BusinessMirror December 29, 2024

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A broader look at today’s business Sunday, December 29, 2024 Vol. 20 No. 79

P25.00 nationwide | 2 sections 20 pages | 7 DAYS A WEEK

NEW FRIENDS, MARKETS VITAL TO A NEW WORLD

VITALIJ SOVA VIA DREAMSTIME.COM

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By Andrea E. San Juan

MID the rise in trade-restrictive measures and geopolitical uncertainties, the Philippines is ramping up its efforts to forge more free-trade agreements (FTAs) to expand its market access and diversify markets beyond traditional partners.

In 2024, five trade deals, albeit unfinished, have made progress in their respective negotiations, while the Philippines-Korea FTA is expected to take effect on the last day of the year or on December 31, 2024.

Two rounds of 6-percent tariff cuts are seen in the first few days of its effectivity in the Philippines.

Upon effectivity, Allan B. Gepty, Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Undersecretary for International Trade Group, said South Korea will grant preferential dutyfree entry on 11,164 Philippine tariff lines accounting for $3.18 billion or 87.4 percent of total Korean imports from the Philippines.

Meanwhile, one of the major beneficiaries of the free-trade deal with South Korea is the banana industry, as the tariff rate for bananas will be reduced to zero in five years.

“For tariff rate for bananas it will have a tariff reduction of 6 percent on December 31, 2024, and another 6 percent reduction on January 1, 2025,” Gepty told the BusinessMirror in a Viber message.

This means that only two days into its effectivity, the free-trade deal with South Korea grants a 12-percent tariff cut for Philippine banana exports to Korea.

Earlier, DTI Secretary Cristina Roque said that through the FTA with Korea, the 30-percent tariffs levied on banana exports would be reduced by 6 percentage points annually until it gets zero-rated in the fifth year.

Gepty underscored that the ratification of the FTA is a “major milestone” for the Philippines as it will now increase the preferential market access of Philippine exports to Korea to 97 percent based on trade value.

“This will complement the Asean Korea FTA and the [Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership] RCEP Agreement. Our banana industry will also mainly benefit from this FTA as the tariff rate for bananas will be reduced to zero in five years from effectivity,” said the Trade official.

27-member European Union

WHAT Gepty considers “another milestone” in the Philippine international trade policy landscape in 2024 is the resumption of talks for the Philippines-European Union Free Trade Agreement.

In the latter part of March 2024, European Commission Executive Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis and former Philippine Trade and Industry Secretary

“Upon effectivity, South Korea will grant preferential duty-free entry on 11,164 Philippine tariff lines, accounting for $3.18 billion or 87.4 percent of total Korean imports from the Philippines.” — Allan B. Gepty, DTI Undersecretary for International Trade

“The EU is the Philippines’s fourth largest trade partner. The FTA between the two parties is projected to increase trade by up to €6 billion.” — Valdis Dombrovskis, European Commission EVP

“We are hoping that we can address the remaining issues under the PH-UAE CEPA and conclude the negotiation early next year.”

— Trade Secretary Cristina A. Roque

“There is a need to continue establishing FTAs with the EU, Chile, etc., as a way to diversify markets away from traditional partners.” — Dr. George N. Manzano, former Philippine Tariff Commissioner

Amid global trade uncertainties, the Philippines is securing key free-trade agreements, including the Philippines-Korea FTA, to expand market access and boost exports. Ongoing negotiations with the EU and UAE promise further economic growth and tariff reductions, benefiting industries like bananas.

Alfredo E. Pascual formally announced the resumption of FTA negotiations between the European Union and the Philippines.

Dombrovskis said the Philippines has the potential to be a major market for the EU industry, with a GDP of €370 billion and a population of over 115 million people. “Trade in goods was worth over €18.4 billion in 2022, while trade in services was worth €4.7 billion in 2021,” he also noted.

Dombrovskis also pointed out that the EU is the Philippines’s fourth largest trade partner. Further, the FTA between the two parties, he noted, is projected to increase trade by up to €6 billion.

As to the sectors that the 27-member bloc is setting sights on in the Philippines, Dombrovskis recognized that “the Philippines is also an important producer of a number of critical raw materials,

such as nickel, copper and chromite, all of which are vital for the green transition.”

Fast forward to October 2024: Gepty said the Philippine trade negotiating team had set an internal target as it eyes to conclude by 2026 the negotiations for the trade deal with the EU. “In one of the President’s speeches, he said he wanted this concluded by 2027. So internally, we want to target 2026. So we’ll exert all our efforts,” the Philippine Trade negotiator said.

EU GSP+ maintained

GEPTY also highlighted the importance of the EU GSP+ to Philippine traders, saying, “With the country’s active engagement with the EU and other stakeholders, and its compliance with the 27 international conventions on human rights, labor, environment and good gover-

nance, the Philippines was able to maintain its beneficiary status.”

