid government.

The European Union has also said that an independent Catalonia cannot stay in the bloc, but must apply to join—a lengthy, uncertain process.

X av ier Ga rc i a A lbiol , t he top politician in Catalonia of Spain’s governing party, called on Wednesday for Catalans who want to stay inside Spain to join a rally on Sunday in Barcelona, the region’s main city.

Spain’s National Court, meanwhile, said it will quiz two senior officers of Catalonia’s regional police force and the leaders of two pro-independence civic groups who have been placed under investigation for sedition.

It said the four will be questioned on Friday about their roles in demonstrations on September 20 and 21 in Barcelona, when Spanish police arrested several Catalan government officials and raided offices in a crackdown on preparations for the referendum.

Spanish authorities say the demonstrations hindered the police operation.

The four include regional police chief Josep Lluis Trapero and Jordi Sanchez, the head of the Catalan National Assembly that has been the main civic group behind the independence movement. AP

U

K Prime Minister Theresa May’s conference went wrong in ways she or no one could have imagined. But, the good news for her is that likely successors also came out tarnished.

May’s closing speech did succeed in winning activists in the hall back to her side, but their support was driven by sympathy.

Video clips played across Europe and likely seen by Brexit negotiators in Brussels, showed her big moment overshadowed by a collapsing set after an intruder triggered a chronic cough that left her struggling to get words out.

It wasn’t the reasser tion of her authority that her allies had hoped for and that she needed in order to forcefully make Britain’s case with the European Union with divorce talks at a delicate stage.

What might keep her hanging on longer is that in a party where the average age is 70 there is a dearth of fresh talent and likely candidates have wobbled.

Foreign Secretar y Boris Johnson’s flirtation with an independent Brexit policy irritated Tory lawmakers whose support he would need to become prime minister.

When he made a flippant comment about dead bodies in Libya, some of his colleagues demanded May should fire him.

Meanwhile, Brexit Secretary David Davis and Home Secretary Amber Rudd both needed colleagues to go out and explain stories about their future intentions.

“It’s a Cabinet of midgets, pygmies and exploded volcanoes,’’ said Steven Fielding, professor of politics at Nottingham University. “It’s bad news for everyone.’’

Hard-liners

Fielding added it’s also bad for the Conservatives when the star turn comes from an eccentric hard-liner with a propensity to quote Latin. Jacob Rees-Mogg toured conference side meetings delighting audiences with his demand that Britain should go for a hard Brexit.

While May couldn’t be blamed for the disintegrating conference set—or for having a cold—there is a danger that the prime minister’s mishaps come to define her and confirm people’s perception that she’s a long way from the “strong and stable” leader promised in the campaign for the June election.

Newspapers from The New York Times to the Tory-leaning Telegraph described May’s performance as a metaphor for her leadership. The Telegraph went as far as saying “she is finished,” and reported that as many as 30 Tory lawmakers are said to be ready to sign a letter calling for her resignation.

However, there is a decade - old precedent that shows that a British prime minister can limp even when everything goes wrong. In the case of Gordon Brown, who was saddled with the financial crisis, he lasted three years in spite of terrible opinion polls and what critics called the “The Curse of Brown.’’

Precedents

The parallels continue. He was helped by the Conservatives in opposition having a charismatic leader who Labour lawmakers did not want to go up against. Similarly with May, members of her party are spooked by the popularity of Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, and don’t want to risk doing anything that might precipitate another snap vote.

On top of that, any leadership contest would be likely to take months—at a time when the country is in the midst of Brexit negotiations. Finally, there is no obvious candidate to replace her, and a contest would risk reopening the internal party fight over Brexit.

May’s shelf life

How long she is safe is an open question and British politics have undergone a period of turmoil that has kept investors on their toes.

“There is a realistic chance that Brexit is hard and disruptive, partly to appease the Conservative Party’s hard-liners,” John Roe, the London-based head of multi-asset funds at Legal and General Investment Management.

A second concern for Roe is that the “negative fallout” leads to a government helmed by Corbyn, a self-declared radical who vows to take into state ownership the railways and water companies.

The word is out already on whether a leadership challenge is imminent. Tory lawmaker Mark Pritchard, who is loyal to May, went on Twitter to attack what he called a “small number’’ of colleagues sending round texts sounding others out about May’s future. “There is no vacancy at Number 10!’’ he wrote.

Eurasia Group said in a note that “based on her very poor performance” it is downgrading the likelihood May will sur vive to finalize to see Brexit through to its end in March 2019 from 60 percent to 55 percent, “with serious downward pressure.”

May’s unhappy conference speech recalled another address from a troubled Tory leader. In 2003 Iain Duncan Smith had a virus he couldn’t shake that left him with a croaking voice for months, which he was forced to deny was evidence of nerves.

In a make-or-break speech to the Conservative conference, he announced that he was now “turning up the volume.’’

His aides engineered an astonishing 18 standing ovations yet he was forced out within weeks.

“This speech had very unfortunate parallels with Duncan Smith’s frog-inthe-throat,’’ said Andrew Russell, professor of politics at Liverpool Universit y.

“It somehow seemed to symbolize his difficulties. This just created the impression that she was struggling to stay in control—and largely failing.”

Bloomberg News

news@businessmirror.com.ph

Banking&Finance BusinessMirror

Editor: Jun B. Vallecera • Friday, October 6, 2017

A9

Govt lenders told to charge competitive rates for teachers

F

By Rea Cu

@ReaCuBM

inance officials are scandalized that public-school teachers across the country would rather borrow from private lenders than from state-owned banks and financial institutions, and urged the Land Bank of the Philippines (LandBank) and the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) to offer the sector a much more competitive loan program.

The SDG and poverty

I

would like to begin this article with a quote from Irene Kahn, director general of the International Development Law Organization, and she says, “You cannot fight poverty and cannot promote sustainable development without the rule of law.”

