BusinessMirror October 14, 2018

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BRIDGING THE RICHPOOR GAP Report shows govts split between fighting and fueling income inequality

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By Jonathan Mayuga

OES income inequality matter? If Southeast Asian countries were to be used as barometers, the answer to this would gravitate to the negative side, particularly if the per capita income and the efforts taken by governments to bridge the rich-poor gap are taken into consideration.

For instance, Singapore—the wealthiest country in Asean— has a GDP per capita of around $57,700.

However, in the newly released edition of the Commitment to Reducing Inequality (CRI) Index report developed by Oxfam and De-

PESO EXCHANGE RATES n US 54.1710

velopment Finance International, Singapore only ranked 149th out of 157 countries.

On the other hand, the Philippines—long considered an economic laggard in Asean despite its vast potential—only has a GDP per capita of around $3,000. But it ranked considerably higher than Singapore in the 2018 CRI Index, landing at 97th.

Cases like those of the Philippines and Singapore fuel debates among governments all over the world that fueling—instead of fighting—income inequality is the way forward.

The CRI Index

THE CRI 2018 ranks countries based on social spending, par-

ticularly health, education and social protection; progressivity of tax policy; labor rights and minimum wages.

While developed countries dominate the top 10 performers in terms of addressing income inequality, some developing economies are actually making significant strides to narrow the chasm between the rich and the havenots in terms of policies—on social spending, tax and labor rights.

These three areas are critical to reducing inequality, according to the CRI 2018 report.

The 157 countries ranked showed a clear divergence in governments’ policies. The Republic of Korea, Indonesia and Georgia are Continued on A2

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Enhancing the PHL human capital

WB index shows 1 in 3 Filipino children under 5 still suffers from malnutrition, stunted growth

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By Cai U. Ordinario

OT all Filipino children born nowadays will be able to be as productive as they could be when they grow up, according to the latest report released by the World Bank (WB).

Based on the World Bank’s Human Capital Index (HCI), if Filipino children will be able to enjoy complete education and full health support, they will only be 55 percent as productive when they grow up.

The World Bank explained that the HCI measures the amount of human capital that a child born today can expect to attain by age 18, given the risks of poor health and education that prevail in the country where he or she lives.

“In terms of the overall index, the Philippines performed better than the average for its income group but below the average for the East Asia and Pacific region.

The index finds that children born in the Philippines will be only 55 percent as productive when they grow up as they could be if they enjoyed complete education and full health,” the World Bank said in a news statement.

Marker

THE index takes into consideration survival, which measures whether children born today will survive to school age; school, which measures how much schooling children will complete and how much will they learn; and health, which measures if children will leave school in good health and would be ready for further learning and/or work as adults.

Data for the Philippines

55%

The percentage of productivity that Filipino children born today would likely attain when they grow up. showed 97 out of 100 children born in the Philippines will survive to age 5. Of these children, those who will be able to start school at 4 years old will be able to complete 12.8 years of school by their 18th birthday.

The World Bank said students in the Philippines scored 409 on a scale where 625 represents advanced attainment and 300 represents minimum attainment.

However, when years of schooling are adjusted for quality of learning, Filipino children only complete 8.4 years of schooling.

This means, the World Bank said, a learning gap of 4.4 years.

Data showed that in terms of adult survival rate, around 80 percent of 15 year olds nationwide will survive until age 60. “This statistic is a proxy for the range of fatal and nonfatal health outcomes that a Continued on A2

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DEPARTMENT OF SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

The World Bank’s Human Capital Index index finds that children born in the Philippines will be only 55 percent as productive when they grow up as they could be if they enjoyed complete education and full health.

n JAPAN 0.4825 n UK 71.4895 n HK 6.9122 n CHINA 7.8236 n SINGAPORE 39.1635 n AUSTRALIA 38.2447 n EU 62.4158 n SAUDI ARABIA 14.4433

Source: BSP (October 11, 2018 )

NewsSunday BusinessMirror

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BRIDGING THE RICH-POOR GAP Continued from A1

obviously taking positive steps to reduce the gap between rich and poor. Some governments, however, are making it worse.

Try harder

OXFAM said all countries, even those at the top, could be doing much more. The report was distributed ahead of the scheduled meeting of finance ministers, central bank governors, and other economic leaders at the World Bank and International Monetary Fund’s Annual Meeting in Bali, Indonesia.

An international confederation, Oxfam is working along with partners and local communities in more than 90 countries to end the injustices that cause poverty.

On the other hand, the Development Finance International Group is a nonprofit capacitybuilding, advocacy, advisory and research group that works with more than 50 governments and international organizations worldwide.

PHL ranking

THE Philippines is ranked 94th overall, behind three of its Southeast Asian neighbors Indonesia (90th), Malaysia (75th) and Thailand (74th).

The country’s ranking in terms of social spending is even worse at 114, but it fared better in terms of taxation policies (84) and labor rights and wages (84).

The Philippines, like other countries, has been experiencing growth in terms of GDP. This year, the country’s national budget is P3.8 trillion, 12 percent higher than the national budget in 2017. Of this year’s total budget, the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) received the biggest allocation. The Department of Education (DepEd) received the second-highest allocation at P553.31 billion. In terms of taxation, the Duterte administration enacted last year the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (TRAIN) law, or Republic Act 10693.

TRAIN is the initial package of the Comprehensive Tax Reform Program (CTRP) signed into law

by President Duterte in December 2017. It consists of revisions to the National Internal Revenue Code of 1997, or the Tax Code. Among the tax reforms introduced include that of personal income tax, estate tax, donor’s tax, value-added tax, documentary tax stamp, and the excise tax of petroleum products, automobiles, sweetened beverages, cosmetic procedures, coal, mining and tobacco.

The Department of Labor and Employment, through the National Wages and Productivity Commission, announced the implementation of the P20 minimum-wage hike for workers in Central Luzon, which took effect starting on August 1.

The wage increase, however, is a far cry from the P320 minimum-

wage increase demanded by labor groups in the Philippines, considering the recent spikes in the prices of basic commodities, with inflation hitting a nine-year-high 6.7 percent.

Best, worst performers worldwide

ACCORDING to the report, all countries could do more, even those near the top, noting that no country is doing particularly well.

Even those at the top of the listings have room for improvement.

Even the top performer, Denmark, does not get a perfect score and could be doing more.

The report said that 112 of the 157 countries included in the index are doing less than half of what the best performers are managing to do.

Among the top performers based on overall CRI are Denmark, Germany, Finland, Austria, Norway, Belgium, Sweden, France, Iceland and Luxembourg.

Iceland, Norway and Luxembourg are among the 15 richest countries in the world. But Singapore is also way up there at No. 3.

On the other hand, the worst performers are Bangladesh, Singapore, Lao PDR, Madagascar, Bhutan, Sierra Leone, Chad, Haiti, Uzbekistan and Nigeria.

Oxfam bats for reduced inequality

IN a separate news statement, Winnie Byanyima, Oxfam International executive director, said: “Simply put, inequality traps people in poverty. We see babies dying

from preventable diseases in countries where health-care budgets are starved of funding, while billions of dollars owed by the richest are lost to tax dodging. We’ve heard from women living on poverty wages and facing hunger, seeing none of the wealth they create. None of this is inevitable. Governments often act like they’re committed to fighting poverty and tackling inequality—this index shows us if their words match their promises.”

“What’s most striking is how clearly the index shows us that combating inequality isn’t about being the wealthiest country or one of the biggest economies. It’s about having the political will to pass and put into practice the policies that will narrow the gap between the ultra-rich and the poor. This index clearly lets us see who’s doing that and who’s not,” Matthew Martin, Development Finance International director, said for his part.

‘Notable performers’

ACCORDING to Oxfam, Nigeria, Singapore and Argentina are among a group of governments that are fueling inequality.

Asia is lagging behind the rest of the world, with a majority of the countries in the bottom third of the index and none in the top 10.

Moreover, across Asia, most governments have failed to improve health and social protection spending, labor policies, workers’ rights and minimum wages, and women’s rights.

Oxfam said the index ranks 157 countries on their policies on social spending, tax and labor rights—three areas the organization says are critical to reducing inequality.

“It found a clear divergence between governments, such as the Republic of Korea, Indonesia and Georgia, that are taking positive

steps to reduce the gap between rich and poor, and governments that are making it worse.

However, all countries, even those at the top, could be doing much more,” Oxfam said.

Singapore’s ranking in the CRI, Oxfam explained, is due in large part to a new indicator on the extent to which a country’s policies enable corporate tax dodging. It also has no minimum wage for its workers, except for cleaners and security guards.

On the other hand, Nigeria ranks last for the second year in a row due to low social spending, worsening labor-rights violations and poor tax collection. The ranking reflects the well-being of the country’s population: 1 in 10 children die before their fifth birthday.

By comparison, the Republic of Korea has taken significant steps to tackle inequality—boosting the minimum wage by 16.4 percent, increasing taxes on wealthy people and corporations, and expanding social spending.

Other countries making progress include Georgia, which increased spending on education by almost 6 percent in 2017— more than any other country— and Indonesia, which increased its minimum wage by nearly 9 percent last year.

According to Oxfam, inequality is a policy choice. It says the CRI Index 2018 demonstrates clearly that governments have a choice.

Either they can take steps to reduce the gap between rich and poor, or they can choose to act in ways that will increase inequality.

Right choice

“THE index demonstrates that many governments are making the right choice, and are choosing to do things that will close the gap. This shames the many other

governments that are failing to do enough,” the CRI 2018 report said.

Amid the widening inequality or rich-poor gap, Oxfam believes governments, such as in the Philippines, can do more to address inequality through increased social spending for health and education.

They can do more to put in place a more progressive taxation, and increase labor wage, promote labor rights and gender equality in the workplace.

“The inequality crisis is undermining progress, and it has to be tackled. We call on all governments to take action, urgently,” Oxfam’s Kala Pulido-Constantino, regional campaigns, policy and influencing manager for Asia, said in an earlier interview by the BusinessMirror.

Pulido-Constantino also said the governments, particularly in the Philippines, should be able to find ways to improve its ranking, through policy reforms that will help narrow the rich-poor gap.

Among Oxfam’s recommendations to governments, in terms of policy action, is to improve their efforts on progressive spending, taxation and workers’ pay and protection as part of National Inequality Reduction Plans under Sustainable Development Goals 10.

It also underscores the need for governments, international institutions, and other stakeholders to work together to radically and rapidly improve data on inequality and related policies and to accurately and regularly monitor progress in reducing inequality.

Last, Oxfam recommends that governments and international institutions should analyze the distributional impact of any proposed policies, and base their choice of policy direction on the impact of those policies on reducing inequality.

Enhancing the PHL human capital Data showed that children who are malnourished at a young age will face challenges in learning, are more likely to drop out of school early and are less likely to hold good jobs as adults.

Continued from A1

child born today would experience as an adult under current conditions,” the report stated.

The World Bank said, however, that 33 out of 100 children are stunted and are at risk of cognitive and physical limitations that can last a lifetime. This means 1 in 3 Filipino children under age 5 is stunted, a key marker for malnutrition, which limits brain development.

Reforms

DATA showed that children who are malnourished at a young age will face challenges in learning, are more likely to drop out of school early and are less likely to hold good jobs as adults.

“The government of the Philippines recognizes these challenges and has initiated critical reforms to improve human capital in the country,” said Mara K. Warwick, World Bank country director for Brunei Darussalam, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand.

“Policy-makers have introduced universal kindergarten, created senior high school, provided greater funding for basic education, and expanded the Pantawid Pamilya Program, which has boosted school attendance among the poor. Going forward, key policy priorities in the Philippines are reducing stunting and improving the

effectiveness of teachers to boost learning,” she added.

Globally, the HCI showed 56 percent of children born today across the world will lose more than half their potential lifetime earnings because governments are not currently making effective investments in their people to ensure a healthy, educated and resilient population ready for the workplace of the future.

Poland, for instance, enacted education reforms between 1990 and 2015, and experienced one of the fastest improvements in Program for International Student Assessment scores in OECD countries. Vietnam recently topped the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development average Pisa score. Malawi succeeded in reducing its rate of stunting by nearly 20 percentage points in under two decades.

However, the index shows much more needs to be done.

Inclusive growth driver

THE index is part of the World Bank Group’s Human Capital Project, which recognizes human capital as driver of inclusive growth. In addition to the index, the Human Capital Project includes a program to strengthen research and measurement on human capital, as well as support to countries to accelerate progress in human capital outcomes.

The Philippines is one of 28 countries across the globe that have expressed advance interest in participating in the project and have nominated focal points within their governments to work with the World Bank Group.

The 28 early-adopter countries are Armenia, Bhutan, Costa Rica, Egypt, Ethiopia, Georgia, Indonesia, Iraq, Jordan, Kenya, Kuwait, Lesotho, Lebanon, Malawi, Morocco, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Peru, the Philippines, Poland, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Tunisia, Ukraine, the United Arab Emirates and Uzbekistan.

These countries have begun work on elevating human capital policy dialogue across their government line ministries and identifying national priorities for accelerating progress on human capital, based on each country’s own development plans.

Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto Pernia of the National Economic and Development Authority is the Philippines’s official focal point for this global initiative.

The index is included in the forthcoming World Development Report 2019 on the Changing Nature of Work, which addresses the importance of investing in human capital to prepare for the future of work.

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Sunday, October 14, 2018

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White Americans gain most from Trump’s tax cuts

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HE tax cuts that President Donald J. Trump signed into law last year are disproportionately helping white Americans over AfricanAmericans and Latinos, a disparity that reflects long-standing racial economic inequality in the United States and the choices that Republicans made in crafting the law.

