BusinessMirror March 13, 2015 by BusinessMirror

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2014 BUDGETARY SHORTFALL FELL TO ONLY 0.6% OF GDP AS infra buildup FAILED TO MATERIALIZE

Underspending evident in deficit drop By David Cagahastian

Mayweather, Pacquiao begin countdown to their big fight

he budgetary shortfall in 2014 totaled only P73.1 billion, equal to 0.6 percent of local output, measured as the gross domestic product (GDP), and significantly better than the programmed deficit of 2 percent of GDP.

The Department of Finance on Thursday said last year’s deficit proved 55 percent lower than the previous year, as most of the planned infrastructure buildup program failed to materialize. Revenue collection for 2014 amounted to P1.908 trillion, which was 5 percent lower than target, although this was also 11 percent higher than collections the year before. Tax revenues aggregated P1.72 trillion, while revenues from nont a x sou rces tot a led on ly P188.1 billion. The Bureau of Internal Revenue collected P1.335 trillion in 2014, an improvement by P118.1 billion from collections in 2013. The Bureau of Customs (BOC) missed its collection target by 10 percent, collecting only P369.3 billion. However, in terms of growth, the BOC led all other agencies with a year-on-year growth of 21 percent from its collection in 2013. Bureau of the Treasury income amounted to P93.4 billion. This was 66 percent higher than its target, and 15 percent more than in 2013. Its Continued on A2

By Tim Dahlberg The Associated Press

Boxers Manny Pacquiao (right) and Floyd Mayweather Jr. pose for photos during a news conference on Wednesday in Los Angeles. The two are scheduled to fight in Las Vegas on May 2. Related story on C1. AP/Jae C. Hong

OS ANGELES—Manny Pacquiao was out walking the red carpet by the time Floyd Mayweather Jr. arrived, fashionably late for their first appearance together to promote a fight that really needs no promoting. But it didn’t take long on Wednesday for Mayweather to put the fight into perspective in a way that only a fighter nicknamed “Money” can. “You get to this level where you’re making nine figures in 36 minutes,” Mayweather said, “and you have to be a winner.” Mayweather had the math right, though he declined to say just how much he will make in the May 2 fight that has stirred excitement far beyond the boxing community. He will get 60 percent of the purse in what is expected to be boxing’s richest fight ever, a haul that could exceed $120 million for Mayweather alone. See “Big fight,” A2

5.5% JOBLESS RATE POSSIBLE IN 3 YEARS By Cai U. Ordinario

he country’s unemployment rate is seen to drop further to as low as 5.5 percent in the next three years, if the economy would continue growing by at least 6 percent. Ateneo de Mani la University’s Fernando T. Aldaba told the BusinessMirror that the rduction in the number of jobless Filipinos was a result of the shift in the country’s economic expansion to a higher growth trajectory.

PESO exchange rates n US 44.3420

ALDABA: “We’ve been growing consistently since 2012, that’s why there’s an impact on employment. This will further improve as long as we grow 6 percent in the next three years, which is what’s expected.”

“We’ve been growing consistently since 2012, that’s why there’s an impact on employment. This will further improve as long as we grow 6 percent in the next three years, which is what’s expected,” Aldaba said. On Thursday, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) disclosed that the country’s unemployment rate dropped considerably to 6.6 percent in January 2015, from 7.5 percent in January 2014. The PSA’s Labor Force Survey data also showed that the country’s underemployment rate fell

to 17.5 percent in January 2015, from 19.5 percent in the same period in 2014. “For this period, the number of underemployed persons contracted among wage and salary workers, as well as self-employed workers, which possibly means greater availability of more remunerative jobs and more profitable ventures,” National Economic and Development Authority Director General and Economic Planning Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan said. Continued on A2

GSIS to hike investment in stocks as bonds sink

he largest Philippine pension fund wants to increase the amount it can invest in stocks, as returns from bonds shrink. The nation’s benchmark equities index gained. The Government Service Insurance System (GSIS), which has about P860 billion ($19.4 billion) of investable funds, plans to ask its board to raise the cap on equities to 30 percent of assets from 20 percent, President Robert G. Vergara said in an interview on Wednesday in Manila. Equities currently account for about 18.5 percent of the fund’s investments, he said. The benchmark Philippine Stock Exchange Index (PSEi) has risen 7.8 percent from end-2014 through Wednesday, the best performance among Asian equity gauges, on expectations that falling oil prices will boost consumer spending and propel economic growth. Peso-denominated government bonds have returned less than 1 percent, versus 6.6 percent in 2014 and 17 percent in 2011, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. “Bonds right now are just digging a big hole for me,” Vergara said. “As we approach the 20-percent threshold, we want to ask for an increase in the weighting that we can have in equities.” The fund’s plan to boost stock holdings echoes that of regional peers. Japan’s public retirementsavings manager more than doubled its target allocation for equities last October, while Thailand’s biggest government pension fund said in January it is seeking approval to reduce sovereign debt holdings. The GSIS, as the Philippine fund for more than 1 million state workers is known, needs at least an 8.5-percent return on investments to meet its

See “Gsis,” A2

n japan 0.3653 n UK 66.2248 n HK 5.7118 n CHINA 7.0808 n singapore 31.9398 n australia 33.6205 n EU 46.7985 n SAUDI arabia 11.8236 Source: BSP (12 March 2015)

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BusinessMirror

Friday, March 13, 2015

Big fight. . .