In 2015 the United Nations adopted 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that established a set of global priorities how the world will eradicate poverty by 2030. In the Preamble of the UN document, entitled “Transforming Our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”, it recognizes that “eradicating poverty in all its forms and dimensions, including extreme poverty, is the greatest global challenge and an indispensable requirement for sustainable development”.

The SDGs are the logical next step to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) that started a 15-year journey in 1990. The MDGs set eight goals. Unfortunately, after 15 years, only four of the targets have been fully achieved, the rest in various stages of being realized. Good governance and anticorruption were not included in the list.

Fortunately, the SDG included this, a realization that the eradication of poverty cannot be attained without fighting a relentless battle against all forms of corruption in the public sector and in all its echelons.

I take exception to SDG 16: Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels. In particular, 16.5: Substantially reduce corruption and bribery in all its forms. For the first time, the leaders in the UN have finally recognized the importance of fighting corruption in eradicating poverty.

In the many years of research and active participation of Transparency International in fighting corruption in many countries, they have established the direct link between corruption and poverty. They have seen that in countries where bribery is a common practice, progress in achieving the MDGs has been slower. Studies also show that in countries where more than 60 percent of the population paid a bribe in the past year, 38 percent of the population continue to live in poverty in contrast to only 8 percent in those where less than 30 percent paid a bribe. The same correlation can be seen in children not living past the age of 5. For every thousand children, 87 live past five years in countries where less than 30 percent paid a bribe in contrast to

FINEX free enterprise Bob Ortiz only 14 in countries where more than 60 percent paid. The same is seen in children not completing school beyond the elementary level. Only 9 percent complete their schooling in countries where corruption is prevalent, versus 50 percent in countries where less than 30 percent paid a bribe. The statistics go on and on. Also whenever corruption is high, poverty and conflict go hand in hand. We see it in Mindanao, Samar, Basilan and many provinces where poverty and conflict are widespread.

In 2016 the Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index ranked the Philippines 101st from 95th in 2015 (first as least corrupt) among the 176 countries and territories surveyed with a score of 35. Of the 10 Asean members, we placed sixth tied with Thailand (35), Vietnam (33), Lao PDR (25), Myanmar (28) and Cambodia (21) worse than us. The least perceived to be corrupt was Denmark with a score of 90.

President Duterte once said “Erosion of faith and trust in government—that is the real problem that confronts us”.

My take is corruption has caused this erosion of faith in our government.

Many presidents before him have manifested the same goals, yet, none that I can remember has ever been successful. The goal to eradicate corruption continues to be elusive despite wellmeaning initiatives as can be seen in the constant news in various agencies of the government.

I am not sure whether of some of his programs are within the SDG framework but I would like to think that our political leaders are aligned with it. I see the SDGs, if successfully attained, will make the country a better place for our children.

The SDGs laid down the foundations to eradicate poverty and, clearly, the fight against corruption continues to be among the priorities of the administration. I look forward with enthusiasm to seeing corruption in the government totally eradicated by putting structures and processes in place that will sustain the programs.

E-mail: rbo811@yahoo.com

Case clippings

By Justice S J Ranada Jr.

LAWYER-CLIENT–mistakes of counsel The negligence and mistakes of counsel are binding on the client. A counsel holds the implied authority to do all acts necessary or, at least, incidental to the prosecution and management of the suit in behalf of his client, such that any act or omission by counsel within the scope of his authority is regarded, in the eyes of the law, as the act or omission of the client himself.

Torres v. Aruego GR 201271 20 Sept. 2017 Del Castillo, J

The idea was bared on Thursday by Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III who said the potentially lucrative program could help wean teachers away from often usurious private lending institution (PLI) interest charges.

Dominguez also made known his desire for both LandBank and the GSIS to establish a loan-restructuring program for the defaulting teacher-borrowers and help make it easy for them to pay back what they owe.

Such an entity, he said, should offer an easy-to-pay loan-restructuring program for public-school teachers so they no longer return to PLIs who charge them exorbitant interest rates.

He reiterated the LandBank and GSIS should come up with a loan-restructuring scheme that would enable debt-saddled

teachers to pay off their loans to PLIs and provide them with better borrowing rates than those offered by private money lenders.

Apart from being highly beneficial for teachers who get to pay low interest on their existing loans, the program should allow school teachers to save up for when they retire.

Based on a report by the GSIS, Department of Education (DepEd) borrowers have a high default rate of almost 40 percent.

The high incidence of default was traced in the main to public-school teachers who cannot pay the GSIS because of their other financial obligation to PLIs that charge them higher interest rates.

GSIS Acting President and General Manager Nora Saludares lamented the DepEd almost always prioritizes PLIs over the GSIS in queuing the loan payments of teachers

via automatic salary deductions.

According to Saludares, the DepEd has already issued a directive giving favored status of GSIS premium payment and loan amortization in the salary deductions of teachers and other DepEd employees.

The GSIS is drawing up a financial-assistance package for teachers and other DepEd personnel to allow the restructuring of their outstanding loans to PLIs. Dominguez said he wants to “rock the boat” and get the LandBank and GSIS to aggressively compete with PLIs by offering lower borrowing rates to public-school teachers and other DepEd personnel.

“We have this demand [for loans] and we are not meeting them even if we can, and others are taking advantage and charging more. Why don’t we maximize what we can lend to them?” he added.

Trump’s short list for Fed chair features these hawks and doves H

ere’s a look at the candidates President Donald J. Trump is considering over the next few weeks to nominate as chairman of the Federal Reserve (the Fed) and where they stand on monetary policy.

Trump has met with Fed Chairman Janet Yellen, National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn, Fed Board Gov. Jerome Powell and former Gov. Kevin Warsh as he considers his choice to head the US central bank, three people familiar with the discussions said last week. Stanford University economist John Taylor is also on the list of recommendations put together by Trump’s advisers. There’s no clear front-runner and outlier candidates haven’t been ruled out.