The finding comes from a new analysis of the $1.5-trillion tax cut using an economic model built by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a liberal think tank, and released in a joint report with Prosperity Now, a nonprofit group focused on helping lowincome Americans attain wealth and financial stability. It is the first detailed analysis of the law

to break down its effects by race.

White Americans earn about 77 percent of total income in the United States, but they are getting nearly 80 percent of the benefits of the individual and business tax cuts generated by the new law, the analysis found. African-Americans received about 5 percent of the benefits, despite earning 6 percent of the nation’s income.

Latinos got about 7 percent, although their share of all income is 8 percent.

In total, the analysis estimates, whites will get about $218 billion in tax cuts this year as a result of the law. Black and Latino Americans will get about $32 billion combined.

The analysis starts w ith a simulation of the law’s effects on Americans by income group, using historical tax data. On that front, its conclusions closely track those of distributional analyses by the Tax Policy Center and the Joint Committee on Taxation, Congress’s scorekeeper on the effects of the cuts. Both found that the vast majority of the law’s benefits would flow to the top 20 percent of US income earners.

The economic policy institute’s model extends those analyses by combining tax data with race and ethnicity data from the Federa l Reser ve’s Sur vey of Consumer Finances. It took months to build.

The racial divide highlighted by the analysis is largely a product of the financial advantages that white people have long held. They earn more on average than black or Latino Americans, and are far more likely to be among the top income earners in the country.

That means they were better positioned to gain from a law that delivered higher benefits to top earners, in total dollars and in percentage terms, than low- and middle-income Americans.

“The average income for white taxpayers is significantly higher than for black or Latino taxpayers,” said Meg Wiehe, deputy director of the economic policy institute. “That’s a huge driver.”

As a result, the average tax cut going to a white American household is more than double one going to a black or Latino one. The study found that the group getting the highest average cut was Asian-Americans, who have the highest average income of any of the groups.

It appears, though, that even among top earners, whites have fared better than other Americans under the law—probably because the tax cuts affect individual taxpayers differently depending on how they make their money.

High-earning white taxpayers, for example, are more likely to own pass-through companies, such as limited liability corporations, and pay taxes on their profits through the individual income tax code. The new law includes a special 20 -percent deduction for pass-through income, subject to some limitations. The pass-through break does not apply to high earners, such as professional athletes who get most of their money from salaries.

The average tax cut, as a share of pretax income, for a white or Asian-American household in the top 1 percent of income earners was nearly 3 percent, the analysis found. For Latinos,

it was 1.7 percent; for blacks, it was 1.2 percent.

“Even if you’re a successful black or Latino household in the top 1 percent, you’ve achieved the American dream, you’ve hit it out of the park,” said David Newville, director of federal policy at Prosperity Now. “You’re still not getting the same returns from this bill as a white household.”

The report’s authors note that Congress could have structured the cuts differently in ways that targeted lower- and middle-income taxpayers more directly.

They also stress that by steering more money to whites, the law could exacerbate an already stark racial wealth divide in the United States.

The Census Bureau reported in September that the median income for white/non-Hispanic households in 2017 was $68,145.

For black households, it was $40,258. For Hispanic households of any race it was $50,486.

New York Times News Service

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Sunday, October 14, 2018

The World BusinessMirror

IS reverting to insurgency tactics after losing caliphate

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EIRUT—Nearly defeated on the battlefields of its would-be caliphate, analysts say the Islamic State (IS) group has reverted to what it was before its spectacular conquests in 2014—a shadowy insurgent network that targets civilian populations with guerrilla-style attacks and exploits state weaknesses to incite sectarian strife.

In Iraq and Syria, hardly a week goes by without the group staging an attack on a town or village, keeping its opponents on edge even as it fights US-backed forces advancing on the last remaining slice of territory under its control near the countries’ shared border.

Hisham al-Hashimi, an IS expert who advises the Iraqi government, said the group now operates like it did in 2010, before its rise in Iraq, which culminated four years later with the militants seizing one of Iraq’s biggest cities, Mosul, and also claiming the city of Raqqa in Syria and declaring an Islamic caliphate across large areas of both countries.

Al-Hashimi said the world’s most dangerous insurgent group is trying to prove that despite losing its territorial hold, “it still has long arms to strike.”

While it fends off attacks on its remaining pockets in Syria, a recent surge in false claims of responsibility for attacks also signals that the group is struggling to stay relevant after losing its proto-state and its dominance on the international news agenda. The main figures behind the group’s once sleek propaganda machine have mostly been killed.

Raqqa fell a year ago this month, and the group has lost all but 2 percent of the territory it held in Iraq and Syria.

There are concerns, however, that while IS may never be able to

recreate the kind of territorial hold it once had, it is trying to latch on to new territory.

One of the group’s deadliest attacks since the collapse of the supposed caliphate came in late July, when dozens of masked IS fighters stormed the southern city of Sweida and nearby villages inhabited by members of Syria’s Druze minority, gunning down more than 200 people and kidnapping about 30, mostly women and children.

The ambush shook the community, which had stayed on the sidelines of Syria’s seven-year civil war and took many by surprise, raising fears that as the militants are on the retreat, they will try to regroup in remote pockets of territory like this once quiet corner of the country.

Last month IS fighters stormed the northern Iraqi v illage of Gharib, killing three villagers and wounding nine after residents refused to collaborate with them and give them supplies, such as food and ammunition. Last week IS attacked the village of Saadiyeh, south of the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, killing three and abducting one.

The group regularly stages attacks in villages in the provinces of Diyala, Salahuddin and Kirkuk and elsewhere, targeting local officials or police because they work for the state.

Iraqi military spokesman Big. Gen. Yahya Rasoul said this week that security forces have begun

a broad operation in the western province of Anbar that borders Syria to take out IS sleeper cells.

Analysts warn that this could be the beginning of a new resurgence of the group similar to the one that preceded their rise in 2010, after many thought the group’s predecessor, the Islamic State in Iraq, had been defeated during the US surge there in 2007.

Hassan Hassan, senior research fellow at George Washington University’s Program on Extremism, wrote in a recent article that IS has been able to undergo an orderly transition from caliphate to insurgency without fracturing.

Last month US-backed Syrian fighters of the Syrian Democratic Forces began a final push to retake Hajin, the last pocket held by IS on the eastern banks of the Euphrates River near the Iraq border. They have had to advance slowly as the extremists rely on mines, snipers fire and suicide attacks in defending their positions.

Clashes this week in the Syrian village of Sousah left more than two dozen fighters on both sides dead as IS fighters took advantage of a sandstorm and bad visibility to attack SDF positions.

It’s not clear how many militants are still fighting with IS. A United Nations report released in August said IS has up to 30,000 members distr ibuted roughly equally between Syria and Iraq, and said its global network increasingly poses a threat.

The UN report said that despite the defeat of IS in Iraq and most of Syria, it is likely that a reduced “covert version” of the militant group’s “core” will survive in both countries, with significant affiliated supporters in Afghanistan, Libya, Southeast Asia and West Africa.

“Make no mistake about it, as [IS] has collapsed inward, in their own way, they have reinforced a center as they’ve been forced into what is now less than 2 percent of their original territory,” US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said in Paris earlier this month.

Many are concerned that while

the United States, working with local allies, was able to destroy the physical caliphate relatively quickly, it did not fix governing problems that originally created the opportunity for IS to emerge, including frustrations among the Sunni populations of both countries.

“ISIS is waging an effective campaign to reestablish durable support zones while raising funds and rebuilding command-and-control over its remnant forces,” said a recent report by the Institute for the Study of War, using an alternative acronym for IS. “ISIS could regain sufficient strength to mount a renewed insurgency that once again threatens to overmatch local security forces in both Iraq and Syria.”

In August, following months of conflicting reports on whether he was alive, IS released a new audio message, purportedly of its shadowy leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the first such recording to emerge in almost a year. The speaker urged followers to “persevere” and continue fighting the group’s enemies.

He also urged supporters in the West to carry out more attacks, adding that each “operation in your land equals a thousand” in the Middle East.

The group appears overly eager to claim responsibility for attacks in the West and regularly claims responsibility through its Aamaq news agency for attacks in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Egypt and countries as far as Nigeria and France.

In August, shortly after news broke out of a man killing two people in France, IS claimed responsibility for the attack. It later became clear that the man was mentally disturbed and had family disputes.

Last month IS claimed responsibility an attack in Iran’s Ahvaz region, but initially made factually incorrect claims about it. Later, IS released footage of several men that Iran ultimately identified as attackers, though the men in the footage are not known to have pledged allegiance to the extremist group. AP

www.businessmirror.com.ph | Editor: Angel R. Calso

Trump pressure on Kim fades as ally floats sanctions relief

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HE US may want to focus on disarming North Korea.

Lately, though, there’s been more talk about relieving sanctions on Kim Jong Un’s regime.

The latest sign came on Wednesday after China said it had agreed with North Korea and Russia “it was time to start considering the adjustment” of United Nations sanctions. The same day, President Donald Trump tersely dismissed a suggestion by US ally South Korea that it was reviewing the repeal of one unilateral package of economic restrictions against its neighbor.

“Well, they won’t do it without our approval,” Trump told W hite House repor ters on Wednesday. “ They do nothing without our approval.”

The exchange highlighted a growing gap between Trump’s goals and those of South Korean President Moon Jae-in, especially after he sealed a series of reconciliation deals with his North Korean counterpart last month. As Moon and Kim push their governments closer, Trump has found himself increasingly alone in demands that North Korea must take more steps toward “denuclearization” before getting economic relief.

US negotiators led by Secretary of State Michael Pompeo appear to have acknowledged the difficulty of trying to rapidly advance the vague agreement between Trump and Kim at their June summit to “work toward complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.” Pompeo returned from meetings with Kim this week, claiming “significant progress,” but also added, “there are many steps along the way and we took one of them today.”

‘Growing frustration’

THERE were other signs of daylight between the US and its key security partners in Seoul. South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha confirmed to lawmakers that Pompeo called to express “discontent” with landmark military pact signed by Moon and Kim last month in Pyongyang.

Jenny Town, a research analyst at the Washington-based Stimson Center, said the exchanges were indicative “of a growing frustration within the US government of a general lack of communication between US and South Korea about sensitive moves.”

“It’s not so much that the US feels it needs to ‘approve’ of South Korean decisions, but since USROK interests are so intimately intertwined, Washington does expect communication on matters that involve mutual interests before they unfold,” Town said.

The alliance had already showed signs of strain as Trump questioned the cost of maintaining some 28,000 troops on the peninsula and installing anti-missile shield there, complaints he repeated at an Iowa election rally on Tuesday. In June he appeared to surprise South Korean officials with his announcement after meeting with Kim that the US would suspend “war games” with South Korea.

“We’re able to speak about a lot of things together and that’s because we really share the same objective here,” US State Department Deputy Spokesman Robert Palladino told reporters on Wednesday in response to questions about disagreements between the allies.

“We’re really working closely with the Republic of Korea.”

Mixed messages

MOON, who reaffirmed his commitment to “complete denuclearization and permanent peace” during a fleet review on Thursday, sought to play down the significance of Trump’s remark.

“We are going to accept that as meaning all issues are going to proceed with the agreement and consultation between South Korea and the US,” his spokesman, Kim Eui-keum, said.

Meanwhile, South Korea issued statements, saying Kang didn’t mean to imply any decision when she told parliament that sweeping trade and travel sanctions passed after North Korea sank one of its warships in 2010 were being reviewed. Unification Minister Cho Myoung-gyon said no detailed analysis of the country’s sanctions had been made.

Mixed messages between the US and South Korea risk giving Kim gaps to exploit in negotiations. So, far the North Korean leader has insisted on US gestures, such as sanctions relief or a declaration formally ending the 1950-53 Korean War in exchange for his decisions to halt weapons testing and dismantle some nuclear facilities. Bloomberg News

SAUDI CROWN PRINCE’S CAREFULLY MANAGED RISE HIDES DARK SIDE D UBAI, United Arab Emirates—In a kingdom once ruled by an ever-aging rotation of elderly monarchs, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman stands out as the youthful face of a youthful nation.

But behind the carefully calibrated publicrelations campaign pushing images of the smiling prince meeting with the world’s top leaders and business executives lurks a darker side.

Last year, at age 31, Mohammed became the kingdom’s crown prince, next in line to the throne now held by his octogenarian father, King Salman. While pushing for women to drive, he has overseen the arrest of women’s rights activists. While calling for foreign investment, he has imprisoned businessmen, royals and others in a crackdown on corruption that soon resembled a shakedown of the kingdom’s most powerful people.

As Saudi defense minister from the age of 29, he pursued a war in Yemen against Shiite rebels that began a month after he took the

helm and wears on today.

What the crown prince chooses next likely will affect the world’s largest oil producer for decades to come. And as the disappearance and feared death of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul may show, the young prince will brook no dissent in reshaping the kingdom in his image.

“I don’t want to waste my time,” he told Time magazine in a cover story this year. “I am young.”

Khashoggi, a US resident who wrote several columns for The Washington Post critical of Prince Mohammed, disappeared on October 2 on a visit to the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. Turkish officials have offered no evidence, but say they fear the writer was killed and dismembered by a Saudi team of 15 men—an operation that, if carried out, would have to have been authorized by the top of the Al Saud monarchy. The kingdom describes the allegation as “baseless,” but has provided no proof that Khashoggi ever left the consulate.

For decades in Saudi Arabia, succession passed down among the dozens of sons of the kingdom’s founder, King Abdul-Aziz. And, over time, the sons have grown older and older upon reaching the throne.