Underspending evident in deficit drop

Continued from A1

Pacquiao won’t do badly, either, in a fight that was five years in the making and will break records in another way—it will cost fans more than any other fight in history to watch both at the MGM Grand arena or in the comfort of their living rooms. At the only news conference the fighters will do prior to the week of the fight, promoters announced that tickets would range from $1,500 in the upper reaches of the MGM Garden to $7,500 at ringside. The pay-per-view price wasn’t announced, but is expected to be in the $90 to $100 range. They may have to reach deep into their pockets to afford it, but there’s little doubt that boxing fans will buy it. They want to see what Mayweather and Pacquiao say they are eager to show—the two biggest draws in boxing settling things between them once and for all in the ring. “We don’t want to leave a question mark in the minds of fans of boxing,” said Pacquiao, from the Philippines. “It’s also very important, this fight is for the honor of my country.” If the interest in the news conference at a downtown theater was any indication, the fight is already on its way to record business. More than 700 credentials were issued for the event, and both fighters walked a red carpet lined by photographers and video cameras that was worthy of the Academy Awards. Mayweather came late, though he could walk over from his condo next door. The payper-view king was businesslike and relatively subdued, with nothing bad to say about Pacquiao or anyone in his camp. “It’s always good to have the best fight the best,” Mayweather said. “That’s what’s so intriguing about this matchup.” Mayweather said he was adamant about making the fight, pestering manager Al Haymon to get it done. But the biggest bout in recent history still may not have happened if not for a chance meeting between Mayweather and Pacquiao at a Miami Heat basketball game in January—a meeting that took place only because a big storm on the East Coast delayed

Pacquiao’s flight. Mayweather went to Pacquiao’s hotel suite afterward and the two talked and decided the fight had to be made. “I didn’t say a lot of words because I didn’t want to say a mistake,” Pacquiao said. “He said there’s an A-side and a B-side and the purse would be 40-60. That’s enough to put me in the B-side.” Mayweather said the fight reminded him of when he was young and Marvin Hagler and Sugar Ray Leonard fought in a huge middleweight title match in 1987. Mayweather said he wondered then how there could ever be a fight as big as that one. Now he’s in a fight that will be bigger, if only because technology has advanced far enough to sell it to almost every home in the country. “It’s all about timing and I think we couldn’t choose a better time,” Mayweather said. “This is a fight the world can’t miss. This is an unbelievable matchup.” Both fighters went out of their way to be polite and respectful to each other. Mayweather also had good things to say about Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum, who he often said he would never work with again after being promoted early in his career by Arum. About the only one not following the script was Pacquiao trainer Freddie Roach, who said his fighter will have an easier time against Mayweather than he would have if the fight was made five years ago because Mayweather’s legs are slowing and he can’t move as well as he used to. “We have to dominate him in the first round and take him out of his comfort zone right away,” Roach said. “Our game plan is to win each round, one at a time.” Like his fighter, Roach will earn some big money from the bout. He may need it, because Pacquiao is charging him $5 for using a certain swear word that the trainer can’t stop using. Before the news conference began, Roach was already down $30. “Salary reduction,” Pacquiao said, laughing as he patted Roach on the knee.

Continued from A1

earnings came from investments and deposit income, as well as dividends on shares of stocks. Other government offices contributed revenues totalling P111

billion, or a 2-percent decrease from revenues in 2013. In terms of spending, the national government’s expenditures in 2014 amounted only to P1.981 trillion, which missed the program for the year by 13 percent and proof

of the underspending in the public sector that resulted to the slower economic growth last year. Nevertheless, the full-year spending activities in 2014 still represented an acceleration by 5 percent, or by P101.5 billion.

5.5% jobless rate possible in 3 years “From employment gains to reductions in unemployment and underemployment, the labor market is becoming robust, and we hope that this will continue and further benefit the poor, especially as the economy grows faster at a higher trajectory,” he added. Aldaba, however, said bringing down the country’s unemployment numbers to 5.5 percent in three years is still not enough to place the Philippines on a par with its Asean peers. He said Asean countries like Malaysia and Thailand have an unemployment of about 3 percent, significantly lower than the country’s jobless rate. Further, the PSA’s recent poverty data showed there was an increase in the country’s poverty rate in the first semester of 2014. Data showed that poverty incidence among Filipinos in January-to-June 2014 was higher than the 24.6-percent level posted in the same period in 2013. These results were supported by a nationwide survey conducted by Ibon Foundation Inc. in Januar y 2015, which showed that most Filipinos still think the economy worsened under the Aquino administration. The survey results showed that 7 out of 10, or 71.7 percent, of the respondents said they don’t think that there is less poverty in the country in the past three months. Continued from A1

3-DAY EXTENDED FORECAST MARCH 13, 2015 | FRIDAY

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Ibon also said 50.7 percent of the respondents believe the economy remained the same and 21.5 percent said it got worse. “The recent report on poverty highlighted the impacts of high food prices mostly to low-income families. Our significant strides in poverty reduction through better quality jobs and higher incomes must move forward along with cheaper food prices. Elevated rice prices are of particular concern, as rice takes up about 20 percent of the budget of the poor,” Balisacan said. “Relatedly, the government must continue its efforts to create a more supportive business environment, allowing the private sector to create more and better jobs,” he added. PSA data showed 62.2 percent of the employed population were full-time workers. Underemployed persons, who work for less than 40 hours in a week, are called visibly underemployed persons. They accounted for 60.7 percent of the total underemployed in January 2015. Among the unemployed persons in January 2015, 66 percent were males. Of the total unemployed, the age group 15 to 24 years comprised 47.3 percent and the age group 25 to 34, 31.6 percent. By educational attainment, 20.4 percent of the unemployed were college graduates, 13 percent were college undergraduates and 34.4 percent were high-school graduates.

MAR 14 SATURDAY

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obligations to members until 2048. Last year its investments returned 8.9 percent and that may have lengthened the fund’s actuarial life to 2050, Vergara said. Profit at the pension fund more than tripled to P139.9 billion last year from P44.3 billion in 2013, boosted by a shift to fair-value accounting of its assets and returns from its local equity and fixed-income investments. At the end of 2014, about 48 percent of the GSIS’s funds were in fixed income, 26 percent in loans to members, 17 percent in equities and about 4 percent in real estate, Vergara said. The balance was in cash. The PSEi has advanced in each of the past six years, a record-winning streak and the longest stretch of gains among 73 equity indexes worldwide. The gauge has rallied more than 310 percent since the end of 2008, outpacing the MSCI Asia Pacific Index’s gain of about 60 percent in the same period. The PSEi rose 0.2 percent at the noon trading break in Manila on Thursday, paced by gains in Emperador Inc., the world’s biggest brandy maker, and GT Capital Holdings Inc., which owns shares in finance, energy and automotive companies. GSIS’s intention “is a positive signal for the market,” Astro del Castillo, managing director at First Grade Finance, said by phone. “It supports the fundamentals of companies and the strong outlook for the economy, encouraging investors to put more money into the market” Philippine equities are poised to extend gains as economic growth accelerates, boosted by rising remittances from overseas Filipino workers, increasing infrastructure investments and higher government and consumer spending, said Vergara, who has run the GSIS since 2010. The Philippines may be among the biggest winners in an environment of falling oil prices, with economic growth expected to accelerate to an average of 7.6 percent over the next two years, according to an Oxford Economics Ltd. analysis of 45 economies in December. Bloomberg News