Trump has said he expects to make a decision on the Fed-chair search this month.

That’ll kick off a months-long process of Senate confirmation before Yellen’s current term expires in February.

exactly why inflation has been running below the Fed’s 2-percent target—which it has mostly missed for the past five years. Weak inflation “strengthens the case for a gradual pace of adjustments” in rates.

Regulatory views: Yellen has defended stricter banking rules introduced after the 2007-2009 financial crisis. “Any adjustments to the regulatory framework should be modest,” she said in August.

Pros: Trump told the Wall Street Journal in July that he favors low rates, adding: Yellen has “historically been a low-interest-rate person”.

Cons: Yellen is a Democrat appointed by Barack Obama who’s led the regulatory policies the Trump administration is seeking to change. She’s an academic, while the administration has preferred installing business people into top positions.

Janet Yellen

Hawk or Dove? From the little we know, Cohn would likely be at least as dovish as Yellen. In 2015 when Cohn was still president of Goldman Sachs Group Inc., he questioned Yellen’s plan to hike rates, saying she had “no legitimate argument to raise rates without inflation being close to—or having some inkling that it’s approaching—2 percent”.

Cohn, 57, has criticized the Fed’s move toward transparency, arguing in a March 2016 speech

Hawk or Dove? Yellen, 71, has had a track record of keeping rates low over her four-year term. She has consistently supported gradually tightening policy and gradually unwinding the balance sheet. Yellen has been a “super dove,” though “sprouting a few hawk feathers”, Amherst Pierpont Securities Chief Economist Stephen Stanley said.

Last month Yellen said it’s uncertain

Gary Cohn

that the central banks’ “very definitive forward guidance has gotten the markets very confused”.

Regulatory views: In February Cohn said rolling back regulations is a central priority for the White House. “We need to deregulate and cut down the regulatory process to grow jobs in this country.”

Pros: Cohn, who has helped lead the president’s drive on a tax overhaul, would seem to meet Trump’s twin goals of wanting low interest rates and pushing deregulation. Most Republican policy-makers are more hawkish, by contrast.

Cons: Cohn’s prospects have dimmed after he publicly criticized remarks the president made in the wake of racially charged violence in Charlottesville, Virginia. Cohn was at Goldman when the firm engaged in some of the era’s most controversial trades, and he helped manage the firm’s precrisis bet against the housing market. That background would be sure to be scrutinized in any congressional hearings.

Jerome Powell

Hawk or Dove? The Fed governor was rated as neutral on monetary policy by the Bloomberg Intelligence Fed Spectrometer. He’s never dissented on the Federal Open Market Committee since taking office in 2012. A survey of 30 economists in March found he was slightly more dovish than average Fed central bankers. Bloomberg News

A10 Friday, October 6, 2017 • Editor: Angel R. Calso

Opinion BusinessMirror

editorial

Autonomy or independence?

W

e think of unification and globalization as a modern condition where nations come together to form political unions such as, for example, the European Union (EU) and Asean. But the ultimate in political union hit its peak in 1922. At that time the British Empire—with one flag and one government—ruled about 450 million people representing 25 percent of the world’s population and land area.

Since World War II, there has been a concerted effort to bring nations and groups of people within nations closer together in the belief that with unity comes peace. An official statement of the EU reads: “The idea being that countries that trade with one another become economically interdependent and so more likely to avoid conflict.” To make that economic interdependence stronger, then political interdependence apparently is also necessary.

However, in spite of the noble ambitions of the EU, Europe is far from the utopian union envisioned.

While currently quiet, Northern Ireland has been fighting a bloody war against the British for independence during the last 100 years. The nation of Yugoslavia began disintegrating in 1992, and what may have been the last piece of that nation became the Republic of Kosovo in 2008. Existing from October 1918, Czechoslovakia became the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993. The Soviet Union is now 15 separate sovereign states.

While the most notable intention to break away from a political union is 2016’s vote by the United Kingdom to leave the EU, this is only the tip of the iceberg. Attention last week on the voting in the Catalonian region of Spain to gain independence is far from an isolated situation.

There are small independence movements all over Europe. But serious attempts to establish new countries, such as Catalonia, are in the works.

Ukraine has already seen its country split nearly in half. Scotland may well leave the UK in the future.

This independence movement is not limited to Europe. Indonesia is at odds with the more orthodox Muslim region of Ache, which wants to go its own way. The Kurds just voted to no longer be a part of Iraq. Thailand’s Muslim southern region has a growing independence movement. Malaysia’s island of Borneo has two separatists groups. Inspired by the separatist vote in Catalonia, secessionists in three wealthy southern Brazilian states are redoubling their efforts to break away.

The Philippines, of course, has its own situation in Mindanao, with some calling for a completely independent Bangsamoro Republic.

In order to save the unity of an existing nation, many countries, like the Philippines, have granted autonomy to regions looking for more selfrule. Catalonia is a prime example. Governments are looking for ways to temper the strength of the independence movements by giving some of what they want while not breaking the country. Winston Churchill said, “An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last” and there is the danger.

Is “autonomy” the slippery slope that will lead to full independence? Or is it a beneficial way to deal with justifiable grievances against a central government? Can a balance ever be reached? How far can or should a central government go to keep a nation whole? These are serious questions that must be answered in the weeks to come as the Bangsamoro basic law moves forward.

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28 weeks James Jimenez

spox

S

o that’s it. The 2017 barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections have been postponed to May 2018. This means that incumbent barangay officials will continue to hold office until their successors have been elected; this also means another seven months during which the youth in our communities will be without Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) officials. The barangay, at least, will have some form of leadership—although many are now lamenting the fact that even the ones in dire need of replacement are getting a new lease on power. The youth, on the other hand, are essentially left to fend for themselves during this particularly awful time to be rudderless.