When King Salman took power in January of 2015 and quickly appointed Prince Mohammed as defense minister, it took the kingdom by surprise, especially given the importance of the position and the prince’s age.

He was little-known among the many grandchildren of Saudi Arabia’s patriarch, a young man educated only in the kingdom who

PRINCE Mohammed bin Salman

stuck close to his father, who previously served as the governor of Riyadh, the Saudi capital.

As defense minister, he entered office facing a crisis in Yemen, the Arab world’s poorest country, which lies south of the kingdom. Shiite rebels known as Houthis had overrun the country’s capital, Sanaa, unseating the deeply unpopular government of Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi.

When Hadi fled and it appeared the country’s port city of Aden would fall to the rebels, Saudi Arabia launched a coalition war against the Houthis—a conflict that soon became a stalemate.

The United Nations estimates 10,000 people have been killed in Yemen’s conflict, and activists say that number is likely far higher. It has exacerbated what the UN calls the

world’s worst humanitarian crisis, with hunger and cholera stalking civilians, worsened by the kingdom’s blockade of ports.

Meanwhile, the Saudi-led coalition has faced widespread criticism for its air strikes hitting clinics and marketplaces, which have killed civilians. The Houthis, as well, have indiscriminately used land mines and arrested political opponents.

The coalition says Iran has funneled weapons to the Houthis ranging from small arms to the ballistic missiles now regularly fired into the kingdom, which Iran denies.

For Prince Mohammed, the conflict remains part of what he sees as an existential struggle between Saudi Arabia and Iran for the future of the Middle East. Asked about Western concerns over civilian casualties, he offers this: “Mistakes happen in all wars.”

“We don’t need to have a new Hezbollah in the Arabian Peninsula. This is a red line not only for Saudi Arabia but for the whole world,” the prince recently told Bloomberg, referring to the Iran-allied Shiite militant group and political party dominant in Lebanon.

The prince also found himself involved in the bizarre resignation-by-television address of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who announced he would step down during a visit to the kingdom in November 2017, fueling suspicion he was coerced into doing so.

Prince Mohammed’s harsh rhetoric extends to likening Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to Nazi Germany’s Adolf Hitler. He’s also hinted Saudi Arabia would be willing to fight Iran in other ways, leading Tehran to link the kingdom to an attack

on a military parade in Ahvaz last month that killed at least 24 people and wounded more than 60. Both Arab separatists and the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the assault.

“We won’t wait for the battle to be in Saudi Arabia,”the prince told the Saudi-owned broadcasting company MBC last year. “Instead, we will work so that the battle is for them in Iran, not in Saudi Arabia.”

His aggressive posture against Iran has won the support of US President Donald Trump and his administration, which pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal struck by President Barack Obama, whom the kingdom deeply distrusted.

Before becoming crown prince, Prince Mohammed visited the White House and forged a close relationship with Trump sonin-law Jared Kushner. The two are believed to be working on the administration’s peace plans for Israel and the Palestinians.

Trump made Riyadh his first stop overseas as president, a visit complete with Arab pageantry and opulence. Behind the scenes, many analysts believe Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates saw a green light to move ahead with the ongoing boycott of Qatar, a small Arabian Peninsula nation, over a political dispute.

Trump initially seemed to favor the boycott of Qatar, which is home to al-Udeid Air Base, the forward headquarters of the US military’s Central Command.

Trump’s first Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, sought in vain to pressure the Saudis into resolving the spat and complained privately that the ties between the White

House and Prince Mohammed were hurting the effort, officials said at the time. Tillerson’s dismissal in March and the arrival of Mike Pompeo as Trump’s top diplomat markedly reduced the State Department’s heat on Saudi Arabia about the detentions of human-rights activists, including women, and the conflict in Yemen.

Despite the mounting civilian casualties in Yemen, Pompeo certified to Congress in September that Saudi Arabia was taking steps to reduce and limit them, drawing severe condemnations from lawmakers and human-rights groups.

Saudi Arabia soon embarked on the prince’s ambitious proposal to allow women in the ultraconservative Wahhabi nation to drive. The resulting pictures of women in long black abayas behind the wheel represented a public-relations coup for the image-shaping firms employed by the kingdom, as did footage of women attending soccer matches and movie theaters for the first time in decades.

But before women started their engines, a new crackdown emerged: The kingdom rounded up and imprisoned women’s rights activists, including reportedly grabbing one woman who was in the neighboring United Arab Emirates.

Prince Mohammed has wowed the business world with promises of an initial public offering for the state oil behemoth Saudi Arabian Oil Co., known as Saudi Aramco, suggesting it would have a $2-trillion valuation. Stock markets around the world have pitched having the IPO on their exchanges, but it has been repeatedly delayed. AP

Faith Editor: Lyn Resurreccion • www.businessmirror.com.ph

Sunday

Sunday, October 14, 2018

A5

FOR THANKSGIVING, BLESSING AND HEALING

The faithful venerate Saint Pio’s incorrupt heart relic

By Edwin P. Galvez | Special to the BusinessMirror

O

UR pilgrimage group of 45 devotees of Saint Pio of Pietrelcina left Greenbelt in Makati City at 3 a.m. on October 6.

It was a rather quiet but expectant journey to the National Shrine and Parish of Saint Padre Pio in Barangay San Pedro, Santo Tomas, Batangas, which could be reached in less than two hours.

The road leading to the shrine was understandably clear and smooth when we arrived a little past 5 a.m. While security and vehicular traffic was tightly controlled, it had also been three hours since Lipa Archbishop Gilbert A. Garcera led the welcome Mass at the main church. Pilgrims who arrived early like us were now attending the first Mass at 5:30 a.m.

It was the most perfect time to venerate the incorrupt heart of Saint Padre Pio, which was already on display in the middle of the cavernous Divine Mercy Sanctuary for Pilgrims. Dressed-up tables guided the queues coming from various entry points.

There were no long lines or throngs of people. The cold morning breeze and the reverent atmosphere (marshals made sure there was no picture-taking near the reliquary) made venerating more peaceful, calm and holy, befitting the holiness and humility of one of the most popular and revered contemporary saints.

What a blessed first day, indeed, for us with the heart relic of Padre Pio, the start of his 20-day visit to the country.

We were among the over 30,000 devotees from different parts of the country who trooped to the shrine before midday, announced shrine rector and parish priest Fr. Joselin C. Gonda, OSJ, after the Concelebrated Mass presided

by Archbishop Gabriele G. Caccia, DD, Papal Nuncio to the Philippines, at 9 a.m.

Overall, Father Gonda said that more than 40,000 participated in welcoming and praying before the heart relic of Padre Pio physically at the shrine and over social and news media sites (the Mass was streamed live online).

Thanksgiving, blessing and healing

OUR group is a balanced mix of young and old pilgrims who came from various parishes in Metro Manila and nearby provinces. One even flew from Tacloban City to personally venerate the heart of Padre Pio at his national shrine.

Besides thanksgiving for their blessings, the pilgrims joined the special pilgrimage of our apostolate called Green Faith Travels to deepen their faith in God and seek spiritual and physical healing

28 SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME: ‘MARK 10:17-30’

Jesus asks for self-surrender MSGR. JOSEFINO S. RAMIREZ SUNDAY GOSPEL IN OUR LIFE

T

HE gospel of today’s Mass tells us how, as Jesus was leaving the city, a young man came running to consult Him. The three evangelists who narrate this event all say that the man was of a good social position. He knelt before Christ and asked a question that is basic for every man: “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” (Mark 10:17) Our Lord began answering him by talking of some general things—keep the commandments. And He then enumerated them—do not kill, do not steal, do not commit adultery…. But the young man answered, “Teacher, all these I have observed from my youth” (Mark 10:20).

And as Saint Matthew records, the young man asked: “What do I still lack? (Matthew 19:20).

What else is lacking? This is the question that all of us may have asked at one time when we have felt that intimate dissatisfaction for those good things which, nevertheless, fail to fill the human heart. And Christ has a personal answer for each one—the only effective answer.

Jesus knew that in the heart of that young man, there was a reserve of generosity, there was a great capacity of self-surrender. That is why Jesus looked at him with affection, with a special love, and Jesus invited him to a life of total dedication, free of all attachments.

“You lack one thing.” Only one thing. What expectation that man must have felt before the words of

Jesus! Beyond any doubt, this would be the most important thing he would hear in his whole existence. “Go, sell what you have, and give to the poor… and come, follow me” (Mark 10:21).

The young man did not expect that. The plans of God do not always coincide with our own plans, with those plans that we may have conjured in our imagination or dreams.

The divine plans, in some way or another, always entail detachment from everything that can tie us down.

To follow Christ, we need to be free. The great riches of this young man became a great obstacle for his acceptance of Christ’s invitation. Yet Christ’s invitation was certainly the greatest thing that ever happened in his life.

God calls every one—sick and healthy, rich and poor, old and young, gifted persons and persons of modest capacities. Every man and woman must learn how to discover the special path to which God calls him or her. And we can be sure that God calls everyone of us to a life of holiness, of generosity, of detachment and dedication to God. God tells each one of us, “Come, follow me.” If we say “yes” to his invitation, we shall fulfill God’s project for our life. But if, through selfishness, we deny God’s call, we shall “go away sad,” like the rich young man.

He retained his riches, His attachments and his personal pet projects.

But he lost the chance to follow Christ closely.

CONCELEBRATED Mass led by Papal Nuncio to the Philippines, Archbishop Gabriele G. Caccia, DD, at the National Shrine and Parish of Saint Padre Pio in Barangay San Pedro, Santo Tomas, Batangas, on October 6. EDWIN GALVEZ

THE faithful venerating the incorrupt heart relic of Saint Padre Pio. RICHARD EUSEBIO

through Padre Pio. “The experience was really once in a lifetime,” said first-time pilgrim Lea Ventosa, who works for a media agency. “From the night before to that morning on the way to the shrine, I’ve been thinking of all the petitions I would bring to Padre Pio when I touch his heart.

But when I got there, all I could say was: ‘Thank you Padre Pio for

bringing us here—to be one with your heart in glorifying God.’” Karla Tecson, who works for an overseas research firm, said that being among the thousands who venerated his heart was “nothing short of a miracle for me.”

“I went to accompany my parents, who are senior citizens, but when I stood before his heart relic, I was completely overwhelmed,”

Tecson said. “I felt Padre Pio said, ‘Pray, hope and don’t worry,’ directly to my heart, reminding me to just trust God’s timing and will.

I already underwent two medical procedures, including an open surgery, within seven months, and now, I am doing well and I praise God.” What also proved very touching was the homily of Archbishop Caccia, making us shed tears silently when he explained why we should emulate Padre Pio’s heart because it is child-like, loving and pure.

“In front of his holy heart, Padre Pio invites us to also entrust our hearts to the Lord and he says to us: ‘Where are you going? To Jesus or to your sadness? What are you going back to? To the One who saves you or to your misery, your regrets, your sins? Come, come, the Lord is awaiting you. Take courage. No reason is so grave as to exclude you from his mercy,’” he said in closing.

Longest visit

THE visit of the incorrupt heart

relic of Padre is the longest to a country outside San Giovanni Rotondo. His heart relic previously spent 10 days in US, eight days in Paraguay and five days in Argentina.

The heart of Padre Pio visited the University of Santo Tomas and its Santísimo Rosario Parish on October 8, Manila Cathedral on October 9 and 10, and Cebu Metropolitan Cathedral from October 11 to 13.

It will be in Davao Cathedral from October 14 to 16 and Lipa Cathedral on October 17.

The relic will be brought back to the national shrine on October 18 until its farewell Mass at 9 a.m. on October 26.

The visit also highlights the celebration of the Year of the Clergy and Consecrated Persons in the country as priests and the religious are encouraged to draw inspiration from the life and sufferings of the saint.

P r ie s t s a nd t he re l i g iou s will spend one day venerating the relic in Manila, Cebu and Davao during the nationwide tour under the theme, “Healing and Reconciliation.”

The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines Episcopal Commission of the Clergy (CBCPECC), in cooperation with the National Shrine of Saint Padre Pio, is hosting the visit.

In a briefing last month, Father Gonda described the visit of the heart relic as a “time of grace” for Filipinos, while it’s also doubly significant for the Church, celebrating both the centenary of his stigmata (the five wounds of Jesus) and golden death anniversary this year.

Galvez, a communications consultant and writer, serves at Greenbelt Chapel. He and fellow servants formed Green Faith Travels, a noncommercial pilgrimage apostolate that organizes Lenten, Easter and Marian pilgrimages every year.

SAINT ÓSCAR ROMERO, BISHOP AND MARTYR A groups and devotion to Our Lady of Peace, the construc tion of San Miguel Cathedral and became rec tor of the Inter-Diocesan Seminar y.

In 1966 he was assigned secretary of the Bishops Conference for El Salvador. He was also director of Orientacion, the newspaper of the archdiocese, which became “fairly conservative when he was editor.”

By Corazon Damo-Santiago

RCHBISHOP Romero concluded his sermon on the Parable of the Grain of Wheat: “Those who surrender to the service of the poor through love of Christ will live like the grain of wheat that dies. If it were not to die, it would remain a solitar y grain. The har vest comes because of the grain that dies....

We know that every effort to improve society, above all when society is so full of injustice and sin, is an effort that God blesses; that God wants; that God demands of us.”

This was the last homily of a man of God who will be canonized today, October 14.

No greater love

The making of God’s servant

A R C H B I S H O P Ó scar Arnulfo Romero was born on August 15, 1917, in Ciudad Barrios, El Salvador, to Santos Romero and Guadalupe de Jesus. His father is in charge of the telegraph office in the city and Óscar helped deliver telegrams.