3-DAY EXTENDED FORECAST

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LEGAZPI ILOILO/ BACOLOD 24 – 31°C METRO CEBU 24 – 31°C

TACLOBAN CITY 23 – 30°C

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Partly cloudy skies Light rains

Weekday hourly updates: 6:00 AM on Balitaan, 7:00 AM & 8:00 AM on Good Morning Boss!, 9:00 AM, 10:00 AM, 11:00 AM, 12:00 PM, 1:00 PM on News@1, 3:00 PM, 4:30 PM, and 6:00 PM on News@6

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SABAH CELEBES SEA

LOW TIDEMANILA HIGH TIDE 11:06 PM

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Watch PANAHON.TV everyday at 5:00 AM on PTV (Channel 4).

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PHILIPPINE AREA OF RESPONSIBILITY (PAR)

Continued from A1

NORTHEAST MONSOON AFFECTING NORTHERN AND CENTRAL LUZON (AS OF MARCH 12, 5:00 PM)

Northeast Monsoon locally known as “Amihan”. It affects the eastern portions of the country. It is cold and dry; characterized by widespread cloudiness with rain showers.

PUERTO PRINCESA CITY 22 – 31°C

GSIS. . .

Interest payments totalled P321.2 billion, constituting 16.2 percent of the total expenditures. This was an improvement from 17.2 percent reported the previous year, indicating that more cash was freed for spending on other items.

@PanahonTV

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The Nation BusinessMirror

Editor: Dionisio L. Pelayo • Friday, March 13, 2015 A3

Lower House resolves to keep purse away from Executive

AWMAKERS on Thursday approved a resolution to keep its war-chest away from scrutiny of the Executive branch of the government. The House of Representatives adopted on March 12 Concurrent Resolution 10 “affirming, ensuring and operationalizing the fiscal independence of the Congress of the Philippines.”

Authored by Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr., Committee on Accounts Chairman and Nacionalista Party Rep. Eleandro Jesus F. Madrona of Romblon; Majority Leader and Mandaluyong Rep. Neptali Gonzales II and Minority Leader and Rep. Ronaldo Zamora of San Juan the resolution was unanimously approved by the members of the lower chamber late Monday. The resolution provides that Congress’s annual budget will be passed “without reduction, alteration or modification.” In filing the resolution, the House leaders have expressed concern over what they consider as budgetary policies of the Executive Department that “threaten its independence” as a co-equal branch of the government. “The present budgetary policies formulated by the Executive, through the Department of Budget and Management [DBM], insofar as they apply to [the House and the Senate], threaten its independence, encroach on its exclusive domain and violate the principle of separation of powers, upon which the entire fabric of our constitutional system is based,” the House leaders said in the resolution. The House leaders, confident of a Senate concurrence, reiterated that “the imposition by the DBM of restrictive policies, rules, procedures, guidelines and conditions relative to the release and utilization of appropriations, applicable only to executive offices and agencies, on the Congress of the Philippines, is an undue encroachment on the exclusive domain of the legislature and a violation of the principle of separation of powers.” The House leaders also noted that “the Judiciary and other constitutional bodies enjoy the full control of their financial affairs, while Congress is subjected to regulations similarly imposed on executive agencies.” “The legislative power vested in the Congress of the Philippines is plenary, complete, unimpaired and subject only to such limitations as are found in the Constitution,” the lawmakers said. The resolution also forwarded the policies and proce-

Espina submits first to Roxas probers’ report on Mamasapano after troops kill 20 extremists

By Rene Acosta

HE Board of Inquiry (BOI) created to look into the Mamasapano incident submitted its report first to Interior Secretary Manuel Roxas II on Thursday. The BOI was set to submit the results of its investigation to National Police Officer in Charge Deputy Director General Leonardo Espina early Thursday evening, but Director Benjamin B. Magalong refused to divulge their findings. Magalong, chief of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group and head of the BOI, said they were still printing the report as of 3 p.m. on Thursday. We would sign the document and submit it to Espina, who, in turn, should have submitted the report to Roxas, according to him. Magalong’s insistence to keep contents of the report to the public came after some lawmakers and groups warned probers would move to absolve President Aquino of any tinge of wrongdoing in the police operation that led to deaths of 44 Philippine National Police-Special Action Force (PNP-SAF) commandos. Magalong said at least five copies of the more than 120-page report would be reproduced. Copies would be submitted to the Senate, the Department of Justice, Espina, Roxas, the Office of the Ombudsman and the families of the slain commandos. The BOI was formed in order to investigate the January 25 operation of the PNP-SAF in Mamasapano, Maguindanao, which also led to the death of Zulkifli bin Hir, alias Marwan. Marwan, a bomb expert, was a leader of the Asean terror group Jema’ah Islamiyah. The report’s late submission to government officials came a day after the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) said its operation in Maguindanao has led to the deaths of 20 more members of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF). Armed Forces Public Affairs Office chief Lt. Col. Harold Cabunoc said on Thursday morning that the two of Usman’s dead relatives were among those killed. Cabunoc identified them as Rene Masabpi and Kumidi Simeon, both nephews of the wanted terrorist, whom the military earlier said was being guarded by a 20-man security team. He said the BIFF members were killed at Barangay Pamalian, Shariff Saydona Mustapha by members of the Marine Battalion Landing Team 8 (MBLT 8) who were pursuing Usman and the BIFF in the towns of Salvo, Pagatin, Mamasapano and Shariff Aguak in Maguindanao. The military refer to this area as the “SPMS box.” The latest deaths from the BIFF have brought to more than a hundred casualties since the military began in mid-February its all-out offensive against the bandit group. Brig. General Joselito E. Kakilala said on Thursday the recent deaths brought to 116, the total BIFF rebels killed, representing a third of the rebels’ estimated strength. “Usman uses his relatives as close in security. Now, we have footprints on Basit Usman,” Kakilala added. The military spokesman dismissed the possibility that Usman and his group, and even the five foreign terrorists earlier seen in the company of BIFF fighters have already slipped from the military’s ongoing operation. “Accordingly, Usman is still within the SPMS box and its periphery. It’s very farfetched that Usman was able to escape. We have established many checkpoints and we now have precise operations that led to these series of encounters.”