The elections were postponed because of the fear that drug money would influence the outcome. Candidates, so the theory goes, will use drug money to be elected and, once in office, will therefore be beholden to drug barons. Underlying this is the belief that roughly 40 percent of our barangays actually suffer from the contagion of drugs. Better, therefore, to just hold off on the elections than to effectively cede the remaining 60 percent of

our barangays to narco-politicians.

Following the logic of this theory, however, leads to the conclusion that 40 percent of our barangays are currently hotbeds of drug activity, and 60 percent are essentially teetering on the knife’s edge of a steep drop into narcotic hell, which basically means that 100 percent of our barangays are effectively hostile—and in recent days, obviously fatal—to the best interests of the youth who live in them. And

If the elections were postponed now due to the threat of narcotics, one can only assume that that threat will have disappeared eight months from now, when the elections are scheduled to be held instead. Unless, of course, within the next seven months, we will have realized that the problem of narcotics, the problem that everyone seems to agree cannot be solved in six years, maybe/ probably/most definitely cannot be solved in 28 weeks. it is precisely in that environment where this postponement leaves these youth without the structure or the leadership that Sangguniang elections could have provided.

The problem is that the youth have never been particularly welcome at the tables of grown-up power and authority. In a decidedly patriarchal society such as ours, the youth are more likely to be condescended to—or even ignored outright—rather than heeded. And so it is, perhaps with a few exceptions here and there, with our barangays.

Instead of having a significant say in the formulation of policies that affect the community, the youth

are often relegated to the role of cannon fodder. The SK system—especially the reformed SK system— was supposed to change that, but it can’t now; at least not for seven more months.

In the meantime, therefore, there will be no programs designed to provide structure to the community lives of the youth; there will be no monitoring programs intended to ensure the development and successful implementation of projects designed to foster the flourishing of civic responsibility in the hearts and minds of the young ones; and there will be nothing standing between them and predation by the machinery of narcotic commerce.

But that’s alright, I suppose. Because if the elections were postponed now due to the threat of narcotics, one can only assume that that threat will have disappeared eight months from now, when the elections are scheduled to be held instead. Unless, of course, within the next seven months, we will have realized that the problem of narcotics, the problem that everyone seems to agree cannot be solved in six years, maybe/probably/most definitely cannot be solved in 28 weeks.

Good luck, boys and girls. You’re gonna need it.

Buy and give through Caritas Margins Expo 5 at Market! Market! in Taguig Rev. Fr. Antonio Cecilio T. Pascual

SERVANT LEADER

L

et us all support Caritas Margins as it invites the public to shop and to visit its recently opened third leg of Buy and Give Expo 5 at Market! Market! in Taguig City.

The fifth Buy and Give Expo, which runs from October 5 to October 7, features products from different marginalized community partners of Caritas Margins, ranging from food, home and ladies accessories, personal-care products, artwork from resident inmates of penal communities cared by Caritas Restorative Justice Ministry,

and other gift items and décors presented on different hubs.

Caritas Margins is a social enterprise that markets products of marginalized communities and microenterprises in the country.

It also provides skills and training to the urban-poor communities and marginalized sectors, as well as honing them to become

social entrepreneurs.

Also made available are products of Segunda Mana, which features artworks, preloved items, such as clothes, shoes, bags, toys, home and fashion accessories, at affordable prices. The Caritas Manila’s Segunda Mana advocates the 3Rs: reuse, reduce and recycle. These charity outlets, likewise, provide employment to almost 6.7-percent unemployed from the urban-poor sector and livelihood to families who make trading as their source of income.

Proceeds of the expo are for the benefit of Caritas Manila’s flagship program, Youth Servant Leadership and Education Program (YSLEP), which supports more than 5,000 youth scholars nationwide.

Car itas Marg ins w i l l a lso have its fourth and final leg from

December 1 to 3 at the Glorietta Mall in Makati City.

The “75 Days of Charity” is launched by Caritas Manila in solidarity with His Holiness Pope Francis’ announcement of World Day of the Poor in November. It runs from September 5, which is the International Day of Charity, up to the World Day of the Poor on November 19. This endeavor can be done by filling can of charities, supporting the Segunda Mana Donations-in-kind Program and by supporting the educational sponsorship through Caritas Manila’s YSLEP. To learn more about and to donate and support Caritas Manila’s programs for the poor, visit www. caritasmanila.org.ph or call DonorCare lines (+632) 563-9311, 564-0205, (+63) 999-7943455, (+63) 905-4285001, and (+63)929-8343857.

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Go ahead, order that cheesecake The Fake Faerie Queene

By Faye Flam Bloomberg View

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n the latest science shocker, researchers discovered that a number of people around the world are eating foods, such as cheese, butter and full-fat yogurt without doing deadly harm to their bodies. This was treated as health heresy, yet this study’s findings weren’t all that out of line with previous research on moderate consumption of so-called saturated fats, found primarily in animal products.

But people tend to greet any study with skepticism if it suggests a food that tastes good might not be killing us.

There’s something about deprivation we seem to associate with health and virtue.

It’s hard to find commentary about nutrition that doesn’t feature some version of the trope that, we, humans, evolved in a state of semistarvation, scrambling for whatever we could scrounge up. And now that food is abundant, the story goes, our innate wiring compels us to commit the deadly sins of gluttony by stuffing ourselves with globs of fat. It’s like a version of the expulsion from Eden for the science literati. But it doesn’t quite square with the data.

This recent fat-exonerating study, led by researchers from McMaster University in Canada, followed 135,000 people in 18 countries for around seven years.

Its conclusion: Those who ate the most fat lived the longest. And it didn’t seem to matter whether they ate saturated fat or the unsaturated kind, which is found in vegetable oils, fish and nuts.