The young Romero excelled in making chairs, tables and doors so his father wanted him to specialize on the trade. But he wanted to be a priest.

At 13, he entered San Miguel Seminar y, and continued his studies at the National Seminary of San Salvatore.

He completed his schooling at the Gregorian University in Rome, where he received a Licentiate in Theology, Cum Laude in 1941.

Since he has not reached the required age, he waited for a year before he was ordained on April 4, 1942, in Rome. His family members were not able to attend the occasion because of travel restrictions due to World War II. He continued his studies in Rome and obtained a doctorate degree in ascetical theology and Christian perfection.

Ke l o g g I n s t i t u te o f No t re D a m e

ÓSCAR ROMERO, in pastel, by J. Puig Reixach (2013). WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Universit y disclosed that, in 1943, Romero was summoned by his bishop.

With Father Valladares, a friend who was completing his doctorate work, he was apprehended and detained by Cuban police “perhaps for having come from fascist Italy.”

Mar t yrdom Files 2015, in Oscar Romero Odyssey in Cuba, published that they were detained in camps. When Father Valladares got sick after several months in prison, the Redemptorist helped for their transfer to a hospital.

Released from Cuban custody, they sailed to Mexico then traveled by land to El Salvador.

Romero was assigned parish priest i n A n a m o re s, t h e n t o S a n M i g u e l, w h e re h e s t a ye d f o r 2 0 ye a r s. H e promoted activities of apostolic

ROMERO was assigned as bishop of Santiago de Maria in 1974. When soldiers raided a village in his diocese, searched houses for weapons and killed innocent people, he was horrified.

He did not only assuage the feelings of the bereaved but even wrote the president of El Salvador about the security forces’ murderous acts.

On February 23, 1977, he was appointed archbishop of El Salvador. Some rich people were happy with the thought that he could stop priests from encouraging the poor to rally for their basic rights.

However, the leaders of Mar xist ideology were disappointed. Progressive priests believed that his conservative beliefs would affect his commitment to help the poor.

Jesus Delgado, his biographer and postulator of the cause for canonization, said: “He gave the lowest priority to Liberation Theology among the topics he studied.”

Three weeks after his appointment as archbishop, Romero’s friend, Father Rufino Grande, SJ, was murdered. The following Sunday, only one Mass in the entire diocese was celebrated, where he spoke against the murder. And he excommunicated the murderers.

Archbishop Romero saw that peaceful protests were answered by death squad killings. While he demanded justice and recompense for atrocities of the police

and army, he rejected the violence of the left and rightist groups. He set up legal and projects to support victims of violence.

When a military junta seized control of the national government, Romero publicly criticized the US government for supporting it.

His weekly radio sermons that were broadcasted throughout the country were regarded as the most trustworthy source of news.

Militar y leaders warned him that “cassocks are not bulletproofs.” But he was unstoppable in advocating justice for the suffering people.

The night before his assassination he appealed to members of the army, National Guards, and the police to stop the killings. He emphasized that they kill their brothers on the order “given by a man. The law of God says, ‘Do not kill should prevail’.... No one has to comply with an immoral law.” He ended his appeal—“I command you in the name of God: Cease the repression.”

Single shot

ON March 24, 1980, he was invited to celebrate Mass at the Carmelite chapel of Hospital de la Divina Providencia. He was preparing the gifts for the offertory when a single shot was heard. He fell at the foot of the big cross. A few minutes after, he died. The time, 6:26 of a Monday afternoon.

A faithful servant of the Lord for 37 years, 11 months and 20 days is added to the list of saints.

Damo-Santiago is a former regional director of the Depar tment of Education National Capital Region. She is currently a faculty member of Mater Redemptoris Collegium in Calauan, Laguna, and of Mater Redemptoris College in San Jose City, Nueva Ecija.

Science

BusinessMirror

A6 Sunday, October 14, 2018

Sunday

www.businessmirror.com.ph • Editor: Lyn Resurreccion

WHO: TB remains world’s single largest infectious killer

W

ASHINGTON, D.C.—A disease that we know how to prevent, treat and cure has become the world’s leading infectious killer: tuberculosis (TB), an airborne bacterial infection.

THE painting, The Sick Child by Edvard Munch in 1885-86, depicts the illness of his sister Sophie, who died of tuberculosis when Edvard was 14. His mother, too, died of the disease. WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

A new report by the World Hea lth Organization ( W HO), launched in New York last month, found for the fourth year in a row that TB remains the world’s single largest infectious killer, responsible for 10 million infections and 1.6 million deaths in 2017.

Still, in many countries, the disease—and those who suffer from it—is overlooked as a normal part of poverty and treated as an unsolvable problem.

Such neglect is the real problem.

Currently, we do not know the full extent of who is sick with TB. Out of the estimated 10 million people who became sick with the disease in 2017, national health systems only identified 6.4 million.

This means they have failed to find and treat 1 out of every 3 people, or 3.6 million, with TB. In the TB community, we refer to these people as “missing”; they are real people out there suffer-

ing, who are undiagnosed or unreported, and where the quality of care—if there was care at all—is simply unknown.

How can we quell an epidemic where over one-third of people with the disease are missing? The truth is, we cannot.

Infected with an airborne infectious disease, these missing people unknowingly spread TB to others. It is the responsibility of governments to invest the resources needed to find, treat and prevent TB. The good news is last month, governments have taken historic steps to fight TB. On September 26 heads of state met in New York for the first-ever United Nations High-Level Meeting (UNHLM) on TB and committed to finding all people with TB, including those who are missing.

The Political Declaration of the UNHLM calls on governments to find and treat 40 million people

with TB by 2022—a move that could finally change the course of history for the disease.

Recommendations for finding, treating and preventing TB

TO find the missing people, governments must take a few key actions.

To reach the missing millions, each government first needs to understand who is being missed and why. Many people with undiagnosed TB belong to vulnerable groups, such as migrants, miners, refugees, children and people living with HIV. Sometimes, members of these groups are reluctant or unable to access health care due to stigma and fear of displacement. Others access care through the private sector, but their treatment is not reported to the Ministry of Health, so its quality cannot be assured.

Once a government knows who the system has missed, it should implement public-health policies that focus on finding and treating those people.

For example, if a large portion of missing TB cases are among children, policies should implement TB screening in places that serve children, such as pediatric clinics, child-care settings and schools.

Linking TB services with other health interventions (e.g., maternal and child health, nutrition, and HIV) can help identify and treat the sick.

Each government needs to improve the effectiveness of its TB program overall by adopting best practices and tools. Contact tracing is extremely effective in finding the missing people with TB. Starting with a person who has active TB, public-health officials identify and screen for TB all those who have been in close contact with that person— family members, coworkers or schoolmates—and screen them for TB. Even if the contacts are not sick, they can take a prophylaxis that can prevent them from becoming sick with TB. Add itiona l ly, gover nments need to deploy appropriate tools.

Microscopes often fail to detect TB in children, so chest x-rays may be a better option. Newer diagnostic tools, such as GeneXpert and the LAM urine test, have proven

particularly effective at finding TB among people living with HIV. Finally, when it comes to TB, the more you look, the more you find. Former US Vice President Joe Biden once said, “Don’t tell me what you value; show me your budget, and I’ll tell you what you value.”

Governments, donors and the private sector need to back up policies for finding the missing people with funding to treat them.

Experts estimate that current investment in TB needs to be doubled to $13 billion per year to effectively address TB—a target that countries have agreed to at the UNHLM.

Together, we can end TB

EACH of us needs to hold our respective governments accountable to their UNHLM commitments by investing in either their national TB program budgets or foreign assistance.

Every government, as well as philanthropy and the private sector, has a role to play in reaching the UNHLM goal of finding and treating 40 million people with TB by 2022.

Countries that have prioritized finding their missing people, implementing effective policies and increasing investments have had success. In 2011 the South African Minister of Health Aaron Motsoaledi rolled out the latest TB diagnostic tool, GeneXpert, as the first-line test to diagnose TB across the country.

Since then, the government has pushed TB screening among at-risk groups such a prisoners and mining communities with laudable results. As of 2017, all South African prisoners were screened for TB, and an estimated 90 percent of mines began routinely screening workers for the disease.

TB is preventable and curable and does not have to be the crisis that it is. By making commitments at the UNHLM on TB, governments have taken an important first step to correct this problem.

We in civil society and affected communities are ready to take the next steps with our governments.

I am hopeful TB will soon be in the history books, on the list of deadly conditions eradicated from the human experience. Mandy Slutsker/IPS

SCIENCE Secretary Fortunato T. de la Peña, DOST Undersecretary for Regional Operations Brenda L. Nazareth-Manzano, DOST-ITDI Director Anabelle Briones, DOST Ilocos region Director Dr. Armando Q. Ganal and Felicidad M. Gan, the provincial science and technology director of Pangasinan S&T MEDIA SERVICE

SALT-PROCESSING PROJECT LAUNCHED IN PANGASINAN

S

ALT is an important ingredient in every dish. It makes food taste good, and the human body can’t live without it. It is needed to transmit nerve impulses, contract and relax muscle fibers, including those in the heart and blood vessels, and maintain a proper fluid balance.

This is why the Philippine government in 1995 enacted Republic Act 8172, or an Act Promoting Salt Iodization Nationwide, or Asin Act, “to protect and promote the health of the people, to maintain an effective food regulatory system, and to provide the entire population especially women and children with proper nutrition.”

The law aims “to contribute to the elimination of micronutrient malnutrition in the country, particularly iodine deficiency disorders, through the cost-effective preventive measure of salt iodization.”

In this regard, the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) and its attached agencies are providing assistance to private initiatives in producing iodized salt.

A simple ceremony at JM Salt Refinery farm, owned by Grace Monterola in Barangay Cato, Infanta, Pangasinan, was held to launch the I-Salt Project of the DOST’s Industrial Technology Development Institute (DOSTITDI) and Philippine Council for Industry, Energy, and Emerging Technology Research and Development (DOST-PCIEERD).

The product coincided with the Regional

Science and Technology Week celebration in Alaminos City, Pangasinan.

The launching was graced by the DOST officials, led by Science Secretary Fortunato T. de la Peña, Undersecretary for Regional Operations, Brenda L. Nazareth-Manzano, DOST-ITDI Director Anabelle Briones, DOST Region 1 Director Dr. Armando Q. Ganal and Felicidad M. Gan, the provincial science and technology director of pangasinan.

The I-Salt Project pilots an iodized salt processing model and design. It uses three technologies. One is the saturated brine feed reservoir, an evaporating setup which has 300 L per batch capacity and allows the production of finer salt with higher purity.

Next is the spin dryer that was designed to reduce the moisture of salt in accordance to Asin Act. This can process up to 75 kg per batch of salt even in humid and rainy conditions.

From the spin dr yer, salt will be transferred to iodizing machine, a portable screw-type machine, which is operated continuously with 750 kg per hour capacity.

This machine uniformly infuses iodine to the salt at the level of 30 ppm to 70 ppm.

De la Peña recalled that one of the identified targets during the industry forum conducted in Pangasinan last 2015 was the production of iodized salt, thus, the I-Salt Project for Infanta was approved to boost the product quality and productivity of local salt producers in Pangasinan. S&T Media Service

PHL TO HOST ASEAN SCIENCE MINISTERS MEETING

S

CIENCE ministers of Asean memberstates and other key leaders in the region are set to gather in Cebu for a series of meetings that will push forward for enhanced cooperation and harmonized strategies in the development of science, technology and innovation (STI) and its deployment for sustainable growth from October 15 to 19.

The D epar tment of S cience and Technology (DOST) is in charge of the event to deliver on the commitment of making STI regionally strong and integrated, globally excellent and responsive to the needs of the Asean population.

Likewise, the science agency will showcase unique Filipino heritage, inviting local micro, small and medium enterprises and other DOST-assisted projects for an exhibit that will promote their crafts to the foreign delegation.

Forums on health ethics, technology transfer, innovation promotion, and youth leadership in science, technology, engineering and mathematics are lined up, as well.

Last year’s meeting, held in Nay Pyi Taw, Myanmar, approved several STI projects worth thousands of dollars.

TO EXFOLIATE OR NOT TO EXFOLIATE: ARE YOU OVERWASHING YOUR FACE? F ACE cleansing used to be the most boring part of a skin-care regimen. Want bells and whistles? Better to look to the pricey moisturizer that comes in a faceted fauxcrystal jar. Need targeted skin-care solutions?

Look to potent serums and masks for results.

But with beauty customers more educated than ever, attention has turned toward the humble face cleanser. Korean and Japanese beauty regimens have introduced double- and even triple-cleansing routines.

Face-wash formulas come in a Willy Wonka variety of forms: foams and balms and gels, mousses, milks and clays. Add concentrated and exotic ingredients, and many of today’s cleansers have little in common with the old-school bar of soap.

To parse all the products and figure out the best solution for you, you’ll need the dermis of an armadillo. Good thing we’ve done some of the work for you.

The ideal cleanser

DON’T get distracted by slick marketing campaigns. According to Barbara Sturm, an aesthetic medical doctor in Germany who has a namesake skin-care line, the function of a daily cleanser should be straightforward.

It’s “to remove dead skin cells, oil, dirt and other pollutants from the skin, unclog pores, prevent skin conditions, such as acne, and

prepare the skin for the next step in your skin-care regimen.”

In reality, though, it’s a formulation challenge: A good cleanser must whisk away the bad stuff, yet magically leave your skin microbiome (that is, microorganisms that naturally live on your epidermis) relatively unscathed.

“Cleansing is really a delicate balance between hygiene and barrier damage,” said Amy Gordinier-Regan, the founder of Skinfix.

“It truly is the foundation of good skin care.