EU GSP+ expired on December 31, 2023, but was extended for four years or until 2027. The country’s trade negotiator said this will provide the time needed for the EU’s legislative process to finalize and adopt the new GSP scheme.

However, he explained anew that if the Philippines reaches upper-middle income status and maintains it for three consecutive years, it would lose its GSP+ benefits.

“Thus, to address the possible adverse effects of withdrawal of preferential tariff rates under the EUGSP+, the Philippines is currently negotiating a free-trade agreement with the EU,” said Gepty.

PH-UAE Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA)

ALSO listed among the “big accom-

plishments” of the trade negotiating team in 2024 is the PH-UAE CEPA, Gepty said.

Gepty told reporters in May that the first round of talks for the FTA between the Philippines and UAE would start in early part of May this year and hopefully be concluded within the year. He earlier underscored the importance of this trade deal, saying, “We have a lot of professionals and also businesses in the UAE.” However, at a recent briefing with reporters, Roque said that while the Philippine trade negotiating team is “on the last stages of negotiations” already, she divulged that the trade deal with the Middle Eastern country is still being “ironed out a little bit.”

“There’s really no delay [in the UAE CEPA]. It’s just…there are so many products. We also have a lot Continued on A2

PESO EXCHANGE RATES n US 58.0140 n JAPAN 0.3672 n UK 72.6799 n HK 7.4684 n CHINA 7.9498 n SINGAPORE 42.6919 n AUSTRALIA 36.0847 n EU 60.4738 n KOREA 0.0396 n SAUDI ARABIA 15.4539 Source: BSP (December 27, 2024)

NewsSunday BusinessMirror

A2 Sunday, December 29, 2024

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2024 by the numbers: Surprising stock market wins and economic resilience

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By The Associated Press

EW YORK—What a wonderful year 2024 has been for investors.

US stocks ripped higher and carried the S&P 500 to records as the economy kept growing and the Federal Reserve began cutting interest rates.

The year featured many familiar winners, such as Big Tech, which got even bigger as their stock prices kept growing. But it wasn’t just Apple, Nvidia and the like. Bitcoin, gold and other investments also drove higher.

Here’s a look at some of the numbers that defined the year. All are as of December 20.

57

THE number of all-time highs the S&P 500 has set so far this year.

The first came early, on January 19, when the index capped a two-year comeback from the swoon caused by high inflation and worries that high interest rates instituted by the Federal Reserve to combat it would create a recession. But the index was methodical through the rest of

stocks also jumped following his post in May on the social platform X, including AMC Entertainment.

Gill later disclosed a sizeable stake in the online pet products retailer Chewy, but he sold all of his holdings by late October.

3

THE number of times the Federal Reserve has cut its main interest rate this year from a two-decade high, offering some relief to the economy. Expectations for those cuts, along with hopes for more in 2025, were a big reason the US stock market has been so successful this year. The 1 percentage point of cuts, though, is still short of the 1.5 percentage points that many traders were forecasting for 2024 at the start of the year.

The Fed disappointed investors in December when it said it may cut rates just two more times in 2025, fewer than it had earlier expected.

1,508

1998

REMEMBER when President Bill Clinton got impeached or when baseball’s Mark McGwire hit his 70th home run against the Montreal Expos? That was the last time the US stock market closed out a second straight year with a leap of at least 20 percent, something the S&P 500 is on track to do again this year. The index has climbed 24.3 percent so far this year, not including dividends, following last year’s spurt of 24.2 percent.

the year, setting a record in every month outside of April and August, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices. The latest came on Decmber 6.

THAT’S how many points the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose by the day after Election Day, as investors made bets on what Donald Trump’s return to the White House will mean for the economy and the world.

The more widely followed S&P 500 soared 2.5% for its best day in nearly two years. Aside from bitcoin, stocks of banks and smaller winners were also perceived to be big winners. The bump has since diminished amid worries that Trump’s policies could also send inflation higher.

1.6%, 3.0% and 3.1%

PEOPLE walk past the New York Stock Exchange on November 26 2024. AP/PETER MORGAN

$100,000

THE level that bitcoin topped to set a record above $108,000 this past month. It’s been climbing as interest rates come down, and it got a particularly big boost following Trump’s election. He’s turned around and become a fan of crypto, and he’s named a former regulator who’s seen as friendly to digital currencies as the next chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, replacing someone who critics said was overly aggressive in his oversight.

Bitcoin was below $17,000 just two years ago following the collapse of crypto exchange FTX.

26.7%

GOLD’S rise for the year, as it also hit records and had as strong a run as US stocks. Wars around the world have helped drive demand for investments seen as safe, such as gold. It’s also benefited from the Fed’s cut to interest rates.