Nutrition researcher Russell de Souza, who was involved in a previous analysis out of McMaster, said many doctors still believe in eliminating saturated fats because there have been several clinical trials on heart-disease patients comparing a standard diet to one in which saturated fats were replaced by vegetable oils—so-called polyunsaturated fats.

The people whose diets were changed did suffer fewer heart attacks than the control group.

These are controlled studies, which makes them very credible, he said. But their results don’t back the conclusion that saturated fats are evil. In a subsequent study tracking 20,000 nurses, he said, some were asked to follow a normal diet of around 37-percent fat, and others were asked to cut that to 20 percent.

What they found was that lowering fat didn’t make the nurses healthier. Still, some noted that low-fat group only got down to 29 percent, leaving open the possibility that had they been more diligent

about starving themselves of fat, they would have reaped great health benefits.

But such assumptions aren’t particularly scientific. Alan Levinovitz, a professor of religion at James Madison University in Virginia, said that, indeed, food gets tied up with people’s suspicion of pleasure and desire. That’s a central premise in his recent book, The Gluten Lie and Other Myths about What You Eat. Food fads and fears, he added, can stem from the same human cravings that underlie religious beliefs—myths, sin, ritual and the promise of salvation.

“Ultimately, people want to believe that our problem is our sinfulness and our sinfulness can be indexed to our choice of impure foods,” he said. He sees a religious parallel in the culture surrounding the so-called paleo diet. Evolution stands in for God, he added, and the stone age for the Garden of Eden: “It was beautiful and everyone was happy and had rock-hard abs, and then we started eating the wrong foods and were kicked out of paradise.”

To be fair to the paleo diet, there is growing evidence that certain modern inventions are harmful—especially socalled trans fats, which are chemically altered to have a solid texture and were common in cheap-baked goods and margarine. But one has to wonder why the medical community and the government assumed that trans fats were healthy enough to launch on the public despite little initial data, and yet they are so reluctant—even now, despite a growing body of evidence—to say a little butter and cheese are okay. Could it have something to do with the fact that nobody really likes margarine?

It’s not just fear but a mean spiritedness that surrounds attitudes toward food and health, at least here in the United States. Popping up as the first comment on a recent New York Times story on fat and health was this sentiment: “How about [you] don’t make a pig out of yourself every time you eat?”

But when it comes to fat, people aren’t pigs. What’s interesting about this newest study, de Souza said, is that it compared people with a wide range of eating habits from all over the world, and virtually no one among the thousands of thousands of participants ate more than 40-percent fat. Fat consumption tends to be self-limiting— much more so than sugar. People don’t routinely binge on sticks of butter, but they often consume massive amounts of sweet stuff in the form of big sodas. The sugar goes down easier, and it’s cheap.

Tito Genova Valiente

annotations

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he was born when the comets swirled with their illusory tails and the dead stars fooled humans with their gleams as if they were still alive. She was born when the Empire was ruled by Liar Kings and Great Pretenders. She was born in an era of truths going out of fashion, and realities were only seen through reality and noontime shows.

She was born with the proverbial fake silver spoon in her mouth. Her eyelashes were false and her vision was unreal. When asked, she never spoke, else she incriminated herself.

Instead of speech, she was given by the Ogres the gift of dance. She could dance around laws and legality; she could dance around decency and any notions of democracy.

She was the Fake Faerie Queene.

In her adult years, she was asked to lead the Kingdom of No-Talk in its search for the Golden Tongue.

The thick slab of gold that looked like a tongue was composed of tongues of tyrants and said to be

wrapped around the branch of the Tree of Ignorance and Indiscretion.

Whoever was lucky to remove it from the branch of that tree would rule the land forever, for the Golden Tongue would arm the victorious one with the power to make any kind of promise look gilded and sincere. Any word that the man with the Golden Tongue uttered became the truth to anyone who heard it, including the one who said it. Uttering what was false was easy. The difficult part was how the Liar could believe their own lies, for therein was the power founded.

The Fake Faerie upon her birth

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was said to have been given a slice of the Golden Tongue. Her truths, therefore, were not only half-truths, and were not truths at all.

T he Fa k e Fae r ie Queene, not knowing that her power was false, gave out wishes to newly born babies. To one infant named Anuel she waved her magic wand and said: You will be a famous wrestler and would win many prizes. The baby did not become a fighter but a political leader who did not know how to fight.

To a baby named Ito, she said: You will be a great politician. Ito became a not-so-great comedian.

For all this, the Fake Faerie Queene continued to wave her wand. The people never noticed how ill her wishes were. The land got used to her power. It was as if the land and its people were under her spell. As the years went by, the land turned ancient and its people lived and died, and new people were born again. The Fake Faerie Queene lived on and was happy at the sad-

EAGLE WATCH

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uring the past few weeks, under the theme, “Focusing on people: striving for peace and a decent life for all on a sustainable planet”, heads of states, heads of government and foreign ministers from different countries all over the world met at the United Nations headquarters in New York.

They participated in the UN General Assembly to discuss various issues—from disarmament to disaster prevention, from conflict resolution to growing refugee crises around the world. The achievement of universal goals to ensure that socioeconomic progress can be undertaken with respect for the environment and for future generations was also a key concern in the UN meeting. Just two years ago, different nations adopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as a banner to meet key objectives in ensuring poverty reduction, protecting the planet and ensuring prosperity for all.

If realizing the SDGs is important, how can one measure the progress made by individual countries in the past few years? Or how can one assess how each nation has achieved its goals in 2030, the year in which the target is supposed to be met? This has been a key concern across different institutions supporting the goals—not only national governments, but also local governments, civil-society groups,

the media, academe and business.