You can do more harm than good by using the wrong cleanser.”

up easily), can skew high on the pH scale (soap is generally between 9 and 10) and strip down the acid mantle.

The problem is that “the definition of ‘clean’ can be subjective,” Engelman said.

“If, after washing, your skin feels tight, dry or inflamed, that means the cleanser or cleansing mechanism was too strong, because, in addition to cleansing, the surfactant has broken down a significant number of bonds in your skin that form your skin barrier.”

That “squeaky clean” sensation many of us strive for is, she said, an unhealthy state for our skin to be in.

What’s the deal with pH?

Oil vs. water

PERHAPS you’ve seen it in product listings or on beauty blogs: It’s all about the pH. But how does that affect washing your face?

The idea is that if the cleanser mimics the skin’s naturally acidic pH (5.5), it will be more gentle on your skin’s acid mantle (the protective, slightly acidic layer made up of natural oils, dead skin cells and sweat).

The acid mantle is what maintains skin health and staves off bacterial infections, said Dendy Engelman, a dermatologist in Manhattan.

Unfor tunately, many traditional cleanser options, like soap and sulfatebased formulas (think: those that lather

DESPITE the huge number of cleansers on the market today, they basically break down into two categories: oil based and water based. “Oil-based cleansers can do a wonderful job of maintaining the skin barrier,” Gordinier-Regan said. Oils also help break down makeup.

But, she said, “an oil-based cleanser will always leave behind some residue, so you want to make sure the oils in the cleanser are not clogging your pores.”

If your skin is oily or prone to breakouts, Sturm suggests, look for a water-based gel or foam cleanser. The foaming aspect need not rely on sulfates. There are gentler surfactants

available (like decyl glucoside, which is often found in baby shampoos).

But even if the product is gentle, she said, “it is important to quickly apply moisturizer to avoid moisture loss through osmosis.”

You’ll want to avoid wipes when possible, though. While better than nothing, they are not a substitute for properly washing your face.

Environmental issues aside (they are one-use items that create waste), wipes “are not going to thoroughly cleanse,” said Hina Choudhary from the SkinCeuticals global scientific communications and medical relations team. “It’s essentially the same concept as using a wet wipe when you can’t find a sink to actually wash your hands. And a wipe will leave ingredients behind that may irritate the skin.”

What’s with triple cleansing?

DOUBLE and triple cleansing are ideas that sprang from the Korean and Japanese beauty crazes of recent years. The traditional K-beauty scenario involves using an oil-based cleanser to break down makeup. And because some makeup, especially waterproof and longwear formulas, is oil-based, it breaks down best with oil.

Then, because the oil cleanser leaves a residue, which is now mixed with the dirt

and makeup, you follow it with “a traditional water-based foaming cleanser, which removes the oils and butters that the balms or oils leave on skin,” said Tiffany Masterson, the founder of Drunk Elephant.

Problems pop up when you start washing with two water-based cleansers, which can result in over-cleansing (see more below).

If you have dry skin and want some oil residue, Masterson offers this hack: Use a water-based cleanser to get the grime off, then use the oil cleanser.

Really, should you wash just once a day?

IF you subscribe to Masterson’s theory on skin barrier maintenance, you should not be washing your face morning and night.

“If you have a good skin-care routine, you should cleanse at night to get the grime and makeup off,” she said. “Then add your serums and moisturizers, and while you’re sleeping, you’re nourishing your acid mantle. You don’t want to wash that off in the morning.”

Many people who have sensitive skin may simply be overwashing.

“The industry is trying to sell as much as possible,” Sturm said. Over-cleansing, she said, “takes the skin’s lipids away and destroys skin barrier function, which in turn allows

bacteria to enter and cause breakouts, redness, irritation, neurodermatitis and decreased natural resistance to UVA and UVB rays.”

Everyone should wash once a day, she said, and twice only if your skin tolerates it well.

To exfoliate or not to exfoliate

OVER-CLEANSING and over-exfoliating go hand in hand. Be wary of cleansers loaded with acids, Masterson said. “It’s completely gimmicky to add all those acids, because cleansers are a rinse-off product, and you’d want your glycolic acid, for example, to have the chance to penetrate.”

Sturm takes an even more conservative approach, noting the abuse of exfoliators. You should be exfoliating only one or two times a week no matter the form, she said.

Yet with exfoliating acids (glycolic, lactic, salicylic and more) in so many formulations now, you can easily over-exfoliate without meaning to. Engelman advises reading the ingredients lists closely.

“If you look at K-beauty or French beauty regimens, you’ll notice that exfoliating is only one step, if any,” she said. “The belief is that if you give your skin everything it needs to perform optimally, you won’t have to help it exfoliate itself. The truth is our skin naturally exfoliates itself through programmed cell turnover.” New York Times News Service

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

By Regina Garcia Cano

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The Associated Press

AS VEGAS—Major League Baseball (MLB) and the casino industry are entrenched in their views on a league proposal to get a cut from wagers placed on the sport following the repeal of a federal ban on sports betting earlier this year.

Representatives from both industries vigorously defended their believed right over the money wagered on Wednesday during a panel at the casino industry’s top trade show in Las Vegas. The MLB and other pro leagues haves asked for a percentage of the wagers, and casinos have strongly opposed any direct payments.

Kenny Gersh, the league’s executive vice president of gaming, told the crowd of casino executives that a proposed 0.25-percent fee—which some have dubbed an “integrity fee”—is essentially a royalty that casino companies should pay if they are going to make money off of the sport. He defended it as a case of “fairness” and partnership with casino operators.

“The state is going to designate these three, four, five very specific licensed entities: You guys get the right to make money from sports betting,” he said. “From a fairness perspective we think, if you are going to designate someone to be able to make money off of what at the end of the day is our sport and our events because if the Yankees weren’t playing the Red Sox last night, you are not betting on the Yankees and the Red Sox...we think we should be involved in that.”

A US Supreme Court decision in May allowed states to legalize sports betting. Sports books have since then opened in New Jersey, West Virginia and other states.

Professional sports leagues have failed so far to convince any state to build the fees into their laws.

Nevada, which has offered sports betting for years, does not pay an integrity fee.

“I mean, look, you want a cut of the revenue without any of the risk that’s associated with it,” Sara Slane, senior vice president of public affairs at the American Gaming Association, countered during the Global Gaming Expo. “That’s why we have to go through the regulatory process. We invest billions of dollars in buildings, in our licenses that cost us millions of dollars to go through. You want us to take that risk, pay you and then you are

Sports

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going to benefit on the back end, as well.... What you guys are proposing is not financially viable.”

The only thing Gersh and Slane agreed during the panel is their enemy: Bookies on the corner and illegal offshore betting sites. The American Gaming Association, which is the largest lobbying group for the casino industry, has estimated that at least $150 billion a year is wagered illegally on sports betting in the US. A grand jury in New Jersey, meanwhile, indicted former baseball star Lenny Dykstra on drug and other charges stemming from an altercation with an Uber driver in May. The indictment handed up Tuesday charges the former MLB all-star with cocaine and methamphetamine possession, and making terroristic threats.

All three are third-degree crimes and punishable by up to five years in prison.

Dykstra claimed the driver threatened and tried to kidnap him early on the morning of May 23 after Dykstra asked to change the trip’s destination. At a news conference a few weeks after the incident, Dykstra said the driver locked the car’s doors and sped up, and that he was “literally in fear of my life.”

The driver told a different story. He allegedly told police Dykstra held a gun to his head, though no weapon was found. Police said they found the drugs among Dykstra’s possessions.

Dykstra was arrested outside police headquarters in Linden, about 32 kilometers southwest of New York City, after the driver stopped and ran out of the car.

Dykstra faces an arraignment on a date to be determined. An attorney for Dykstra didn’t immediately return a phone message on Wednesday.

Dykstra played 12 seasons with the Philadelphia Phillies and New York Mets and was a member of the Mets’ 1986 championship team.

Since retiring from baseball, Dykstra has served prison time for bankruptcy fraud, grand theft auto and money laundering, and he declared bankruptcy in 2009, claiming he owed more than $31 million and had only $50,000 in assets.

Sunday, October 14, 2018

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LEAGUES SEEK ‘INTEGRITY FEE’

PEOPLE view the CrystalBetting sports betting terminal at the IGT booth during the Global Gaming Expo on Wednesday in Las Vegas. AP

Ancajas shopping around for potential challenger

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EIGNING World Boxing Council (WBC) superflyweight champion Srisaket Sor Rungvisai was, as advertised, dominant in his most recent outing.

Defending his world title for the first time in his home country of Thailand since regaining it over a year ago, Srisaket outboxed Mexican challenger Iran “MagnifiKO” Diaz en route to a unanimous-decision victory after 12 rounds of boxing action in the main event of ONE: Kingdom of Heroes recently.

Srisaket’s masterful dismantling of Diaz thrilled thousands of martial arts fans present at the Impact Arena in Bangkok, and it was also enough to earn the praise of a very interested observer.

Sitting in the crowd was none other than International Boxing Federation super flyweight champion

Jerwin “Pretty Boy” Ancajas, who was invited to witness the historic debut of boxing on the ONE Championship stage.

“Seeing boxing on this kind of stage is surreal. One Championship is the biggest martial arts organization in the world, and it’s no surprise that boxing feels right at home there,” Ancajas said.

“It was definitely an honor to be able to witness history. ONE Championship provides another avenue for boxers to showcase their skills and their talents on a massive stage. I congratulate ONE Championship on a successful first boxing match, and I certainly wish them even more luck in the future,” he added.

Besides watching history unfold, Ancajas also did some scouting against a possible future opponent.

Ancajas had nothing but good things to say about the Thai boxing superstar.

“It played out just as I expected. Don’t get me wrong, Iran Diaz is a great challenger, but Srisaket Sor

PGA of America inks 11-year deal with CBS, ESPN

T THE decision kicks off a two-year qualification process that would send Kerri Walsh Jennings to Tokyo 2020 a month before she turns 42, in partnership with Brooke Sweat, who is eight years younger.

Walsh Jennings pairs with Sweat for 2020 Tokyo

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HREE-TIME Olympic gold medalist Kerri Walsh Jennings, already the most decorated beach volleyball player in history, will pair with defensive star Brooke Sweat in an attempt to make it to the Summer Games for a sixth time.

The decision kicks off a two-year qualification process that would send Walsh Jennings to Tokyo in 2020 a month before she turns 42. Sweat, eight years younger, is a four-time AVP defensive player of the year who competed in Rio de Janeiro in her only Olympics.

“I was so excited that Brooke wanted to play,” Walsh Jennings said in an interview with The Associated Press.

“She’s literally a Jedi on defense. You can tell Brooke was born to play this game. She’s elevated every single partnership she’s ever had.”

A five-time Olympian—she also went to Sydney on the US indoor volleyball team—Walsh Jennings won three gold medals with Misty May-Treanor, who retired after the 2012 Games. Walsh Jennings paired with London silver medalist April Ross in 2016 and earned bronze, but the pair split when Walsh Jennings left the AVP over philosophical differences and formed

her own tour, called p1440.

The new partners will compete together for the first time from October 18 to 21 at the p1440 event in Las Vegas.

“I’m so excited to finally be on the same side of the net as Kerri,” Sweat told the AP. “I’m excited to play defense behind that block. She’s the best blocker, and it makes my job on defense way easier.”

Beach volleyball partners can take years to learn each other’s strengths and weaknesses, along with the quirks that emerge while traveling on a world tour that bounces among Europe, Asia and North and South America.

Walsh Jennings, nicknamed “Six Feet of Sunshine,” is a ruthless competitor, a relentlessly optimistic chatterbox, a Stanford graduate and now a budding mogul who formed her own tour rather than give up on her vision to grow the sport. Sweat grew up in Fort Myers, Florida, and stayed home to attend Florida Gulf Coast University rather than make the usual pilgrimage to the beach volleyball hub in Southern California.

“I probably will do most of the talking,” Walsh Jennings said with a laugh. “She’s a really grounded,

really good human being. If you have a problem with Brooke, you are just not a good human being.”

Sweat, who pronounced herself recovered from May rotator cuff surgery, attended the San Jose p1440 event last month as an spectator.

The two practiced together last week for the first time.

“It just confirmed what I’ve always thought about Kerri: She just raises the level of hard work and professionalism,” Sweat said. “I always want to show up for practices wanting to be the hardest worker on the court, and I think Kerri gives me a run for my money.”

Two-person teams qualify for the Olympics by earning points on the FIVB world tour over a two-year period that began in the spring. The two are starting at zero and will have to work their way up into the top two dozen—and be one of the top two US teams—to make it to Tokyo.

“I have no points on the qualification,”Walsh Jennings said. “It’s a new situation for me, which I don’t like.”

Sweat’s Olympic experience will be an advantage, Walsh Jennings said. AP

Rungvisai is just on a different level. You could feel that he was feeding off from the excitement of the crowd, and you could see that he wanted to put on a show for his home country. It was definitely a good match. I had fun watching it,” he said.

Being arguably the two of the best pugilists in the 115-pound weight class today, Ancajas and Srisaket appear to be headed for a collision course, and for the Filipino, it is only a matter of when and where.

Ancajas successfully retained his IBF crown six times, coming off a split draw against Mexican slugger Alejandro Santiago Barrios last September.

A title unification bout against Srisaket is definitely something that could be on the horizon for the 26-yearold Panabo, Davao del Norte native.

“That has the potential of being a really big fight, maybe the biggest fight in the super-flyweight division even. Definitely, we’d like to sit down with his camp and finally discuss it to get the ball rolling,” Ancajas said.