When bonds are paying less in interest, they pull away fewer potential buyers from gold, which pays investors nothing.

$420

IT’S a favorite number of Elon Musk, and it’s also a threshold that Tesla’s

stock price passed in December as it set a record. The number has a long history among marijuana devotees, and Musk famously said in 2018 that he had secured funding to take Tesla private at $420 per share. Tesla soared this year, up from less than $250 at the start, in part because of expectations that Musk’s close relationship with Trump could benefit the company.

$91.2 billion

THAT’S how much revenue Nvidia made in the nine months through October 27, showing how the artificial-intelligence frenzy is creating mountains of cash. Nvidia’s chips are driving much of the move into AI, and its revenue through the last nine months catapulted from less than $39 billion the year before. Such growth has boosted Nvidia’s worth to more than $3 trillion in total.

74%

GAMESTOP’S gain on May 13 after Keith Gill, better known as “Roaring Kitty,” appeared online for the first time in three years to support the video game retailer’s stock, which he helped rocket to unimaginable heights during the “meme stock craze” in 2021. Several other meme

THAT’S how much the US economy grew, at annualized seasonally adjusted rates, in each of the three first quarters of this year. Such growth blew past what many pessimists were expecting when inflation was topping 9% in the summer of 2022. The fear was that the medicine prescribed by the Fed to beat high inflation—high interest rates—would create a recession.

Households at the lower end of the income spectrum in particular are feeling pain now, as they contend with still-high prices. But the overall economy has remained remarkably resilient.

20.1%

THIS is the vacancy rate for US office buildings—an all-time high— through the first three quarters of 2024, according to data from Moody’s. The fact the rate held steady for most of the year was something of a win for office building owners, given that it had marched up steadily from 16.8% in the fourth quarter of 2019. Demand for office space weakened as the pandemic led to the popularization of remote work.

3.73 million

THAT’S the total number of previously occupied homes sold nationally through the first 11 months of 2024. Sales would have to surge 20% year-over-year in December for 2024’s home sales to match the 4.09 million existing homes sold in 2023, a nearly 30-year low. The US housing market has been in a sales slump dating back to 2022, when mortgage rates began to climb from pandemic-era lows. A shortage of homes for sale and elevated mortgage rates have discouraged many would-be homebuyers.

NEW FRIENDS, MARKETS VITAL TO A NEW WORLD Continued from A1

of products that we want to export to them,” Roque said.

For his part, Gepty told this paper, “We are hoping that we can address the remaining issues under the PH-UAE CEPA and conclude the negotiation early next year.”

As to the next steps that will be undertaken in the negotiations, the Trade official also noted: “We will continue our consultation with key agencies and stakeholders on the remaining issues involving market access. We will closely work also with the UAE to conclude negotiations on the remaining provisions on certain rules and disciplines involving trade.”

PH-Chile CEPA

ANOTHER trade deal which progressed this year is the PhilippinesChile CEPA, which was launched recently.

Roque and Chile’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Alberto van Klaveren, signed a joint statement officially launching the negotiation during the latter’s official visit to Manila on December 6, 2024, according to a statement issued by the Trade department.

“The CEPA with Chile presents significant benefits for the Philippines, including enhanced market access for key exports, increased consumer welfare with lower prices of goods, and facilitative rules of

trade. Strengthened economic ties with the Latin American region is also expected,” DTI said.

The agency also noted that the trade deal goes beyond trade in goods and services by including key areas such as intellectual property rights, digital economy, micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), environment, labor, and trade and gender, among others.

Other trade deals

GEPTY also considered as big accomplishments in 2024 the “substantial” conclusion of the upgraded Asean-China FTA. According to the Asean website, “Asean, under the chairmanship of the Indonesia Competition Commission (KPPU), has successfully concluded the negotiation with China on the Competition and Consumer Protection Chapter of the ASEAN-China Free Trade Agreement (ACFTA).”

Asean, a 10-member regional organization, said the newly concluded chapter is a “landmark achievement” for Asean and China, as it marks the first “comprehensive” negotiation on consumer protection provisions, extending beyond traditional cooperation to cover electronic transactions and other new commitments.

“The strengthened provisions on competition emphasize transparency and information exchange in law enforcement,” it noted.

This was achieved during the 8th Round of Negotiations for the ACFTA Working Group on Competition and Consumer Protection (WGCC) held in Nanning, Guangxi, China, from June 25 to 27, 2024.

Gepty also included on the list of milestones the launch of the Philippines-Canada exploratory talks for a possible FTA. “The Department of Trade and Industry is proud to participate in the exploratory discussions on a potential free-trade agreement between the Philippines and Canada,” Roque said at the Team Canada Trade Mission Gala Reception on December 5.