dures the lawmakers said would ensure and operationalize Congress’s fiscal independence. The lawmakers called for a policy giving the Senate and the House “full autonomy” in determining the appropriations required for their operations. Budget proposals of the respective Houses shall be submitted to the Office of the President through the DBM, but

shall not be subject to the same process of evaluation, budgetary guidelines and standards applicable to the other agencies of the national government, the lawmakers said. The amount of appropriations as proposed and determined by the Senate and the House shall be included in the annual budget of the national government without reduction, alteration or modification, the lawmakers added.

The lawmakers also seeks automatic appropriations provided for the Senate and the House under the General Appropriations Act, “at the start of the calendar year, without condition, limitation or restriction.” “The Senate and the House shall enjoy flexibility in the utilization of funds appropriated for their operations,” the lawmakers said. They also want a policy allowing

them to keep the “unexpended year-end balances of approved appropriations for the Senate and the House.” They also want any income both Houses received “made available for any function, projects and activity.” Congress, over the past 15 years, was allocated only an average of half of 1 percent of the national budget, according to Belmonte and the resolution’s proponents. Jovee Marie N. dela Cruz

Economy

A4 Friday, March 13, 2015 • Editors: Vittorio V. Vitug and Max V. de Leon

briefs phl to continue using diplomatic means in sea row

Malacañang, confronting reports of continued Chinese construction of mall-like structures in Burgos Reef, said on Thursday the Aquino administration is adhering to “diplomatic and peaceful process” in protesting latest China encroachments in Philippine Sea territories. Communications Secretary Herminio B. Coloma Jr. pointed out that neighboring countries in the region, likewise, locked in conflicting claims with China have also lodged separate protests against Beijing’s aggressive encroachment of their territories. At a news briefing about Philippine options to thwart Chinese encroachments in Burgos Reef, Coloma confirmed that the Philippine government still has a pending protest lodged against China for blatant violations of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. This developed as Coloma indicated that the Philippine Coast Guard is also looking into reports by Filipino fishermen about the presence of Vietnamese fishing vessels suspected to be poaching in Philippine waters near Bajo de Masinloc. Coloma said that, as soon as the report is confirmed, the Department of Foreign Affairs will promptly bring up the matter with the Vietnamese government. Butch Fernandez

israel touts expertise in building goods at expo Israel, considered an expert in technology, health care and agriculture, is participating in the ongoing Philippine World Building and Construction Exposition at the World Trade Center in Pasay City. The aim is to further strengthen business ties with the Philippines, according to Adam Michael Levene, Israel’s Economic and Trade Officer in Manila. “Israel is regarded as an expert in technology, health care and agriculture. But, when it comes to building products and services, Israeli companies create infrastructure, efficient energy solutions, civil-engineering software and home-surveillance units,” Levene said. “Our export of building products and services is already above $3 billion and growing.” Levene said business between Manila and Tel Aviv is growing. Last year it grew by 7 percent. “This year, we expect it to grow by a lot more,” he added. Recto Mercene

dbm reforms to end use of lump sums—abad

Budget Secretary Florencio B. Abad said the administration is implementing reforms to reduce lump-sum allocations in the national budget, owing to huge fund misuse in the past. He said part of the reforms include transparency to empower citizens to hold public institutions and officials accountable. Abad said the Department of Budget and Management has been implementing Public Financial Management reforms, like the targeted outcomes of the Performance Informed Budget, the reduction of lump-sum funds and the streamlined budget release process. He also said the department’s bottom-up budgeting aims to give “greater voice in identifying local poverty-reduction programs that can be funded by the national budget.” “We believe that the creation of prosperity should not be through ‘trickle down’ but ‘bottom up.’ The people are our country’s greatest resource and their empowerment is at the heart of inclusive development,” said Abad. The budget chief told delegates to the three-day Philippine Good Governance Summit that the Filipino youth will have a special role to play in the success of the administration’s reform agenda. Estrella Torres

BusinessMirror

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DTI revising product-certification scheme

By Catherine N. Pillas

he Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Bureau of Philippine Standards (DTIBPS) is aligning the country’s Product Certification Scheme with current international trade practices as part of efforts to facilitate trade and rid the market of substandard goods.

DTI-BPS Director in Charge Ann Claire C. Cabochan said the revision of the administrative orders on product certification “is part of the bureau’s program in keeping its guidelines and procedures abreast with the regional and global trade developments to contribute to the DTI’s efforts on trade facilitation.”

“Enforcement of technical regulations is essentially a gate-keeping function. The new scheme will address the recurring incidents where substandard products are able to gain entry into domestic market,” Cabochan said The BPS issues Philippine Standard (PS) licenses and Import Com-

modity Clearance (ICC) certificates to manufacturers and importers, respectively, of products covered by mandatory Philippine National Standard (PNS), as stated in the DTI-Department Administrative Order (DAO) 4:2008, DTI-DAO 5:2008 and Republic Act 4109, or the standards law. Products covered by mandatory PNS include building and construction materials, electrical and electronic home appliances and chemical and consumer products. For DTI-DAO 4:2008, manufacturers are required to undergo the BPS Certification Scheme and satisfactorily meet the requirements of relevant PNS before they can affix the PS mark on the products that they release in the local market. On the other hand, for importers, DTI-DAO 5:2008 requires all their imported products under mandatory PNS to undergo and pass BPS evaluation, sampling and testing before they can place the