HE Professional Golfers’ Association (PGA) of America Championship will remain with CBS Sports and pick up a powerful partner in ESPN for weekday rounds as part of an 11-year agreement in which the networks will combine to deliver 175 hours of coverage across broadcast, cable and digital platforms.

Financial terms of the deal announced on Wednesday were not disclosed, though it was clear the PGA Championship is more attractive held in May than in August.

The agreement gives CBS and ESPN, which broadcast the Masters, the first two majors of the year.

“I can tell you from our standpoint, the property was more valuable in May than in August,” said Sean McManus, chairman of CBS Sports. “We are paying a rights fee increase.

It was definitely a more attractive package.”

McManus said the number of households watching on TV is higher in May, and he spoke of a “halo effect” in broadcasting the next major after the Masters, which is the highest-rated golf telecast of the year.

The PGA Championship had been held in August for the better part of 50 years. It moves next year to May as part of a restructured schedule that allows the PGA Tour to conclude its FedEx Cup on August 25, a week before the start of football.

When the CBS-ESPN deal begins in 2020, the PGA Championship will be at Harding Park in San Francisco.

CBS first broadcast the PGA Championship from 1958 through 1964, and continuously since 1991. The network will continue to provide weekend coverage, adding an extra hour Saturday and Sunday under the new deal.

“Premium content such as the PGA represents the past, present and future of CBS,” said Joe Ianniello,

president and acting CEO of CBS Corp. “There is nothing like live sports programming to attract a mass audience and drive our business.”

Still to be determined is a broadcast schedule for ESPN, which replaces Turner Sports.

ESPN offers a network dedicated to sports, along with “ESPN+,” a subscription-based streaming service sold directly to the consumer that can provide an array of programming from featured groups, featured players or specific hole coverage.

“The general vision here is what the PGA wants to do,” said Burke Magnus, executive vice president of programming and scheduling for ESPN. “They want every hole of competition covered over the four days, from the first group on Thursday. They want it all covered in one way or form. And that’s right in our wheelhouse.... We will have an array of complimentary presentation.”

CBS will be in charge of production, just as it is at the Masters.

The PGA of America’s current deal expires next year, and given the pursuit of live programming, it became a valuable property during negotiations. Along with the financial aspect, CBS Sports was helped by being the incumbent and having established a strong relationship with the PGA of America.

PGA of America Chief Executive Seth Waugh said partnering with ESPN provides “72 holes of coverage on a network known for sports.”

ESPN previously had weekday rounds of the US Open before those rights went to Fox Sports in 2015. It also had the British Open as recently as 2015, until those rights went to NBC Sports and Golf Channel. AP

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Sunday, October 14, 2018

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www.businessmirror.com.ph

BM graphics: Job RUZGAL

Mohammad from Iran Sees Malaysia for the First Time

By Danton Remoto

The leaves widen Like eyes wondering At these forests filled With inks of green (No more line of sand Merging with the sky) The ferns like fingers Splay in the sun And the orchids hang Like rainbows’ breath.

A hummingbird blurs In air cooler than the river.

A dragon fruit peeled Layer by layer Reveals flesh that is moist And red: An explosion on one’s tongue.

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Sunday, October 14, 2018

Tulip of Sinai

Mother and Child

I am the Moon

By Danton Remoto

By Jade-Ceres Violet Dolor Munoz

By Jade-Ceres Violet Dolor Munoz

(Thanks to Sir Muhammad Iqbal)

The children know where they belong

The grains of sand bound

on your body

The land like skin.

I walk alone in the Sinai,

As babies they fit just right

Lost in the whiteness.

in the cradle of your arms

Everything I see Has the color of skulls.

As toddlers, even in the dark they find

Like a mirage, I see a small oasis— The water is like a blue bowl—

And you are there, My tulip of Sinai, Alone and pure,

the crook of your neck or the curve of your waist upon which to lay an arm, a leg or a weary head Now 6, my little one Thinks my back is her surfboard Her legs readily hug my body

Drinking in the sight Of another lost traveler, Breathing the same,

Difficult air you breathe.

Danton Remoto is the Head of School of English and a Professor of Creative Writing and Literature at the University of Nottingham in Malaysia. He was a General Participant in Fiction at this year’s Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference held in Middlebury College, Vermont, USA. He has published three books of poetry as well as a novel titled Riverrun. He is at work on a second novel as well as a collection of short stories.

Screaming in delight mid-flight

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I am the moon I glow where there is darkness But only in fractions You see a crescent of me Afraid to show more Just a silver sliver The rest shrouded in darkness Take a peek at my mystery.

Some nights, I show you half Waning. Waxing.

Giving you some of me.

But never all of me.

Then there are nights, When I shine my brightest Heavy and full for all to see.

On nights like this, my love I want you to be the Bakunawa of Philippine lore.

The moon-eater.

I welcome you to Devour me.

Only then will I be Reborn.

The new moon begins again.

on this piggyback ride Intertwined mother and child Little arms wrap around me.

While my heart wraps Around her little finger.

Jade-Ceres Violet Dolor Munoz lives in Auckland, New Zealand with her husband and six-year-old daughter. She currently works as a digital marketing consultant specializing in SEO and Content Strategy. Jade has been writing fiction and poetry since her early teens. She studied AB Literature from De La Salle University and been working for over 15 years as a professional writer. She has written for a San Francisco-based broadsheet, several magazines, blogs and websites in Canada, the US, Australia and New Zealand. Jade started a movement in Auckland called Books on the Bus NZ – she and her husband have placed over 3,000 books in buses, trains, ferries, train stations and bus stops around New Zealand since starting it last year. She blogs about their family adventures at www.babyjetsetgo.com.

Tourism&Entertainment BusinessMirror

A10 Sunday, October 14, 2018

A toast to forever at Marco Polo Ortigas Manila

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EGIN the next chapter of your life by celebrating the most memorable day with Marco Polo Ortigas Manila’s wonderful offerings, making that once-in-a-lifetime event a beautiful start to forever. Marco Polo Ortigas Manila, the first and only five-star sky hotel in the Philippines, helps soon-to-weds celebrate their special day elegantly with the Serenity wedding package, offering the couple a generous hand from pre-wedding preparations up to the after-wedding gifts.

Kick off the festivities with a bachelor or bachelorette party at Vu’s Sky Bar and Lounge. Aside from an unobstructed view of the metropolis, Vu’s Sky Bar and Lounge also offers exclusive party package rates that deliver convenience and entertainment 45 stories high. Never stress out on the reception details as the hotel’s expert event professionals take charge and provide beautiful options for that fairytale dream wedding. The newlyweds can arrive in style with a choice of a luxurious Rolls-Royce Ghost. Set the mood right with complete lights and sounds, featuring a string trio to serenade the guests for an enchanting experience, as well as floral arrangements to make the event more spectacular. A complimentary three-layer wedding cake, followed by a toast of Moët & Chandon will be given as a token to celebrate couples’ new life as man and wife.

Keeping the once-in-a-lifetime

event perfect, the love birds will get to experience and enjoy the Marco Polo Way with the complimentary two-night accommodations in a suite room with breakfast for two at Cucina. The couple can also enjoy a 20-percent discount on food at any of the restaurants or bars of the hotel during the stay. The newlyweds can also enjoy a complimentary dinner for two at Cucina as a gift from the hotel on their first wedding anniversary.

The Marco Polo Grand Ballroom is at the 7th level of the hotel tower and can accommodate up to 300 persons for banquets and 500 persons for a cocktail reception. The 714-square-meter ballroom may be divided into two sections and has a pre-function area for events. It features elegant ceiling chandeliers and has a sizeable layout graced with natural daylight and 5-meter floor-to-ceiling glass windows, making it the perfect backdrop for conventions, meetings, seminars, parties and social affairs.

Celebrate and experience moments brought by remarkable celebrations with Marco Polo Ortigas Manila’s Meaningful Journeys fair on October 21 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Get to know more about the country’s finest stylists, designers, organizers and events professionals who will make intimate gatherings all the more special. Among the event’s many highlights is a special couture showcase by Vania Romoff.

ONCE UPON A TIME, A DIAMOND HOTEL HALLOWEEN EVENT

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N a land of princesses, villains, elves, dragons, and where heroes save the day, you can be just about anyone. On October 28, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Diamond Hotel Philippines, get ready to become part of a bedtime story filled with adventure, magic and a whole lot of fun. Find the secret to happy ever after in Once Upon a Time, A Diamond Halloween Event that comes with lots of surprises for all. Purchase your event ticket for only P1,000 net per person inclusive of a take-home snack box and access to the Halloween fairytale quests and activities. Wish upon a star and you might just win a Lego Grand Showcase in the Grand Raffle Draw!

Experience the thrill of your greatest adventure yet. Start your search for sweet treats or tricks around the hotel. For a fun and artsy kind of activity, unleash your creativity and join the kids for some arts and crafts making.

You may need some fairy dust along the way so head over the face painting or glitter tattoo booths for that shimmer fix. Make sure to keep all the good memories of the day with the

family and drop by at the photo booth for some snapshots. Catch enthralling live stage performances and don’t forget to visit the food and beverage stations for yummy delights. Wear your most charming fairytale costume for a chance to win a special prize!

The magic continues with the Enchanted Room Promo available from October 25 to November 5. Priced at P5,500 net per night, spend a blissful stay in a Deluxe Room inclusive of buffet breakfast for two, complimentary use of Health Club and Spa facilities, and swimming pool, Wi-Fi access, a 20-percent discount on food and beverage in all outlets, massage and laundry, and shuttle service on weekends to Intramuros, MOA and Robinsons Mall.

You may also avail yourself the room promo for only P6,000 nett per night and get one complimentary ticket to the Halloween event. Use the promo code ENCHANTED to book your stay from now until October 28 at www. diamondhotel.com. Room promos are applicable for local residents only and other conditions apply.

Editor: Carla Mortel-Baricaua

DO YOU HAVE WHAT IT TAKES TO CONQUER MOUNT RINJANI?

We don’t always make it to the top

THE start of the trek was easy enough with views of the mountain at a distance.

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Story & photos by Joshua Berida

SIGNED up for a trek to Mount Rinjani just before my trip around Lombok concluded.

I kept pushing it to a later date because of the mixed reviews from who went before. Some said the hike was easy, others said it was difficult, and there are those who were in between. Eventually, I looked for the best value package among the travel agencies that included porter, food and tents, chose one and decided to go.

The driver picked me up before sunrise for the tour; the car went up a serpentine road. I didn’t realize where we were as I was drifting in and out of sleep, and before I knew it we arrived at the jump-off point.

The start of the trek was easy enough, flat surface that cuts through bucolic villages in Lombok’s countryside. I could see Mount Rinjani from a distance, its peak obscured by clouds and the hazy mid-morning light. I was in a group with French and Danish hikers and an Indonesian guide; we exchanged small talk and pleasantries about where we’ve been, how long we will stay and where we’re going next.

As the trail went further into and up the mountain, the tougher the trek was. In steep ascents loose dirt and scree challenged my already weakening legs and resolve.

“Why did I do this again?” I often asked myself during the trek. I lagged behind our group, who were always a couple of minutes ahead; every time I caught up, they were about to leave.

I reached the first campsite on a flat surface of the volcano’s crater.

The sight of the turquoise waters of

the lake below, and the light of blue hour striking the rock formations and the mountain’s craggy and dog gnawed-like surface were worthwhile rewards for this part of the trek.

Our group called it a night early to get enough rest for the final assault to the summit. The night wasn’t completely dark; the stars and moon were out, partially illuminating the lake below and the trail in front of us in patches of black and white. With only a couple of hours sleep, we were on our way to Rinjani’s peak.

The initial ascent was my most difficult climb to date. My foot sunk with each step; it was like taking two steps back with each step forward. We also had to worry about the precipice as we ascended.

The freezing temperature numbed my hands and my face. It didn’t help that I was wearing lighter-thanusual clothing for such a trip. I wasn’t even wearing pants and only had a leather jacket over my light, long-sleeved shirt.

I heard another hiker shout “spirit!” I opined that she meant to keep going, but I thought to myself “my spirit’s on a poolside lounge chair, sipping a glass of cold mango juice instead of freezing in the dark with a chance of dying.” I passed other hikers who were nice enough to offer something to eat or drink and a lighter to somehow keep my hands warm; for a moment we cared about each other, even if we were strangers.

It took several grueling hours to make it just halfway through to

AS we made our way up, the clouds begin to veil the trail below us.

AT the campsite, the summit we’re supposed to ascend looms over us.

THE sunset’s blue hour tinges the crater into an orangey hue.

HERE’S the last look of the crater-lake’s cerulean waters before descending.

the peak. A glimmer of light was already peeking through the clouds.

After losing track of time, I realized that it was almost sunrise. I looked up at the remaining kilometer or so and thought about the remaining

arduous trail, then turned around and gazed at the path back to camp.

I watched the sunlight ascend the ridge, then I made my decision.

I didn’t make it to the top, only one guy did out of the five of us.

I told myself I could’ve pushed and tried harder, given more time, if the guide wasn’t always worried about the schedule and all other reasons. However, looking back, these didn’t matter. If I was so concerned about making it to the summit, and adding it to the checklist of mountains conquered, I would’ve missed out on what made Mount Rinjani truly beautiful; the craterlake and its azure waters, the way the sunlight fell on the cusp of the crater and the ridge of the mountain, turning its ash, brown surface into a fiery red, and the way the stars and moon lit up the surroundings into a black and white hue, or the nice strangers I’ve met.

It was never just about the destination (of course, it would’ve been nice to reach the summit, though), it was always has been the journey and everything that happened along the way.