“I am confident that this trade mission will pave the way for meaningful and productive partnerships between Canadian and Filipino business leaders. We are eager to collaborate with you in shaping a brighter future for both our nations. Under the ‘Bagong Pilipinas’ agenda of President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr., this potential FTA is set to generate high-quality and better-paying jobs for Filipinos. Together, let’s make it happen in the Philippines,” Roque said.

Through the lens of an economist, former Philippine Tariff Commissioner George N. Manzano told the BusinessMirror recently that there is a need to “continue establishing FTAs with EU, Chile, etc., as a way to diversify markets away from traditional partners.”

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TheWorld

Thai government suffers setback in campaign to sway central bank

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HE Thai government’s campaign to pressure the Bank of Thailand to cut interest rates suffered a significant setback, with the Office of the Council of State effectively ruling that the official nominee to be chairman, former finance minister Kittiratt Na-Ranong, is not suitable.

Without directly naming Kittiratt, Secretary-General Pakorn Nilprapunt said in a statement that “Mr. K’s” role as an adviser to the prime minister means he is a “person holding a political position” who was appointed for political reasons and is therefore not qualified.

While the chair of the Bank of Thailand is not involved in monetary policy meetings, they can evaluate the governor’s performance and also have a say in which outside experts join the seven-member rate panel. The council ’s legal opinion means that if the government tries to push ahead with Kittiratt’s appointment, it could face political risks and challenges.

It’s also possible the selection process must start over.

Kittiratt earlier this week posted on Facebook that he will “respect the decision” as to whether he becomes the central bank ’s chairman.

Pakorn’s statement didn’t mention the central bank’s own nominees, Kulit Sombatsiri, who has previously worked at the energy and finance ministries, and academic Surapon Nitikraipot.

The government hasn’t immediately commented on Friday’s announcement, which comes just three days after the Thai Post, citing the finance permanent secretary, reported that the council had decided Kittiratt was unqualified. Within hours of that report, the Office of the Council of State’s Pakorn declared it had not yet concluded its legal opinion.

That underscored the sensitivity of the issue, with Thailand already having delayed naming a new chairman as opposition mounted against Kittiratt, a former member of the ruling Pheu Thai party.

The Economists for Society group, which includes former multiple former central bank governors, in November warned a chairman with strong political links would raise questions about the independence of the Bank of Thailand.

The Thai government has been looking for ways to increase its influence over the central bank, and Bloomberg News reported in June that it was considering using the chairman’s role as a means of gaining leverage.

The Bank of Thailand has cut its benchmark rate by a quarter point this year, to 2.25 percent, but at its most recent meeting held borrowing costs unchanged.

The government wants lower borrowing costs to reduce the burden of household debt, but BOT policymakers say rates are appropriate and other measures are needed to boost growth.

Bloomberg News

Sunday, December 29, 2024

A3

China presses ahead with plans to build mega-dam near India

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HINA is pressing ahead with plans to construct a mega-dam near its contested border with India, a colossal undertaking that could generate three times as much power as the Three Gorges Dam. The Chinese government approved the construction of “a hydropower project” in the lower reaches of the Yarlung Tsangpo river in Tibet, the official Xinhua News Agency reported, without giving more details.

Previous reports indicated the dam would be the world’s biggest and require 1 trillion yuan ($137 billion) of investment—making it one of the costliest infrastructure projects ever and likely a huge boon to Beijing’s efforts to revive growth.

The dam could also become a source of renewed tension between China and India, as the Yarlung Tsangpo runs through the contested Arunachal Pradesh area and feeds into one of India’s major rivers. Ties between two nations

have just stabilized after a fouryear stalemate over a June 2020 border clash that killed some 20 Indian and at least four Chinese.

The project would take at least a decade to build and require connecting to the grid further east as there’s “zero need” for this sort of energy supply in Tibet, said David Fishman, a Shanghai-based senior manager at the Lantau Group, an energy consulting firm.

“It’s a massive engineering undertaking. The river itself has excellent hydropower resources,” he added. “Ever ybody dow nstream is going to be concerned about what it means if water flow is reduced. I know India is very anxious about it.”

Beijing appears aware of the

sensitivities. An article from 2020 asking whether a hydroproject on the river—known as the Brahmaputra in India—would wipe out Tibet’s last tigers was censored on messaging platform WeChat.

By Friday, that link returned the message: “The content violated rules and cannot be seen.”

India’s Ministry of External Affairs declined to comment when contacted for further information.

China’s Foreign Ministry didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment on whether Beijing and Delhi had been in communication over the project.

A colossal China-run dam on India’s doorstep would give Beijing influence over water flow into India, something leaders could use as leverage in times of political tensions. The two nations set up an exchange mechanism to manage such issues in 2006, and held a virtual meeting as recently as May 2022, according to China’s Ministry of Water Resources.