ICC mark on their products. The proposed revisions to the Product Certification Scheme will constitute a new order that replaces DAO 04 and DAO 05. A major revision in the new order is the inspection, sampling and testing of an imported regulated product in its country of origin, based on the requirements of a relevant PNS. According to Cabochan, the change is in line with keeping the country’s commitments to the World Trade Organization’s Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) Agreement. The other revisions that the BPS has put forward include adjustments on fees and surety bond, reduction on documentary requirements; and tightening of the monitoring and enforcement procedures. D T I- Con su mer P rotec t ion Group Undersecretary Victorio Mario A. Dimagiba asserts: “The revisions are slanted on the safety parameters specified in the PNS that will respond to the needs of

Construction material prices in NCR contract 1.4% in Feb By Cai U. Ordinario

verage prices of construction material in the National Capital Region (NCR) contracted 1.4 percent in February, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA). Based on the Construction Materials Wholesale Price Index (CMWPI), the PSA said the decline was brought about by the steep year-on-year decline in oil prices. The PSA said the 23.9-percent annual drop in the fuels and lubricants index primarily brought about the downtrend. “In addition, slower annual gains were seen in sand and gravel index at 3 percent; cement index, 0.6 percent; hardware index, 2 percent; lumber index, 3.6 percent; and GI (galvanized iron) sheet index, 1.4 percent,” the PSA said. In January 2015, the CMWPI posted a year-on-year contraction of 1.6 percent and, in February 2014, the index posted a growth of 2.2 percent. Meanwhile, on a monthly basis, there was a 0.3-percent growth in the CMWPI in February, faster than the 0.1 percent month-on-month growth posted in February 2014. In January 2015 the CMWPI posted a month-on-month contraction of 1.2 percent. The PSA said the growth was due to the increase in the indices of concrete products at 0.3 percent; cement, 0.5 percent; plywood and tileworks, 0.4 percent; PVC pipes, 0.7 percent; and fuels and lubricants, 0.9 percent. Data showed that the indices of sand and gravel, hardware, and plumbing fixtures and accessories, however, had slower rates. “Price hikes in gasoline, diesel and fuel oil were noted during the month. Upward adjustments were also observed in the prices of some construction materials, like sand and gravel, cement, hollow blocks, plywood, floor tiles, concrete nails, paints and PVC pipes,” the PSA said. The CMWPI is a variant of the general wholesale price index that measures the changes in the average wholesale prices of construction materials. It is used for the computation of price escalation of construction materials for various government projects as indicated in the Presidential Decree 1594. The current CMWPI market basket considered those construction materials prevailing in 2000. The market basket for the 2000-based series includes 102 items.

the consumers.” Trade Secretary Gregory L. Domingo added that the proposed changes are timely, as the country prepares to integrate into a single economic community in Asean. The BPS has conducted public consultations on the proposed amendments on DAO 04 and 05 with representatives from the gover nment offices, industr y associations and federations of products under the BPS product certification scheme, as well as members of academe and testing institutions present. The DTI-BPS enjoins its stakeholders to review the draft new order that can be accessed at the BPS web site, www.bps.dti.gov.ph, and to submit their comments and position papers on or before March 24. The draft has, likewise, been circulated to WTO members for comments in keeping with the transparency requirements of the TBT Agreement.

NEA lent P2.53B to co-ops in 2014

‘MALL-HIGH’ SALE BANNER To emphasize the scope of its three-day promotional sales campaign, a mall in Manila unfurled a huge banner that is almost as high as the establishment itself to invite shoppers to flock to the mall during the sale period. NONIE REYES

he National Electrification Administration (NEA) has provided loans amounting to P2.534 billion to 67 electric cooperatives (ECs) last year. Of the amount, P829 million went to ECs that were badly hit by typhoons Yolanda, Santi and Glenda. The amount was later converted to subsidies. Some P203 million was borrowed by eight ECs to finance their monthly shortfall on the settlement of their power accounts with the powergeneration companies and National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP). Meanwhile, Pelco (Pampanga Electric Cooperative) III and Casureco (Camarines Sur Electric Cooperative) I availed of the stand-by credit loan facility amounting to P30 million and P13.125 million, respectively. Three co-ops in Mindanao secured loans for the procurement of modular generator set in anticipation of the shortfall of power supply in the island during summer. These are Davao del Norte Electric Cooperative (P19.697 million), Misamis Oriental Rural Electric Service Cooperative I (P12.194 million) and Zamboanga City Electric Cooperative (P105.285 million). Meanwhile, Marelco, Ileco II, Ceneco, Buseco and Moresco I used the Single-Digit System Loss Loan Facility to further decrease their system losses through either acquisition or commissioning of substations, upgrading of overextended and overloaded distribution lines and purchase of kilowatt-hour meters. NEA processed 84 financial packages visà-vis its target of 53 last year. It has, likewise, posted a 100-percent collection efficiency on the loan amortization payments of the ECs. “As part of NEA’s mandate, the agency has developed a credit-guarantee program and facility for the ECs. This is to establish a power supply guarantee to secure the power purchase of qualified ECs in the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market, Interim Mindanao Electricity Market or under a bilateral contract with the generation companies or the NGCP,” NEA Administrator Edita Bueno said. “NEA also continues to find ways to make funds readily available for the Ecs, particularly in times of natural and man-made calamities for them to better serve their member-consumers,” she added. Lenie Lectura

PSALM looking for supplier of P5.44B worth of industrial fuel oil By Lenie Lectura

he Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. (PSALM) is soliciting bids for the supply and delivery of industrial fuel oil (IFO) for several power plants this year. The state firm is setting aside P5.44 billion for the procurement of 235 million liters of IFO to fire up three power plants. Some 35 million liters will fuel

the Malaya Thermal Power Plant in Rizal, which has an approved budget for the contract (ABC) amounting to P854,368,113.00; 72 million liters will go to the Southern Philippines Power Corp. in Zamboanga Cit y, w ith an ABC of P1,664,310,181.00; and 128 million liters for the Western Mindanao Power Corp. in Sarangani Province, with an ABC of P2,920,340,947.00. “Especially with the incoming

lean supply of electricity this summer, these fuel purchases are essential for supply stability through the operation of these power plants all throughout the year,” PSALM President and CEO Emmanuel R. Ledesma Jr. said. Interested bidders should have similar experience on the subject procurements within the last five years from the date of the submission and receipt of bids. He said the bid invite states that the allowable

experience is a similar contract that is equivalent to at least 25 percent of the ABCs. In addition, interested parties must pay a nonrefundable fee of P75,000 for the bidding documents for each of the three procurement projects. A prebid conference is scheduled on March 17. The deadline for the submission of bids is on April 7, after which the bids will be opened.