OGNJEN STEVANOVIC | DREAMSTIME.COM

Pinoy youths perk up coffee-shop trend

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AGUIO CITY—Coffee consumption in the country has surged, with millennials willing to shell out P100 just for a cup.

Agriculture Undersecretary for HighValue Crops Evelyn Laviña shared this observation at the opening of a four-day coffee exposition here last week.

“Our millennials are willing to shell out P100 or more in whatever innovative concoctions they prefer to have their coffee—traditional, plain, brewed, espresso, or blended, such as cappuccino, latte, macchiato,” Laviña said in a message read by Cameron Odsey, Cordillera regional executive director of the Department of Agriculture (DA). “They are populating our coffee-scape and they know how coffee smells, tastes and looks like, and we need to take notice.”

Raul Paz, deputy director of the Philippine Center for Postharvest Development and Mechanization (PhilMech), shared the same view.

“There is a growing market for the ground and roasted coffee, especially for the millennials, who have developed the ‘love for coffee,’” he said on the sidelines of the event organized by the DA and PhilMech. “There are lots of coffee shops in the country. There is a growing demand for the roasted and ground coffee, and the value is higher than the green beans.”

He said coffee shops that mushroomed all over the country are frequented mainly by young people.

Filling up

LAVIÑA also noted that popular American coffee brands have become a favorite among millennials. Recently, a Vietnamese coffee chain has opened in the country.

“Ironically, and this is where the problem and opportunity lie,” she said. “They [coffee shops] source out 95 percent of their Arabica from Brazil, Indonesia, Kenya, Colombia, Vietnam and others.”

The Philippines is unable to produce and meet the high demand for coffee.

Helen Martinez, PhilMech’s supervising science research specialist, cited a study made two years ago saying 70 percent of the coffee consumed in the country are imported.

“The coffee that we consume in the Philippines is more than what we produce,” Martinez said. She cited the Philippine Coffee Inc. as saying the country is importing 5,000 metric tons of coffee annually to meet the growing demand of coffee drinkers.

A STORE selling different blends of coffee in Baguio City.

Experts said if local growers could not fill up the rising demand for coffee, they could at least make up in terms of quality.

Martinez said local coffee growers “can produce for local coffee shops.”

“It may not be enough, but we can compete in terms of taste and quality using technology,” she added.

Perking up

MARTINEZ said the country’s coffee industry must at least try to capture the local market, especially the emerging millennial consumer sector and foreign tourists, who are coffee drinkers.

Even if local coffee is only available in the Philippines, we are already global, as many tourists come in and out of our borders, Martinez said in Filipino. They want to taste the locally produced coffee and not the coffee that comes from their own countries, she added.

Martinez’s expertise is in rural development and development of business models for community-based coffee-processing enterprise.

She said 60 percent to 70 percent of coffee production in the Philippines comes from the small farmers, who just practically use their backyards to grow the commodity.

This, she said, is where PhilMech comes into the picture.

“We want to preserve our harvest na hindi sana matatapon dahil poor ang quality na kahit konti hindi siya mawawalan ng silbi

2 BusinessMirror

dahil kaya natin i-improve ang quality using technology [Even if our harvest is small, this won’t go into waste because we can improve its quality with the use of technology],” she said. “Quality is the name of the game now, as it has always been,” Laviña further stressed. “Only now, we just need to pay attention to it because the stakes are much higher.”

Martinez said PHilMech organizes small farmers and backyard growers into organizations. The small farmers bring their little produce for consolidation to the organization or cooperative’s total production, which are sold together.

Through this scheme, she said, small farmers are enticed to sell their minimal produce to the organization, rather than simply stock this in their homes.

“A farmer would not invest much in mechanization and processing. They cannot afford it,” she explained. “But one way to do it is consolidation of the production through community-based production and processing of coffee.”

Cordillera coffee

THE coffee industry in Cordillera is pushing for its Arabica blend of coffee.

“We are pushing for the production of the Arabica type because we really have an advantage there,” according to Odsey.

“They say we produce the best quality because of our elevation and other factors,” he added.

According to experts, Arabica tastes bet-

OCTOBER 14, 2018

ter if planted on high elevation, specifically 800 meters above sea level. Most of the Arabica production in Cordillera comes from Benguet province, Mountain Province and parts of Ifugao. A little comes from the highland villages in Kalinga and Abra provinces.

“The premium quality comes from us,” Odsey said. But the problem is the limited production of the region, he explained.

“Ang problema, kulang ang production kasi wala naman tayong malalaking plantation areas at kung meron, pailan-ilan lang, mostly backyard [Our problem is the limited production because we do not have big plantation areas. There are few, but most are backyard farms],” he said.

Odsey said on the average, a coffee tree produces a third of a kilo per year.

But if the production is raised to 1 kilogram, which is possible through technology, he said, it would be a big boost to the region’s production.

He said DA-Cordillera is now encouraging farmers to plant more coffee trees, together with their other major crops.

“We give quality seedlings to the groups we form,” Odsey said. “We distribute these and we teach them how to rejuvenate old trees, which are no longer productive, with the use of technology.”

For postharvest, the DA also provides equipment to cooperatives and organizations that consolidate their backyard produce, so they could process the beans— from the removal of the skin, drying, roasting, grinding, down to the packaging. PNA

BusinessMirror

MUSIC

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SPLENDIO TRITUS

ALL ABOUT MUSIC, FAMILY

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by Darwin Fernandez

ELONGINGNESS in a family is one of the few things permanent in this world.

Whatever we may go through, we always involve our kin in the things we love to do.

The strong bonds shared by the Ferrer family are the sources of the band Splendio Tritus’ purpose in its music. The four-piece ensemble “officially” became a collective in

2012. It is composed of Nicolle (guitar and vocals), Josiah (or Josh) (bass and vocals), Iazelle (drums) and Yhaele (keyboard and vocals), and is under the loving

release of their first single Be Who U Wanna Be, the band is well on their way in completing their 2018 goal of finishing their EP, Don’t Ever Let Them Pull U Down.

Where it started

support of their parents and managers Florie and Agripino (or “Agree”) Jr. With combined vocals and their own take on modern rock, the young quartet performs renditions of hit songs that would play in your head well past bedtime. And with the recent

MORE than the sheer joy of playing music and admiration for the works of The Corrs, System of a Down, and Parokya ni Edgar, the band was mainly formed to support for their brother Josh.

At the age of 2 Josh was diagnosed with autism and had to undergo early speech and occupational therapies.

As soon as their youngest Yhaelle had learned to play the keyboard, the music of Splendio Tritus was born.

“The forming of the band was more spontaneous than planned,” Yhaelle Continued on page 4

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OCTOBER 14, 2018 | soundstrip.businessmirror@gmail.com

MUS

with this first track.

‘Oh Giliw’

Splendio...

from page 3

said. “All we really had in mind was to use music to help Josh. We didn’t actually know it would come to

this point. It’s pretty cool,” the sixth grader added.

From live concerts in their living room, to jamming with other indie bands on concert grounds, their simple act of

caring has come a long way and has been successful in improving Josh’s condition, as Iazelle described.

“After we first performed in public, he has improved a lot,” Iazelle assured. “He became more sociable and more enthusiastic about playing in the band.”

Josh also sees possibilities of their music going beyond the stage, and on to the big screen as a movie soundtrack.

Balanced, perfect

PERHAPS the best view of the family comes from the eldest, Nicolle, who had recently turned 18.

It was during her debut day when they unveiled their first single. Clips from her life-event were also the material used for the song’s video.

Despite being surrounded by so much love and appreciation, she remains honest on what her family is. “Like all families, we aren’t perfect,” she said when describing them as more than just band mates.

“We do tend to have our ups and downs; a few misunderstandings,” she recounted. “[There are] days when one of us cries, and when we literally compliment ourselves. [We] jump with happiness after we finish learning a song and play it perfectly, and [there are also moments] when we just joke around and laugh at each other’s goofiness.”

“Honestly, we like our life; [it’s] one with balance,” she went on to say. “It’s what we consider ‘perfect,’ and we thank God for giving us such.”

Composing the words and music, Nicolle was clear in the message of their lyrics, and what the band represents in their EP

MUSIC does run deep in the family, as shown by their parents, whose relationship goals are one for the romantics.

The song “Oh Giliw” was made about 23 years ago back before they were married, and far from each other. Many years later, they were to see the actual song they made performed by their children. The new single’s release was scheduled on October 8, on the exact day of the couple’s wedding anniversary.

Splendio means, “we shine;” and Tritus, “though worn.” It’s the family’s motto, which goes to show that more than their creative minds, their music takes inspiration from those close to their hearts. Josh wonderfully puts it by paraphrasing a verse from the Bible’s New Testament, particularly St. Paul’s Epistle to the Philippians: “Regardless of the trials in our everyday lives, family continues to support each other, to make sure that we continue to radiate the best versions of ourselves,” Josh proclaimed. “Whenever they see our [band’s] name, we want them to think about family.”

(To support these young talents of OPM, visit their web site http://www. splendiotritus.com/, and be updated of their releases by liking Facebook page Splendio Tritus Music.)

d trip

soundstrip.businessmirror@gmail.com | OCTOBER 14, 2018

SIC ON PRINT

Grindcore band Maticrust rocks the desert, Europe

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by Rick Olivares

ANY Filipinos have gone abroad to work not only to support their families, but also fulfill their dreams. Some of them are also bent to play music.

Meet Maticrust, an extreme grindcore (a meld of extreme heavy metal and hardcore punk) four-piece based in Dubai, where the band was formed and all four members are now based. Don Collado (vocals) and Dennis Tana (guitars) are both Filipinos; the other half, Nishit Ramesh (bass) and Rippon Madtha (drums), are Indian.

Outside their gigs, Collado makes a living as a graphic designer. Tana is an estimator who handles data.

Ramesh is a sales team leader, while Madtha works with an external affairs department of a company handling public relations and communications.

Within Maticrust’s five-year history, it had first release, “Their Lies,” by American underground label Placenta Records in 2014, and a ninetrack, cassette-tape issue on the Polish label Extreme Terror Productions.

The band has performed in Dubai, Malaysia, the Czech Republic, the United Kingdom. Last year, the quartet made a triumphant two-date debut on Philippine soil, the first of which was at Malate’s old Darkside Bar in July 2017.

The venue was packed that evening as fans braved the inclement weather to catch two of their rockin’ compatriots who just had a two-night show in the country (the next one was in Pampanga). They also had a local full-length release, Inhumane World Deprivation Year, via underground label Threshold Records during their local shows.

The band at that time was coming off a stint in the Obscene Extreme Festival in the Czech Republic, where they were one of 60-plus bands who performed in the five-day-long concert.

For Collado, he is still amazed at their unlikely journey. During their show in Manila, the lead growler reflected on such: “Kakaiba yung kapalaran ng banda namin na sa ibang bansa muna kami nagsimula at nakahanap ng opportunity.”

Much to Collado’s surprise that even in an Continued on page 6

PHOTO BY CHI BALURAN

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MUSIC ON PRINT

SoundSampler | by Tony M. Maghirang

Sunday delights featuring Tide/Edit, Paul McCartney, The Nexxus, Bruno Major

TIDE/EDIT All My Friends

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HE band’s Bandcamp page welcomes you with: “We are tide/edit and we play happy music.” Happiness is such a warm gun that over the course of their sophomore album, the Pinoy indie quartet fires up smile-inducing slices of carefully constructed post-rock.

The progressive rock fixation of most post-rockers is all over the new album, although not in the technical/ djent/mathy craftsmanship of the genre’s better-known international counterparts. Where ascending epic chords and pummeling drums are the norm, Tide/Edit keeps the chords in forward motion—for lack of a better description—and the backbeat, on a typical jangle. If you know loud-soft dynamics, theirs is soft-a little loud-soft nuances.

For a good part of the album, there’s fire kindling in the happy conjugation of chords and rhythms you’ve likely heard before recalling the post-new wave jangle pop of Aztec Camera and The Smiths. To their credit, Tide/ Edit tries and successfully executes a number of stylish disruptions from the standard operating procedure of their chosen genre and skirts what could be a formulaic drive into well-trodden territory. Top-of-mind would have to be the elegant Mr. Crame, the weirdly rocking Twelve and the somber mood turns to rumble riffola of Afterglow.

At heart, All My Friends is the catchiest thing you’d get this time of the year aside from common colds. It’s also a welcome break from all the shenanigans that’s growing fiercer and bloodier each week.

Grindcore...

PAUL MCCARTNEY Egypt Station

THE NEXXUS The Nexxus 2.1: A New Beginning

from page 5

Arab state (moderate though in its views), there was an underground music scene that thrived with a lot of the audiences, locals and expats. “Mas active yung scene now than before, but iba’t-iba

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HE Nexxus is a ‘90s OPM band that specialized in toothpaste commercial-worthy songs like I’ll Never Go and I Keep On Saying. You’ll likely to hear them every once in a while if you still tune in to radio stations that laugh at themselves and their audience.

The five-piece group comes out of semiretirement this year and puts out a new eight-track album that’s supposed to mark a fresh start. Pleased to report that The Nexxus’ flair with hooks remains intact; a bit sad to say though that none of their new materials can match the gleaming sparkle of I’ll Never Go, a pinnacle of songwriting prowess.

Instead, “A New Beginning” aspires for true poprock revival within the formulaic wimp wing of Pinoy rock. The synth covers a lot space in most songs to establish the slow rock mood, although in “Minsan” and “Ikaw,” the guitars and drums conspire to push mere love songs into rock and roll territory not heard since the last boy band revival bannered by Bamboo.

Listen to how vocalist Jason Singcol makes trite lyrics like “Ikaw ang buhay ko…” sound hot and burning under the cover of his compadres’ poaching of Van Halen by way of Survivor.