Power pivot

HYDRO is the second largest source of power generation in China, making up nearly 14 percent of the nation’s mix last year, according to data

from BloombergNEF. But it’s growing at a slower pace than other power types. Global warming has extended droughts in China and unexpectedly cut hydropower output, leading to power crunches in water-rich provinces such as Sichuan and Yunnan.

Analysts earlier saw damming the Yarlung Tsangpo as unlikely.

Getting materials and workers to such a remote site would be enormously costly, as would stringing the power lines needed to get the electricity to market.

Des pite t h at , t he gover nment kept the door open. In 2020, a state media report cited the head of government-owned Power Construction Cor poration of China saying the lower reaches of the river featured a huge gorge with potential for 70 gigawatt electricity generation capacity—more than triple that of Three Gorges Dam, which is the world’s largest.

Environmentalists in China have long worried about the irreversible impact of dam constructions in the gorge, home to a national natural reserve declared in 2000 and one of the country’s top biodiversity hotspots.

Bloomberg News

A4

TheWorld BusinessMirror

Sunday, December 29, 2024

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Suzuki, who ran automaker German president dissolves Osamu across several decades, dies at 94 Parliament, calls for election

By Yuki Hagiwara Bloomberg News

By Iain Rogers

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Bloomberg News

ERMAN President FrankWalter Steinmeier dissolved parliament and set the country’s snap election for February 23, formally endorsing a timetable proposed by Chancellor Olaf Scholz after he pulled the plug on his ruling coalition last month.

Alternative for Germany party, with the Greens in fourth.

Me r z’s ce nte r - r i g ht C DU/ CSU bloc has about 31 percent support, according to the latest Bloomberg polling average, with the Af D at around 19 percent and the center-left SPD 16 percent.

The Greens have about 13 percent, while Lindner’s FDP is in danger of missing the 5 percent threshold for getting into parliament with 4 percent.

Lars K lingbeil, an SPD coleader, said he expects the party to begin narrowing the gap to the conservatives in January and still believes it can emerge as the strongest party again.

At the last election in 2021, the SPD came from behind in the final weeks of campaigning to secure almost 26 percent in first place, beating the CDU/CSU, which got 24 percent.

“More and more citizens will ask themselves: Do we want Olaf

Scholz as chancellor or Friedrich Merz?” Klingbeil was quoted as saying in an interview with Tagesspiegel newspaper published Thursday. “We have the better candidate, the better team, the better program.”

Although Steinmeier has formally dissolved the Bundestag, its term will only end with the constitution of the next parliament.

Lawmakers will continue to meet and conduct parliamentary business, with two sessions planned before the election.

Scholz’s move to force an early election is unusual in German politics since World War II. The national ballot was brought forward only twice in West Germany and only once since reunification in 1990.

Former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, also a Social Democrat, triggered an early vote in 2005 before losing to Angela Merkel, who went on to run the country until Scholz took over in late 2021.

Social Democrat Scholz ended his three-party alliance with the Greens and Free Democrats when he sacked FDP Finance Minister Christian Lindner in a dispute over government borrowing.

The surprise move deprived Scholz of a majority in the lower house, or Bundestag, and paved

the way for a national ballot seven months before the scheduled end of his four-year term.

With just under two months until the vote, the main opposition conservatives under Friedrich Merz are strides ahead in the polls. Scholz’s SPD is languishing in third place behind the far-right

Leaders, politicians pay homage to India ex-PM Manmohan Singh

China launches largest amphibious warship in show of naval power

By Aijaz Hussain

The Associated Press

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EW DELHI—Authorities in India have declared a seven-day mourning period to honor Manmohan Singh, officials said Friday, as politicians and public paid tributes to the country’s former prime minister widely regarded as the architect of India’s economic reform program.

Officials canceled all cultural and entertainment events for the week, with government buildings f lying the national f lag at half staff across India. Singh, who died late Thursday at age 92, is scheduled to be cremated on Saturday.

Singh’s body was put in a glass casket, adorned with flowers and wrapped in the Indian flag, as leaders and mourners paid their respects. Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited his home and offered condolences to his family.

Later, Modi in a video message said Singh’s life “was a reflection of his honesty and simplicity.”

“He saved the countr y from an economic crisis by providing a road towards a new economy.

As a prime minister, his contribution towards the development and progress of the country will always be remembered,” Modi said.

A mild-mannered technocrat, Singh was prime minister for 10 years and leader of the Congress Party in the Parliament’s upper house, earning a reputation as a man of great personal integrity.

He was chosen to fill the role in 2004 by Sonia Gandhi, the widow of assassinated Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi.