A6 Friday, March 13, 2015

Opinion BusinessMirror

editorial

From mining to marijuana

EING interested in the global mining industry, we follow several international news services devoted to this business. It is important to know what the world thinks of the prospects in the Philippines, particularly in regard to our relations with the industry compared to other mineral-rich countries. Mining.com is a digital publication covering the global mining sector. It has closely followed developments in the Philippines as we progress—slowly, to be sure—to rationalize our mineral-extraction sector. Mining.com is not a mining-industry publication but is a news service offering, perhaps, the most complete information and analysis on the industry. Unfortunately, its editors have pointed out that the Philippines is the least desirable destination for mining investment on the planet. However, all is not well in the mining industry with depressed or falling prices in gold, copper and iron ore. The Philippines has benefited from local nickel-ore producers gaining from Indonesia’s ban on the export of nickel ore in favor of eventually moving completely into the processed metal. A Mining.com story this week did catch our interest. The article was titled “Struggling Australian junior to grow cannabis in Canada.” “Junior” mining companies are those that are engaged in the risky, but potentially high-profitable, business of exploration. Junior miners are the ones that take all the risk in searching for new deposits of precious and industrial metals. The 21st century stated on a positive note for these companies, as metal prices were increasing. Since the global financial crisis, though, times are hard, as prices are down and sources of funds for these companies have decreased. From Mining.com: “Trying to stay afloat in a tough environment, struggling Australian gold prospector Capital Mining [CMY] has decided to diversified its business by tapping into an emerging, but controversial, market: medical marijuana. The company said on Monday it has agreed to acquire a 49-percent stake in Canadian medical cannabis grower and distributor Broken Coast Cannabis.” Capital Mining is a listed company in the Australian Securities Exchange. Reading CMY’s announcement about this purchase, it could have been talking about acquiring ownership of a Canadian fast-food restaurant chain, with projections about revenue growth and potential profit. But, instead, it is about a business that is illegal in most of the world. Here is another interesting point. These junior miners are in the business of sourcing mostly individual private capital for their mining exploration. To stay in business, they must be good at being able to constantly raise new money. In the last two months, at least a dozen of these Canadian companies, hit by a downturn in the mining industry, have announced they are also considering growing cannabis. There are at least 75 publically listed US companies in the marijuana business, and investors were bidding prices up nearly 100 percent in the first-quarter 2014. Since then, prices are flat. But this may be the first time a company has moved from mining to marijuana.

Votes win elections James Jimenez

spox

LECTIONS are won by actual votes, not promises of votes or declarations of loyalty or assurances of all-out support. The steadfast denial of this fact is the intrinsic weakness that lies at the heart of the argument that a person must have been cheated out of his victory because he is confident that his constituents love him. It is the same weakness that underlies the assumption that the head of any organization will win a popular election, because the members of that organization swear up and down that they voted for him. And it is that weakness, yet again, that sweeps the legs out from under the notion that a person who has won public office once cannot possibly lose reelection without the intervention of fraud. Any person who holds to any of these arguments—or their variations and derivatives—at best betrays either a deliberate obtuseness or a very shallow understanding of the very constituents he claims to represent. At worst, this kind of thinking reveals a failure to accept that our electoral system has outstripped the ability of the unscrupulous to manipulate how the outcomes of elections are reported. Contrary to how a lot of people understand the concept of cheating in elections, the trick—prior to the automation of the electoral system—was not to bother with the actual reading of the

ballots, but to focus on how the results were being recorded and reported up the chain of canvassing. The reading of the ballots—what we call the counting of the votes—was treated by election operators as a simply a way of subliminally priming the public consciousness to accept the manipulated reports later on. By flooding the counting of votes with numerous challenges, the public was led to accept the possibility that the actual outcome would be different from how the public counting seemed to indicate. It was only after the counting was done that the true “operation” kicked into gear. Ranging in degree of brazenness

from the subtle manipulations of the manually accomplished election returns—primarily through mistranslations of taras marks into Hindu-Arabic numerals—to the outright fabrication of results, as with the dagdag-bawas scheme, these operations aimed to accomplish only one thing: to record, and subsequently report to the world, a tailor-made result that differs from the actual ballot count. And this is where all those arguments about being loved by voters et cetera come into play. By loudly claiming a particular place or constituency as a bailiwick or political stronghold—think “Solid North”—manipulations of the results become less likely to invite suspicion. If, for instance, a politician says that the voters in his hometown love him—or have pledged all-out support for him or some such nonsense—then excellent results for him coming from that town tend to be accepted as inevitable and are rarely questioned. In a very real sense, because this politician has primed everyone to believe that his hometown will support him, he has gained the ability to dictate what the outcome should be, regardless of the actual will of the people. Imagine, then, the shock brought about by automation. With automation, the recording and subsequent reporting of the results were suddenly taken out of the hands of operators, who, previously, had the opportunity to doctor the results, in case the ballot counting indicated a less-than-favorable outcome. Instead of

election returns being subject to the discretion of people translating taras marks, election returns were being automatically generated directly from the ballots themselves. As a result, the election outcomes being reported were more faithfully reflective of the people’s will than they had been for quite some time. The concept of the “bailiwick” crumbled over night, exposing not just the extent to which some politicians had been relying on postelection “operations” for their wins, but, more important, revealing that voters do vote for the people they want, even if it sometimes contradicts who they said they were going to vote for. Think of it as a kind of Bradley effect. This is the theory that voters tend to exhibit a social-desirability bias and— when asked who they will vote for— provide an answer that they feel is more publicly acceptable. Makes a lot of sense in a culture where pakikisama is held at such high premium, but a far cry from being proof positive of electoral fraud. So the next time someone tells you that he could not have possibly lost the elections because the voters love him, or because he received assurances from local leaders, or because he thinks his status as an incumbent guaranteed a win, take it with a grain of salt and—if you dare—remind them that votes win elections, not hot air. James Jimenez is the spokesman of the Commission on Elections.