It is also important since not only developing countries, but also industrialized countries, need to be assessed in terms of how they were able to implement the commitments that they have made. At the same time, a metric needs to be created to identify priorities for action, highlight challenges in implementing progress, track and evaluate advancement, ensure public accountability, enjoin stakeholders and identify gaps that must be closed to achieve the SDGs in 13 years’ time.

An assessment tool in terms of SDG achievement is the SDG Index, which has been developed by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN), a network of academic institutions around the world which the UN has mobilized to solve sustainability problems, and the Bertelsmann Stiftung, a Germanbased private foundation that aims to promote inclusion of all sectors in societal decision-making. Initially developed to evaluate the work in terms of the SDGs of 34 industrial countries, it has now expanded

E-mail: titovaliente@yahoo.com.

Russia’s latest game: Challenging Nato at sea

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ussia just conquered a fictional country, and it’s scaring the heck out of some real ones. The Kremlin’s recent Zapad war game shows the need for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato) to do more to deter Russian aggression not just on land, but also on the Baltic Sea. In the exercise, Russia sent an estimated 100,000 troops to defend against a mock attack from the state of “Veyshnoria”. For the most part, it took place in the former Soviet republic of Belarus and in Kaliningrad, a tiny, well-armed Russian territory between Lithuania and Poland. But Russians also dispatched their Baltic fleet, which includes destroyers and several attack submarines, as well as a major naval force into the Arctic Ocean off the coast of Norway, a Nato member.

Much has been made in the last few years of the threat Russia’s massing of men and machines poses to the easternmost members of the Nato—Estonia,

Latvia, Lithuania and Poland. But Russian forces have been increasingly active at sea, especially in the Baltic, with submarines and warships repeatedly entering sovereign waters of other coastal nations and fighters buzzing United States ships.

The Baltic states—which were integral to the old Soviet and czarist empires that President Vladimir Putin and many of his countrymen feel great nostalgia for—are understandably concerned. An outright Russian invasion is extremely unlikely, thank goodness, but there are realistic fears of the Kremlin repeating the “hybrid warfare” techniques that worked so well in Crimea and eastern Ukraine.

There are many ways in which sea power could be a part of a covert or overt Russian strategy to destabilize the Baltics: Submarines could cut undersea communications lines and cause power disruptions; surface ships can be

bases for cyber attacks; naval blockades could keep out vital energy imports; marine forces could land on isolated but strategically important islands, such as Sweden’s Gotland and Finland’s Aland chain.

Russia also has some advantages here: The Baltic is a relatively shallow and narrow body of water, and Russia’s small diesel-electric powered subs are very maneuverable in tight spaces. Also, Moscow has complete command and control over its navy, while any Nato operation has to deal with the organization’s formidable bureaucracy.

There are steps the Nato can take to improve its position. Given Russia’s aggressive stance in the Baltic, the Nato should establish more high-level institutions in those eastern states, along the lines of its Nato Cooperative Cyber Defense Centre of Excellence in Estonia.

Likewise, the US’s typical show of strength is to have a couple of casual

Measuring progress in Sustainable Development Goals Randy Tuaño

ness around her. She, of course, like the land and its people, could not tell the sad from glad, the swell from evil and the true from false. The universe kept on swirling. Whether it was collapsing or expanding, it did not mean much for the people could not tell the difference.

the assessment to more than 157 advanced and developing countries.

The full details of the methodology and the underlying data can be found in www.sdgindex.org.

The SDG Index was developed also as an operational tool to ensure policy action in all 17 goals listed under the SDGs, and aims to support prioritization and formulation of different plans with regards to the different goals at the national level. It also aims to complement the efforts that will be undertaken by the UN to develop a more robust data monitoring system, and to identify the gaps in the data which need to be immediately addressed and financed.

In the Index, indicators for each of the 17 SDGs were identified based on their applicability and relevance for both poor and rich countries; these indicators need also to be collected in a timely manner and in a statistically sound way in which period-toperiod progress can be adequately tracked. To ensure comparability across countries, data for the different indicators were gathered from global databases which have been deemed internationally consistent.

Around 83 indicators for all 17 goal domains were identified. Then to make the data comparable across indicators, each of the indicators were rescaled from zero (worst performing) to 100 (best performing).

Then to develop a composite index, indicator scores were computed for each goal and then the overall index for all the goals using the arithmetic mean (or average). Since developed countries were highly ranked in most of the indicators in the Index, in this year’s version of the Index, indicators reflecting “spillover” or

SDG Index scores and global ranks for Asean countries

visits a year by destroyers to Baltic ports.

This should be increased into so-called regular presence operations like those the Navy is now carrying out in the South China Sea. The alliance also needs to cut red tape and give its supreme allied commander more authority and flexibility to act quickly in a crisis.

The bottom line is that the Nato needs to better coordinate with members—and nonmembers who have most to fear from Russian aggression, namely Finland and Sweden. The eventual goal should be to bring these Scandinavian states, whose ground and naval forces are well suited for combat in the region, into the alliance itself. For now, the Nato should negotiate binding agreements with them on responding quickly to crises. It will take a while for the West to fully analyze the implications of Zapad. It’s already clear, however, that more formal cooperation is necessary to deter Russian aggression at sea. Bloomberg View

SDG Index dimensional scores for the Philippines, 2017

Source: Sustainable Development Solutions Network and Bertelsmann Stiftung

“negative externalities”, in which rich countries contribute destructively to the environment, economy and security situation of poor countries, were included. Last, a “dashboard”, akin to a traffic light with red, yellow, orange and green colors, accompanies the Index, reflecting progress in each of the goals.

How then does the Philippines fare in this global ranking? Most Asean countries scored between 58 and 69 out of 100 points, placing them between 54th to 114th in the list of countries. The country scored 64.3 points, placing it 93rd across countries in implementing the SDGs, which is a little above the Asean average of 63.3, where a score of 50 means that countries were halfway in achieving their goals.