Singh was reelected in 2009, but his second term as prime minister was clouded by financia l scanda ls and cor r uption charges over the organization of t he 2010 Com monwe a lt h Games. This led to the Congress Party’s crushing defeat in the 2014 national election by the Hi ndu n at ion a l i st Bh a rat iy a Janata Party under the leadership of Narendra Modi.

Singh adopted a low profile after relinquishing the post of prime minister.

C

HINA launched the first of its next-generation amphibious assault ships, as the Chinese navy ramps up capabilities amid growing territorial tensions.

The Type 076 vessel, named Sichuan, entered the water at a ceremony in Shanghai on Friday, according to the official Xinhua News Agency. It was independently developed and will enhance China’s combat capabilities far from its shores, the report said.

The vessel, described as the world’s largest amphibious assault ship by the Center for Strategic and International Studies,

brings more air power to China’s navy as the Asian nation confronts f lash points in the South China Sea and in the Taiwan Strait. It will undergo tests and sea trials after the launch, according to Xinhua.

The Sichuan is an upgrade from the three Type 075 ships currently operated by the People’s Liberation Army. It features an electromagnetic catapult system, seen also on the latest Fujian aircraft carrier, that allows it to carry fixed-wing aircraft and expand the use of drones increasingly seen as crucial in modern warfare.

The launch of the Sichuan

A SHOPPER looks at handbags at Macy’s department store on Sunday, November 24, 2024, in New York. AP/ANNE D’INNOCENZIO

Shoppers increased spending by 3.8% despite higher prices

By Anne D’innocenzio & Haleluya Hadero Ap Business Writers

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ALES rose this year during the holiday shopping season even as Americans wrestled with elevated prices for many groceries and other necessities, according to new data.

Holiday sales from the beginning of November through Christmas Eve climbed 3.8 percent, outpacing the 3.1 percent increase from a year earlier, according to Mastercard SpendingPulse, which tracks all kinds of payments including cash and debit cards.

The last five days of the season accounted for 10 percent of the spending.

This year, retailers were even more under the gun to get shoppers in to buy early and in bulk since there were five fewer days between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Michelle Meyer, chief economist at Mastercard Economics Institute, said the holiday shopping season “revealed a consumer who is willing and able to spend but driven by a search for value” as seen by concentrated online spending during the biggest promotional periods.

Sales growth was higher than the 3.2 percent increase Mastercard SpendingPulse had projected this fall. The data released Thursday excludes the automotive industry and is not adjusted for inflation.

Clothing sales rose 3.6 percent, with most of the growth being fueled by online shopping. Spending on restaurants, and sales of electronics and jewelry also grew. Online sales jumped 6.7 percent from a year ago and in-person spending rose 2.9 percent.

Consumer spending accounts for nearly 70 percent of U.S. economic activity and economists carefully monitor how Ameri-

shows the Chinese military made technological progress despite persistent corruption in the PLA, as reflected in an anti-graft campaign sweeping through the PLA since last summer.

The drive has expanded within the militar y after originally focusing on its equipment procurement unit and the secretive Rocket Force. This week, a nav y commander of the Souther n T heater w a s pu rged for suspected violations of law and discipline, which usually means corruption, follow ing the removal of his predecessor a year ago. Bloomberg News cans use their money, particularly during the holidays, to gauge how they’re feeling financially.

The most recent government data on consumer spending, released on Dec. 17, showed shoppers stepped up activity at retail stores last month. But auto dealer sales drove most of those gains as huge storms created a need for new cars in parts of the southeast slammed

by Hurricane Helene in October. Big discounts at many retail chains also attracted shoppers.

But the report also hinted at some consumer caution as sales at grocery stores, clothing shops, and restaurants fell. Outside of car dealers and online retailers, sales gains were modest.

Retailers felt more pressure this year due to the shorter holiday shopping period, and also from a presidential election that captured the attention of many consumers.

Sales of general merchandise slid 9 percent in the two weeks ended November 9, according to Circana, a market research group. Sales have been rebounding but stores will have to make up for those losses.

A broader picture of how Americans are spending their money arrives next month when the National Retail Federation, the nation’s largest retail trade group, releases its combined two-month statistics based on November-December sales figures from the Commerce Department.

The group expects that shoppers will have made $979.5 billion to $989 billion worth of purchases in November and December, which would represent a 2.5 percent-3.5 percent increase over the same two-month period a year ago. That would be a slower rate than the 3.9 percent increase from holiday 2023 over holiday 2022 season.

Overall, retailers had a decent start to the unofficial kickoff to the holiday shopping period despite lots of discounts that started as early as October.

O

SAMU Suzuki, who ran Suzuki Motor Corp., known for its minicars and motorcycles, for five decades and drove the company’s global expansion, has died. He was 94.