Opinion BusinessMirror

opinion@businessmirror.com.ph

The art of being a working mom

Presenting a President Tito Genova Valiente

Ailene Co

Women Stepping UP

ALANCING a career and your duties as mom and wife is never really simple. It’s doable but it takes love and commitment to do both. A sense of duty should also be present since both work and motherhood requires one to be responsible. It’s basically an art. The balancing act may look lovely and awesome at first sight, but it entails process and details before it becomes a masterpiece. There’s hard work involved but that’s no excuse to have no real joy in it. Personally, I find that being a mom is a tough job—it feels like it extends beyond 24/7! Just like marriage, it’s a lifetime commitment. A lot of people ask me how I’m able to juggle the demands of my career and raising my twins, and my reply has always been time management and having fun! It’s also been a tremendous relief to be blessed with a very understanding husband. As a working mom, you should stop trying to be dead conscious about balancing personal life and work and simply enjoy the experience. Still, I can understand where the stress is coming from. For instance, it would be quite a dilemma when you’re asked to attend a PTA meeting at school around the same time there’s an important client presentation to go to. It also comes when work deadline looms and your kids adorably want to spend more play-time moments with you. Or when your kid gets sick and you have to report for work. It’s also easy to have a grand time guilt-tripping when your child would suddenly say, “we never get to spend more time together, mommy.” I would be worried if that ever happens to me. I’m not exempted to inner monologue that deals with questions like, “How am I as a mom? Am I spending more hours outside our home or is it normal? Do my kids feel abandoned and left out by me or have I spent a healthy time with them? Is it really about quality time or the quantity of time I spend with the family? Do I look stressed out by handling two major roles in the office and at home? Is it time for me to quit my job?” Those are questions that sometimes pop up, but don’t sweat it! It’s normal. Motherhood is not something to be terrified about. It is a blessing and a privilege from God that we should all be grateful for. After all, it’s not every day that you’re gifted with a child to raise and to look after. It’s a welcome responsibility of sharing one’s legacy and making sure that the significant values you’ve learned are passed on to the next generation. To stop being fretful about it, I’ll be sharing a study which took 50 years of research that indicates working moms’ kids turn out fine. According to the study published in the Psychological Bulletin and in a TIME article, children whose mothers went back to work before the

kids were 3 years of age had no worse academic or behavioral problems than those who were raised by stay-at-home moms. In addition, the study found little evidence to suggest that mothers who work part-time or full-time have children with problems in later life. The researchers even found two positive aspects between working motherhood and well-adjusted children. It was found that kids whose mothers worked when they were younger than three were later rated as higher-achieving by teachers and had less issues with depression and anxiety. That information significantly helped me in my thoughts about the work-life balance and the worries about the future of my kids. Don’t ever think that you’re alone in doing this delicate balancing act. Talk to other moms or read up on my daily schedule and you’ll find that we have a lot of things in common than you think. My daily routine consists of waking up at five in the morning making sure that my kids are ready for school. At 6 a.m., they are off to school. It was only then that I prepare for work and report to the office between 8:30 a.m. and 9 a.m. I have already taken the rush hour and traffic madness into account. The whole day is spent at work. My life does not end at 6 p.m., though. My day goes beyond office hours what with all the business meetings and social functions to also pay attention to. I get my first real break of the day after the kids have gone to bed and the next day, I do it all over again. I make it a priority to reserve my weekends for family time and Sunday for the Lord. I especially take inspiration from the scriptures: Exodus 31:15 “For six days work is to be done, but the seventh day is a day of Sabbath rest, holy to the Lord.” How do I do it? I love what I do—it’s as simple as that. Sometimes we tend to make things complicated but it’s really not. Untangle and uncomplicate things. Look at life from a child’s perspective and it will be so much beautiful. Enjoy life always with the grace of God. Know what your priorities are. And I hope, just like me, family will come first above anything else.

annotations

VER a long taxi ride, I was hearing a voice that was familiar through the radio. It was President Aquino. He was narrating the details of that botched operation in Mamasapano. I was happy my sister was not with me in the taxi. She is on vacation and each day she tells me there is no other except about that mishap in Maguindanao. Her complaint is not about the frequency or regularity of the news; it was that the same details were being aired, discussed and shown on free television each day. In news items related to the incident, the same footage are being shown over and over. For the entire surplus in the news about the Fallen 44, there is a dearth of development.

It was therefore quite reassuring when the President started talking about Mamasapano. There must be something urgent that had been reached at. There must be something fresh about what people describe as unwarranted death. It is strange, though, that we should search for freshness in news about death and violence. And so, I listened; and so, I was distressed. There were details and more details that would make a tabloid reporter squirm in glee. The sense of being in the field—at the battlefield—was what the speech was coming upon. At a certain point, when Mr. Aquino was to describe something complex, he asked for the indulgence of his listeners—to think as if we just came from the beach. There was

laughter at this point. A joke! There was a joke. The President continued to talk. As the speech went on, it began to sound very informal. The President was talking of new details, how he was fooled by former Special Action Force chief Director Getulio Napeñas, about how he cannot be fooled twice. The candor was embarrassing. Who wrote this speech? Was that a speech or a kind of on-the-spot confession? The next day that speech was lambasted and lampooned by the media. Certain sectors thought the speech was not sincere enough, and the grieving kin of those who died in Mamasapano took note of that. Many felt the explanation, however articulate, was too late in the game.