Decades after their acclaimed hit songs, The Nexxus isn’t producing the most original music. They have however ambled into a variety of ways to broaden their sonic palette without losing their original essence.

yung style ng music.”

“Dati ang genre lang dito is trash metal, death metal, hardcore and punk rock. Now, lahat ng styles,” he added. “Gulat nga ako accepted yung mga extreme styles lalo na sa Arabs na gusto nila ng extreme kumpara sa karamihan

H

ARDCORE Beatles fans will find it difficult to separate solo Sir Paul McCartney’s music from those of the genre-busting Fab Four where he once butted heads literally and figuratively with the late temperamental John Lennon.

Case in point: the opening piano of I Don’t Know slips in the nostalgic whiff of Let It Be. Follow up Come To Me resonates with something like smooth blend of “Lady Madonna” and “Obladi-Oblada” but by midsection, the fiery pysch-soul horns blow the memory away.

Thereafter, the acoustic reverie in Happy With You, with its intimations of our musical idol drinking too much and getting stoned, sets listeners to less starry zones. A bit of ZZ Top’s blues rock swagger in Who Cares, dalliance with bossa nova in Back In Brazil featuring a sideways wink at Stevie Wonder, a noisy jam in Caesar Rock and a final number, Hunt You Down/Naked/C-Link that slides from ‘80s pop-metal to a waltzy holding pattern to electric blues rock, completes the cavalcade.

In an interview, McCa’s one-time collaborator Kanye West said the latter has a little more angst than he—something in the mold of Lennon. Some critics inferred from Kanye’s observation that music-making for McCartney is as natural and easy as breathing air.

In reality, the Beatles’ bassist, now 76 years old, admits he looks at life with humor and an easygoing attitude. He has his own way of growing old gracefully and continues to charm the socks off everyone who ever loved the Beatles.

dito na into rap music. Gusto rin nila maging unique kaya yung iba, into extreme music talaga.”

Maticrust was also fortunate to have performed alongside their heroes from India and Germany: Gutslit and Stillbirth. “We delivered a solid performance that night, September 21, in Dubai,” related

BRUNO MAJOR A Song for Every Moon

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NGLISHMAN Bruno Major writes and sings tearjerkers. No, not the kind that warbles about queen of hearts and such crap, but like Home off his latest album.

In an emotional delivery accompanied by an acoustic guitar, Major starts, “There’s no life, without love anyway/You’re a mystery to me some days… / That’s what keeps me sane.” In the chorus, his voice dripping with sadness moves to a higher pitch: “I don’t need to build a house of stone… / Wherever you are’s where I call home.”

Home is the centerpiece of Major’s new album. Strategically, it divides the record into two parts: the first half steeped in pop balladry, and the second part flirting with blues, jazz and a little Billy Joel fascination via Just The Same. Penultimate track Fair-Weather Friend even imagines Gottye and Paul Simon harmonizing over a doo-wop remake.

The simple playing is first-rate, the materials are strong and the production, unfussy. Major is the latest argument that good love songs and great singers can still make the world go ‘round.

(Karpos Live presents Bruno Major in Mix 3 of 2018 at the Vertis Tent, Ayala Vertis North Complex in Quezon City on October 23, which will also feature chanteuse Jess Connelly.)

Collado. “We are overwhelmed because hindi man kami wellknown, nabibigyan kami ng chance tumugtog abroad para ma-express passions namin.”

A tour of Australia early next year and the recording of new tracks for another release are in the works for the band.

Ex-bootlegger makes billions navigating Putin’s booze barriers

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USSIA’S very sober president, Vladimir Putin, has spent 18 years erecting barriers to selling alcohol to a population that’s still recovering from the decade-long bender that followed communism’s collapse.

Crackdowns on kiosks and ads, electronic inventory tracking and higher taxes have all succeeded in suppressing consumption. They’ve also cleared the field for a Soviet-era bootlegger with a knack for navigating complex rules to make a fortune selling cheap booze.

Sergei Studennikov opened his first discount liquor store near the gritty industrial hub of Chelyabinsk on the Asian side of the Ural Mountains a dozen years ago. Today, his Krasnoe & Beloe chain is the fastestgrowing major retailer in the country, with 6,700 outlets in 57 of 85 regions, a rollout that intensified during the longest economic slump of Putin’s rule.

A sales jump of about 50 percent to 215 billion rubles ($3.3 billion) last year and another 40 percent this year has turned the former wholesaler into Russia’s newest billionaire, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. And with funding from state-run banks including Sberbank and VTB, Studennikov, who got a taste of profit selling illegal vodka amid an anti-alcohol campaign in the 1980s, said he has no intention of slowing down.

“We’re opening an average of six new stores every day,” the media-averse tycoon said in an interview in the lobby of a hotel in the Russian capital, where he spends so much time discussing often contradictory regulations with officials that he’s moving his headquarters here next year.

Breakneck expansion THE breakneck expansion puts Krasnoe & Beloe, or Red & White, on pace to overtake Dixy and Auchan and challenge Lenta for third place among Russian chains by 2021, according to Infoline, a Saint Petersburg-based research group. Market leaders X5 and Magnit, which have spent years studying each other’s strategies, now have a self-proclaimed negotiating whiz to contend with.

Studennikov’s no-frills business is based on tacking a small array of food items onto a larger assortment of beverages rather than the other way around. An obsession with margins means shelf space is allocated to whichever supplier offers the cheapest price. The mix may vary, but the number of

A WORKER carries boxes beside a Krasnoe & Beloe delivery van. BLOOMBERG products is held at about 1,300, almost twothirds of which contain alcohol.

It’s a model that isn’t just making Studennikov rich. It’s upending the whole supermarket industry, Infoline chief Ivan Fedyakov said.

“Alcohol has been the most profitable category for the largest food retailers, but Krasnoe & Beloe is disrupting the market,” Fedyakov said. “It’s offering a wider range of beer, wine and spirits at lower prices and even taking on the grocery chains on their own turf by selling food.”

Basic foodstuffs A TYPICAL Krasnoe & Beloe store offers 800 types of alcohol, including imports such as Corona beer, Jack Daniel’s whiskey and Barton & Guestier wine—when the bulk price is right. Roughly 400 are basic foodstuffs like coffee, milk and sausages, with the rest a hodgepodge of cigarettes and whatever Studennikov can get a good deal on, be it barbecue grills or toys.

He drives a relentlessly hard bargain, with suppliers as well as his 100,000-plus employees. Former shop assistants, who are paid as little as 25,000 rubles ($380) a month in some regions, say they often had to pay for unsold inventory at the end of every month, a practice he’s defended as motivational.

Even the standard storefront in most regions is cheap—sheets of building material painted half red, half white. That gives the outlets, which have a selling space of just 80 square meters, not much more than the average two-bedroom apartment, a kind of retro-Soviet look befitting the brand itself.

Asking someone if they wanted red or

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white when Studennikov, 51, came of age, meant wine or vodka. These days, after the millennial-led shift away from spirits, it means the same in Russia as it does just about everywhere else.

“The most efficient retailer is the one who offers a limited assortment—like Aldi does in Europe,” Studennikov said.

“Having too many items to choose from raises costs that are ultimately passed on to consumers.”

Cherry-picking strategy THE newly minted billionaire said it’s not all about making money. He also aims to change what he called Russian “attitudes” toward drinking, a history of using alcohol as a way to tune out life.

One thing he’s doing that competitors aren’t is selling makes of wine that are already rated by international experts.

The cost of the service adds as much as 30 percent to wholesale prices in the industry’s fastest-growing segment, but he said he’s consistently able to sell decent vintages for less than the ruble equivalent of $15 a bottle.

Studennikov uses the same cherrypicking strategy for food as does for wine and miscellaneous items. He sells Jacker, for example, a Malaysian brand of potato chip, instead of Kellogg Co.’s better-known Pringles because it’s much cheaper and the quality is similar. He doesn’t have the space to offer both.

But it’s beer, the biggest alcohol segment, that offers the clearest indication of which distributors are offering Studennikov the steepest discounts. Krasnoe &

OCTOBER 14, 2018

Beloe carries only a handful of products made by Carlsberg A/S, the biggest brewer in Russia. It sells a much wider variety of brands from Anheuser-Busch InBev SA, a laggard in the once-booming domestic market.

Flavor of life

PUTIN has overseen one of the world’s steepest declines in alcohol use in the past decade, yet Russians still drink about 80 percent more than the worldwide average, 11.7 liters of pure alcohol a year, according to the World Health Organization. The UN body said its latest global status report that Russia’s level of “heavy episodic drinking” continues to be “very high.”

Russia has long been plagued by alcoholism in part because vodka has always been cheap. The government instituted a price floor for retail sales in 2009 only to cut it slightly during the depths of the recent recession to discourage the proliferation of often deadly moonshine. But at less than $3, the minimum price for a half-liter bottle is still less than a Burger King Whopper.

Studennikov said he fully supports stricter oversight of the industry in part because it’s dealt a body blow to the black market. Tougher rules have also helped repair some of the catastrophic demographic damage the country suffered during the chaos of the 1990s, when economic and emotional depression drained six years off the average man’s life.

“Alcohol should be a flavor of life,” he said. “Look at Italy and France, where people just enjoy wine and don’t drink themselves to death.” Bloomberg

Kaspersky Lab warns freelancers vs. RATs

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YBERCRIMINALS love people in HR departments, because their job includes opening files that come from unknown sources—CVs, application materials and so on.

KASPERSKY LAB

And these files quite often contain something malicious. You know who’s in the same boat, for the very same reason?

Freelancers.

Freelancers also have to communicate with a lot of people they don’t know personally and open files that come from who knows where, be it text for translation, technical documentation for a coding project, or a description for a picture they are supposed to draw. That makes freelancers an easy target for cybercriminals of all sorts.

Malicious

SECURITY researchers recently noticed an active campaign targeting people on web sites for freelancers, such as Fiverr and freelancer. com. A group of cybercriminals was contacting people registered on those services saying they had a job they wanted done and that the details were in the attached file.

It actually was a .doc file, not an executable, and that convinced at least some of the victims that it was safe to open.

But a very specific thing may be wrong with Office documents: macro malware or malicious software hidden in macros used in Microsoft Office files. When people open such files, they are prompted to enable macros and some of them comply. After that— in the case of the recent campaign—the program installs a “keylogger” or a remote access Trojan (RAT) on their computer.

With keylogger or a RAT installed on your computer, the crooks can see everything you type, including your logins and passwords, which allows them to steal your accounts and your money.

A similar malicious campaign was allegedly spotted on LinkedIn and on Alibaba.

Being a freelancer has advantages, but there are huge drawbacks as well, and adding increased interest from cybercriminals to the mix can turn the burden of being a freelancer into something unbearable.

Here are some steps to protect yourself from different kinds of threats.

1 Do not install any software a client or potential client wants you to install, unless you download it from official sources and make sure that it doesn’t give the client ac-

MILLENNIALS UNIVERSE

By Vernon Velasco

T

HERE are a lot of things that are forever showing up on my newsfeed like “Five Ways to Avoid Testicular Cancer,” etc.

The thing with these articles is that they’re very specific and, for the record, I didn’t ask for it. Someday I may contract

cancer, sure. Does it really have to grow in my cojones?

But no matter how unlikely, still, there’s a part of me that says this can be God’s punchline, telling me that I should evaluate my life. Do I ride a bike with no handlebars à la Lance Armstrong? Did I teethe too hard?

Every so often, I would cross-check some of my phantom pains with symptoms of diseases on Google. Oftentimes the results would strike me as scary. Once, as per my own research, I had what I diagnosed as a bunion, which I gleaned would likely result in serious complications and—

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cess to your computer.

2 Do not open any “.exe” or other executable files. They might be malicious.

In case you absolutely need to do that, check those files first with an antivirus tool.

3 Do not enable macros in Microsoft Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, Power­Point presentations and so on.

Macros are basically executables hidden in files and malefactors love to fool people by sending seemingly innocent documents that actually contain malware.

4 Do not fall for phishing. Crooks may be interested in gaining access to your accounts on some web sites because that will also grant them access to th e money you’ve earned using these services.

Gaining access into your account might

also result in damage to the reputation you’ve worked so hard to build. So watch out for misspelled sites and letters that urge you to relogin or send your credentials to someone for any reason.

5 When being paid directly, do not send anyone photos of your credit cards. Also do not disclose information such as expiration date or CVC/CVV code (three digits on the back of your card). That information is never necessary to get paid.

It’s OK to send the banking information (such as your card number) when someone needs to pay you but it’s better to do that using secure encrypted channels.

6 Install a reliable security solution that will protect you from malware, phishing, spam and other cyber threats.

Hypochondriac gasp!—ultimately lead to sudden death!

If these don’t warrant a call to the emergency hotline, they call for very radical changes. Aside from cutting back on sugar and MSG, I also learned from these articles that some seemingly “healthy” food are actually bad for you.

For instance, you can put your finger on salad dressings for a flaccid penis; organic ketchup causes your pink parts to lose their glow.

With hair loss, I took the words of the balding and basked in their wisdom. Someone from an online forum attributes his receding hairline to lack of protein and iron

OCTOBER 14, 2018

and zinc. He said he’s done a thorough research.

He also said he does surmise his huge appetite for pasta and certain kinds of dessert can also be culprits, and then remembers he once mistook his mom’s feminine wash for shampoo.

I’m not sure if that poses any problem.

But I’m sure a scientific study on the matter will come along and show up on my feed.

Vernon Velasco is a regular contributor to the BusinessMirror. The views Velasco expressed in his column do not necessarily reflect those of the BusinessMirror’s.