Suzuki died of lymphoma on December 25, the company said in a statement.

Born Osamu Matsuda, Suzuki married into the family that gave the Hamamatsu, Japan-based automaker its name. During his long tenure, he formed partnerships with General Motors Co. and Volkswagen AG to sell vehicles in North America and Europe and leveraged Suzuki Motor’s expertise in small cars to build a dominant market share in India.

“If I were to listen to everybody, it would make things too slow,” Suzuki said of his leadership philosophy in “I’m a Small-Business Boss,” a Japanese-language memoir published in 2009. “Never stop, or else you lose.”

Suzuki’s more than 28 years as president across two terms made him the longestserving head of a global automaker. He passed the presidency to his son in June 2015 and assumed a role as chairman and chief executive officer, a dual title he held onto for a year before stepping down as CEO in the wake of a fuel-economy misstatement. The company admitted to using unapproved methods to test the fuel-mileage of its vehicles in Japan, spurring a sharp selloff in the company’s stock and a wave of management departures.

Global reach

THE automaker sold about 3.2 million vehicles worldwide in the fiscal year that ended in March 2024, trailing Japan’s dominant carmaker and world No. 1 Toyota Motor Corp., according to data compiled by Bloomberg. More than half of those vehicles were sold in India, where the company’s Indian unit, Maruti Suzuki, holds the lion’s share.

A former bank employee, Osamu Suzuki got his start in the automotive business thanks to his arranged marriage to Shoko Suzuki, a granddaughter of Michio Suzuki, who founded Suzuki Motor’s predecessor, a loom manufacturer, in 1909.

Osamu Suzuki took his wife’s surname, as is the Japanese custom when there are no male heirs to a family business.

He joined the company in 1958, three years after the debut of its first motorcycle, the ColledaCOX 125cc 4-cycle, and the Suzulight 360cc 2-cycle car, which helped usher in Japan’s minivehicle age.

He served in several management roles before becoming president in 1978. The next year he made his first mark by introducing the Alto minicar in Japan. A big hit, the model was credited with resurrecting the domestic market for minicars.

Betting that the company could establish a foothold in small markets neglected by larger rivals, he led Suzuki Motor’s overseas expansion by building production bases from Pakistan to Hungary.

Alliances formed

IN 1981, Detroit-based GM, then the world’s biggest carmaker, agreed to buy a stake in Suzuki Motor, which was seeking to expand in North America and Europe.

GM would later hold as much as 20% of Suzuki Motor after doubling its interest in 2001. Reeling from five straight quarterly losses, the US automaker began selling its Suzuki Motor shares for cash in 2006 and completed the divestment in 2008. GM filed for bankruptcy the following year amid the global financial crisis.

After the GM alliance was dissolved, Suzuki Motor agreed to a tie-up with Germany’s VW, which bought a 19.9% stake in 2010.

That alliance descended into acrimony after VW described Suzuki Motor as an “associate” in an annual report, and Suzuki accused VW of disparaging its honor by alleging it had violated their partnership agreement by buying engines from Italy’s Fiat SpA. The partnership ended in September 2015 when Suzuki Motor bought back VW’s $3.8 billion of shares.

Osamu Suzuki said the company would value its independence in future dealings with other automakers. Suzuki formed a capital alliance with Toyota in 2019.

His greatest achievement was often considered to be his expansion into India.

He came across a newspaper article about the Indian government’s search for an automaking partner and in 1982 met with a team from the South Asian nation in a Tokyo hotel.

Suzuki Motor agreed to set up a venture with the Indian government outside New Delhi and acquired a 26% stake in the state-owned carmaker Maruti Udyog.

The next year, the venture rolled out the Maruti 800 small car, which was so popular that waiting times to purchase it stretched as long as three years.

Maruti, now a unit of Suzuki Motor, quickly became the biggest carmaker in India, though its market share has been eroded by Hyundai Motor Co. and Tata Motors Ltd. Suzuki today is also one of the top global manufacturers of motorcycles, selling around 1.9 million units in the 12 months ended March 31. The brand has become well-known for winning world titles.

President twice

OSAMU Suzuki was born January 30, 1930, in Gero, a city in central Japan’s Gifu prefecture. He was the fourth son in a farming family. Aspiring to be a politician, he worked part-time as a junior high-school teacher and night guard while completing his degree in law at Chuo University in Tokyo, according to a March 2009 article in Nikkei BP magazine.

After graduating from Chuo in 1953, he went to work at a bank until his marriage brought him into the family business.

After stepping down as president in 2000, he became Suzuki Motor’s chairman and chief executive officer. He returned as president at age 78 in December 2008, when Suzuki Motor was expecting its first profit decline in eight years as the global recession and tighter lending weighed on car demand.