According to the SDG Index dimensional scores and accompanying dashboard, the Philippines ranks poorly in terms of SDG 9 (industry, innovation and infrastructure) due to a relatively lower percentage of population using the Internet, percapita number of scientific journals

and research and development expenditure.

Other areas in which the Philippines need Source: Sustainable Development Solutions Network and Bertelsmann Stiftung improvement would be for many of the scores.

SDGs 2 (zero hunger), 3 (good health Certainly, the SDG Index has and well-being), 8 (decent work and many limitations, as its authors, economic growth), 10 (reduced inboth the SDSN and the Bertelsmann equalities), 14 (life below water) Foundation, have acknowledged that and 16 (peace, justice and strong it includes both a mix of inputs and institutions). On the other hand, outcomes, and not desired impacts of the country’s progress in sdg 1 states of well-being in meeting the (no poverty), 4 (quality education), goals. Also, many of the indicators 6 (clean water and sanitation), 12 may not provide clear indication of (responsible consumption and proa country’s progress in meeting some duction) and 13 (climate change) of the specific SDGs. Nevertheless, fares relatively better, although all the SDG Index and Dashboard may are below the “green” signal, which provide some indication of progress denotes close progress to the each in meeting a country’s global goal of the goals. commitments.

Overall, according to the SDG Index findings for 2017, progress in meeting these goals are relatively Randy Tuano is an assistant professor, Departuneven across countries and actions ment of Economics, Ateneo de Manila University, are necessary to improve outcomes and is also the acting manager, Sustainable Develacross countries. The Philippines ceropment Solutions Network, Philippine chapter. This tainly needs a more vigorous effort article is based on a presentation to be made at the to meet its many goals given in many International Conference on Sustainable Developof the SDGs, given the low rankings ment Goals Statistics in Manila, on October 6.

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Duterte sets up unit to handle raps vs presidential appointees

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By Elijah Felice E. Rosales

@alyasjah

resident Duterte, in a radical move, has created his own anticorruption commission with the power to investigate presidential appointees, even those outside the Executive branch, who might have been involved in graft and corrupt practices.

As part of his crusade against corruption, Duterte has created the Presidential Anti-Corruption Commission through Executive

Order (EO) 43. The commission is mandated to assist the President in investigating and hearing administrative cases on graft

EO 43

The executive order mandating the creation of the Presidential Anti-Corruption Commission and corruption involv ing presidential appointees.

The commission will be administered by a chairman and four commissioners, all handpicked by the President. Aside from this, the members of the commission shall be comprised mostly of members of the Philippine bar and must have been practicing law for at

least five years.

Under EO 43, the commission shall have the authority, on complaint or motu proprio, “to hear, investigate, receive, gather and evaluate evidence, intelligence reports and information” in administrative cases against all presidential appointees. The authority must be in coordination with the Office of the Ombudsman.

Aside from presidential appointees in the Executive branch, the commission can also look into presidential appointees in the military and police ranks upon the instructions of the Commander in Chief.

The most powerful the commission can get is “to conduct lifestyle checks and fact-finding inquiries

on acts and omissions” on presidential appointees outside of the Executive branch. The commission can then submit a recommendatory action to the President on the basis of its fact-finding inquiries.

In the exercise of its functions, the commission may also enlist the aid and support of law-enforcement agencies and other government instrumentalities for the acquisition of necessary documents, or to participate in the conduct of the investigation. It may also ask the Department of Justice to place vital witnesses under the witnessprotection program.

Upon the filing of a complaint or charge, the commission may recommend to the Chief Executive the issuance of a preventive-suspension

order, most especially if the case may lead to the removal from office of the respondent. The preventive suspension shall persist until the commission lifts the case, but shall not exceed 90 days, unless the delay is caused by the negligence of the respondent.

According to EO 43, the President found it necessary to create the Presidential Anti-Corruption Commission so as to pursue the ad m inist rat ion’s ma nd ate to eradicate graft and corruption in the government. The creation of the commission comes at a time Duterte is at loggerheads with the Office of the Ombudsman, which has been conducting an investigation into the alleged bank accounts of the President.

DOT targets 60,000 French tourists this year Call-center nation puts up a fight vs job automation T S

By Ma. Stella F. Arnaldo

@akosistellaBM Special to the BusinessMirror

he Department of Tourism (DOT) is projecting an increase in visitor arrivals from France to some 60,000 this year.

This developed as Tourism Secretary Wanda Corazon T. Teo made a “powerful pitch” to participants at the recent IFTM Top Resa, the largest travel fair in France, according to a news statement from the DOT. Teo impressed on delegates that the Philippines is a safe and fun destination, a claim which many French nationals seem to agree with. Data from the DOT showed visitor arrivals from France grew by 21.7 percent to 55,384 in 2016.

In the first six months of 2017, French tourists in the Philippines jumped by almost 25 percent to some 38,900.

“The strong interest and support that we gained from our meetings with the world’s leading tour and travel executives are proof positive that we have accomplished our mission,” the DOT chief said.

This year’s expo boasted of some 1,700 brands and 166 destinations, which included the Philippines, whose booth constantly attracted a large number of inquiries from French tourists and travel agents about local destinations. Over 31,000 delegates were expected to have attended this year’s travel fair, which ran from September 26 to 29 at Porte de Versailles, Paris.

Teo and other DOT officials held marathon meetings with top officials of associations of travel agencies and tour operators, including the Les Enterprises du Voyage as represented by its vice president Richard Soubielle, and the Syndicate of French Tour Operators (Seto), headed by its secretarygeneral Jurgen Bachmann.

Both French executives acknowledged the spike in French

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the next 10 years; and means of compliance by the mandated participant set by the government to meet the RPS requirements.