My problem with the speech was that as President Aquino continued to speak, he sounded more like a child or a very young man very much involved in the storytelling. “When an individual becomes over-involved in a topic of conversation, others are drawn from the talk to the talker. One man’s eagerness is another man’s alienation. Readiness to become overinvolved is a form of tyranny practiced by children, prima donnas and lords, placing feelings above moral rules that should have made society safe for interaction.” Those were the words of Erving Goffman, and indeed the President was just distressingly into his talk. The candor blunted the talk instead of making it sparkle. Goffman was a sociologist who was identified with an approach to social analysis that is based on dramaturgy and interaction. Goffman believes that when a person interacts with another person, he tries to influence—subtly and sometimes with apparatuses—the other person’s perception of him. He can lower his voice or he can discuss with a person something intellectual while he shows in his hand a book on, let’s say, Heidegger or Brecht. The act is called “impression management.” In Goffman’s book, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, the sociologist points to our behavior as theatrical performances. As with any performance, though, there are those acts that work and those that fall flat on the ground. As with any theater, there is a backstage and there is an onstage area. At the backstage, you confine your most undesirable self,

the personal quirks that you can never show to others. Your most positive psychology, your best face, your best foot, you display and perform onstage. In the said book, Goffman writes of how a person “may wish them to think highly of him, or to think that he thinks highly of them, or to perceive how, in fact, he feels toward them, or to obtain no clear-cut impression; he may wish to ensure sufficient harmony so that the interaction can be sustained, or to defraud, get rid of, confuse, mislead, antagonize, or insult them. Regardless of the particular objective, which the individual has in mind and of his motive for having this objective, it will be in his interests to control the conduct of others, especially their responsive treatment of him.” For Goffman, this kind of control “is achieved largely by influencing the definition of the situation, which others come to formulate.” No good speech can ever replace the personality or authority. For Goffman, language is a social construct and not a linguistic form. Our societies determine the value of a language and not the words or the expression found in a speech or a discourse. Even the face as a social construct can be created. In that speech heard over the radio in a long taxi ride, I thought I saw theater that had more backstage than onstage performances. I sensed something was not managed very well and the national grief continues without resolve.

productivity, whether in manufacturing or agriculture, and to move workers toward these more productive sectors. If this had been done, then inflation would also been solved. This, however, is easier said than done. Apart from upgrading skills and expanding productive knowledge, reforms in the country’s labor market institutions, including labor market regulations (such as the minimum wages), are essential in order to make the high-quality jobs more accessible to the poor. To be fair, the previous administrations, particularly the Arroyo administration, had undertaken similar structural reforms. However, these reforms, involving, for instance, the development of the service sector, such as business-processing outsourcing, prove to be ineffective in addressing the poverty problem. The predicament is that these sectors defied the country’s comparative advantage and failed in making employment easily attainable to many workers. Moreover, such sectors cannot be scaled up in a way that results to a permanent contribution to development.

Countries, like India, where services have a comparative advantage, managed these sectors more effectively and attracted greater foreign investment that resulted in higher wages. The observed increase in poverty incidence is, thus, not an indictment on the CCT or other forms of social protection programs nor the growth policy of the government. In fact, the poverty situation could have been much worse without such programs. However, structural reforms and transformation would be crucial in finally reducing poverty. More important, unlike previous structural reforms of the country, we need to situate these programs in the context of the country’s poverty. Not only will these help in reducing the number of poor households, these will also be more sustainable since these will necessarily be tied to the country’s comparative advantage.

E-mail: titovaliente@yahoo.com

Ailene Co is a seasoned marketing professional with close to two decades of experience in PR and Marketing. She is also the cofounder of online magazine www.trendhotspot.com. Falling twice and rising three times! This article reflects her opinion and not the official stand of the BPW network. For more information on BPW Makati, visit www.womensteppingup.org.

The structural reforms needed to address poverty Leonardo A. Lanzona Jr.

EAGLE WATCH

OVERTY incidence among Filipinos in the first semester of 2014 was estimated at 25.8 percent based on the 2014 Annual Poverty Indicators Survey (Apis) conducted in July 2014. This is higher than the poverty incidence recorded during the same period in 2013, which was at 24.6 percent. This development ironically comes at the heels of an impressive growth performance by the country, which grew by 6.3 percent in the last quarter of 2013 and 5.6 percent in the first quarter of 2014.

Nevertheless, per-capita income in the first semester of 2014 was higher by 6.4 percent than in 2013. Among the bottom 30 percent of income-earners, per-capita income rose by about 7.3 percent in the same period in the previous year. Secretary Arsenio Balisacan of the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) attributes this increase to the twin implementation of increased investments

Friday, March 13, 2015

and production alongside a massive redistribution program, such as the Conditional-Cash Transfer (CCT) Program. According to the Neda, the increase in poverty incidence can be traced to the increase in inflation, which virtually totally offset the increase in per-capita income. The country’s inflation rate rose near the higher end of the inflation target in the first half of 2014. The consumer price index for food went up to

6.5 percent and 2.7 percent for the nonfood items in the same period. Hence, the increase in per-capita income did not provide poor households mostly in the agricultural sector enough purchasing power to consume more goods. In real terms, per-capita income was not high enough to move out these households of poverty. This perspective of increasing poverty has three main implications. First, the increase in food prices is supposed to benefit the farmers who constitute most of the poor. However, apparently their production is insufficient to carry most of them out of poverty since farmers are not only producers but consumers, as well. The government’s grains sector policy, particularly the quantitative restrictions policy on rice imports to achieve the rice self-sufficiency goal failed to take into account that farmers also buy rice in the market. Hence, as the Neda recommends, we need to take advantage of the lower grain prices offered in the international market. Second, agricultural production needs to be increased, but productivity

programs have to be based on comparative advantage. Goods that have comparative advantage are produced from the country’s abundant resource endowments. These are goods that can be produced more cheaply in the domestic economy but, at the same time, command a higher price abroad. More important, products that have comparative advantage in the Philippines should also be those goods that are labor intensive. In which case, the poor whose only resource is labor can produce more of these goods without much government intervention. Rice production has become less competitive here compared to other countries, and the poor does not benefit significantly from its production. If the government follows its comparative advantage, more labor-intensive industries will be produced, thereby allowing the poor to benefit more in development. Third, inflation is not the only problem. If income per capita increased at a faster rate, inflationary pressures would not have mattered. The key to poverty reduction then is to raise

Leonardo Lanzona Jr. is professor of Economics at the Ateneo de Manila University and a senior fellow of Eagle Watch, the school’s macroeconomic research and forecasting unit.