The following entities would be mandated to participate in the program: DUs, licensed retail electricity

Tourism Secretary Wanda Corazon T. Teo (third from left) and Philippine Ambassador to France Ma. Theresa Lazaro (fourth from left) lead an official delegation to the IFTM Top Résa, the largest travel fair and expo in France. PHOTO COURTESY D.O.T.

38,900 tourists in the Philippines, which they said has become a “trendy destination”, following more aggressive DOT-led marketing programs and collaborations with French travel and trade groups.

“They noted the market’s growing interest in the Philippines, and cited the typical French trip to our country as a mixture of culture, diving, beach and ecotourism destinations,” Teo stressed. “They are also very keen on interacting with local communities,” she added.

DOT Spokesman and Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Frederick M. A legre told the

BusinessMirror that French tourists usually head to Palawan, Banaue, Cebu, Bohol and Negros.

“Siargao is also becoming popular destination for the French,” he said.

Teo, along with DOT Undersecretary for Tourism Development Planning Benito C. Bengzon Jr., also met with producers of two mainstream French TV networks planning to feature adventure and travel in the Philippines on their prime-time shows aired nationwide.

Alegre, however, declined to identify the TV networks, pending the finalization of the project.

Participants from the private sector also had their plates full meeting with their French counterparts. The private-sector delegation included representatives from Ansett Holidays, Alize Voyages and Adventures, Asiaventure Tours and Travel, Baron Travel, Blueberry Sky Travel and Tours Services, Blue Horizons Travel and Tours, Corporate

International Travel and Tours, Happy Juanderer Travel, Intas Destination Management, Select Travel Services, Travel Experts, Ten Knots Development Corp. and AHMGI Hotel Luna.

“This is the biggest delegation we ever had in France, giving us more opportunities to tap into this high-value market,” Teo said.

“The DOT is, likewise, encouraged by the consistent and growing interest of our local travel trade groups to grow the French market and we look forward to even more strategic and creative partnerships with them, as well as with key communications establishments, in promoting our fun destinations in France,” she added.

The DOT delegation to Top Resa also included Alegre, Assistant Secretary Arlene Mancao, Regional Director Maria Venus Q. Tan and Tourism Attaché Margarita Patricia Valdes.

supplier, directly connected customers (DCCs), supplier of last resort, entities authorized as distributors within the economic zones, and generating companies only to the extent of their actual supply to their DCCs. A composite team will determine the minimum annual RPS requirement per mandated participant.

The members of the said team will be composed of representatives

from the NREB, Electric Power Industry Management Bureau, Renewable Energy Management Bureau, Legal Services and Energy Policy and Planning Bureau.

The minimum annual increment in the RPS level shall be initially set at 2.15 percent to be applied to the actual total supply portfolio of the mandated participant in each grid for the previous year, the draft circular stated.

RE sources include biomass, waste to energy technology, wind, solar, run-of-river, impounding hydropower sources that meet internationally accepted standards, ocean, hybrid systems, geothermal and other RE technologies that may be later identified by the DOE. T he NR EB is the adv isor y body tasked with the effective implementation of RE projects in the Philippines.

The number of French tourists who visited the Philippines in the first half of 2017, up 25 percent

ince the early-2000s, the Philippines added more than a million jobs, as foreign companies outsourced customer support and sales tasks to the Southeast Asian nation.

Now a looming wave of automation is threatening employment at call centers and forcing the industry to retrain workers to meet the demand for higher skilled jobs in areas such as health care, banking, finance and insurance. “ T he bi g gest c h a l le nge i s people,” Jojo Uligan, president of the Contact Center Association of the Philippines (CCAP), said in an interview at his office in Manila on Wednesday. “We lack people with enough technical expertise and experience to service emerging needs.”

The Philippines is the world’s top call-center destination, with companies like Accenture Plc. and American Express Co. among those that have set up shop in the Southeast Asian nation. They’ve been lured by cheaper wages, Filipinos’ cultural affinity with the West and a 100 million population that’s mostly fluent in English.

With technology constantly advancing, machines are now able

to replicate some of the tasks that people do, including customer relations. More than half of outsourced jobs could be lost in a few years unless significant retraining is done, according to a study by Tholons Capital, a New York-based consultancy.

In India robots are now replacing warehouse workers, for example.

Leaders of some of the biggest outsourcing companies in the world will meet this month in the Philippines to craft fresh strategies to counter the impact of automation, Uligan said.

Companies are increasingly seeking workers who are college educated, experienced, have technical expertise and can easily be retrained, he said.

“There is a lot of complex work now,” Uligan said. “It’s no longer mere directory assistance or taking orders.”

These concerns are tempering the outlook for the industry. The CCAP estimates that revenue will grow as much as 8 percent this year until 2022, compared with growth rates exceeding 10 percent in the past. “People don’t evolve as fast as technology,” Uligan said.

Bloomberg News

Duterte ends vow not to leave PHL until Marawi siege is over

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resident Duterte on Thursday night headed to Brunei Darussalam for the 50th year celebration of Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah’s accession to the throne, marking his first foreign trip in nearly five months.

Since the conflict in Marawi City, Lanao del Sur, broke out, the President has vowed not to leave domestic soil until the fight against Islamist extremists is over.

But the President is committed to that promise—having rejected in June an invitation from Japan to attend a business conference in Tokyo—he seemingly could not refuse Bolkiah’s request for his personal attendance.

The President is scheduled to join Bolkiah, the royal family and

other invited leaders in a royal banquet and dinner. Right after he is expected to return to Davao, where he will most likely spend the weekend.

This is Duterte’s second trip to Brunei, the first was in October 2016. He has been making rounds in neighboring countries since his assumption of power as part of his chairmanship duties in the Asean.

The President’s overnight trip to Brunei is his first time outside Philippine soil since May, when he went to Russia for a four-day official visit to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. However, the trip was cut short due to the unprecedented siege laid by Islamist extremists in Marawi City. Elijah Felice E. Rosales