“In the face of an extremely difficult business environment, I have to stand at the forefront,” he wrote in his memoir. “In the past 30 years, a sense of complacency has spread throughout the company. As the one who brought the company to where it is, I have to correct this and lead the company until the economy improves.”

Suzuki felt a similar sense of responsibility for the company’s faulty fueltesting practices in Japan, apologizing to a room of reporters in 2016 as his son and president, Toshihiro Suzuki, stood beside him. Suzuki Motor’s “top-down culture” made it difficult for junior employees to approach management with testing concerns, Toshihiro Suzuki said.

Osamu Suzuki ceded his title as CEO and accepted a 40% pay cut but remained as chairman, a title he held until 2021, just as the advent of electric cars started to roil the world’s legacy automakers in earnest.

At the briefing at which he announced his retirement, Suzuki expressed satisfaction with the company’s management while adding that he would “continue to be easily accessible for advice.” He also assured the audience that he was “full of life,” having played golf 47 times over the previous year.

He and his wife had three children.

Sunday, December 29, 2024

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

A5

32 countries approve GM crop cultivation

By Kristine Grace Tome, Clement Dionglay & Janine Cyren Escasura

T

HIRTY-TWO countries have granted cultivation approvals to genetically modified (GM) crops as of October 2024. This indicates a significant growth in utilizing biotechnology as a sustainable tool to address global challenges, such as food security and climate change.

The International Ser vice for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications Inc. (ISAAA Inc.) released two new infographics highlighting the “Countries Approving GM Crop Cultivation” and the “Contributions of Biotech Crops to Food Security, Sustainability, and Climate Change Solutions.”

Additional GM crop adopting countries from Africa

IN 2019, a total of 29 countries planted GM crops globally. Five years later, the number of adopting countries increased to 32, with three additional countries from Africa that granted cultivation approvals.

In 2020, Kenya announced the approval of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) cotton after the five-year field trials exhibited effective resistance to African bollworm while increasing the yield and lowering the cost of production.

Kenya also lifted the 10-year ban on GM product importation and cultivation by a Cabinet decision on October 3, 2022.

While this decision has been challenged in court, Kenya has continued with research and advanced other crops, including insect-resistant Bt maize, virus-resistant cassava, and late blight-resistant potato in the research and biosafety regulatory approval pipeline.

Ghana is the latest addition to the biotech-adopting countries in 2024 with the commercial approval for GM cowpea with resistance to pod-borer developed by the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research-Savanna Agricultural Research Institute.

Burkina Faso has come back to the list of GM crop-adopting countries this year with the cultivation approval of Bt cotton hybrids from 2024 to 2033.

The Bt cotton-producing country reported seven years of adoption from 2008 until 2015, the same years when the country was hailed as the top cotton producer in the region.

The suspension in planting occurred in the 2016/2017 planting season due to concerns regarding the lint length of the varieties.

The newly approved Bt cotton hybrids have been hailed to achieve the desired lint length, attaining the requirements, and achieving a competitive edge for the Burkina Faso market.

GM crops in the pipeline

INTERNATIONALLY recognized researchers and institutions are focusing their efforts on the development of GM products aimed at addressing global challenges in agriculture, nutrition, and sustainability.

Countries in Africa have been developing promising GM crops in the pipeline, including NEWEST Rice in Nigeria, virus-resistant cassava varieties in East Africa, Nigeria, and other West African countries.

GM crops being developed in Kenya include insect-resistant and drought-tolerant corn, brown streak disease-resistant cassava, sorghum with enhanced vitamin A, zinc, and iron, and late blight resistant potato, that may be commercialized in the next five years.

Several GM crops are also being developed in the Latin America and Caribbean Region.

This includes drought-resistant rice varieties and pineapple with higher levels of lycopene in Costa Rica, yellow leaf virusresistant sugarcane varieties in Colombia, tree nuts resistant to fungi and viruses in Chile, and various GM crops awaiting commercial approval in Brazil, including potatoes, papaya, rice, and citrus.

Developers of HoneySweet, a plum tree resistant to the plum pox virus, are also hoping for final approval for commercialization in the EU in the next few years.

In Asia, the Philippines, Indonesia, India and Bangladesh are also making significant progress in developing GM crops.

The technology developers from the University of the Philippines Los Baños introduced a papaya resistant to papaya ringspot virus, and are now preparing for further trials after the field trials in 2014 and 2017 have been completed.

Researchers in Indonesia have also started research on high sucrose sugarcane, Golden Rice, and Fe-Zn biofortification rice and have been conducting safety studies for both granola and diamant varieties of GM potatoes with stacked genes in 2023-2024.

GM mustard in India is slowly progressing through the country’s regulatory approval system. In 2023, the controlled field trials for the development of late blight resistant potatoes had already commenced in four research stations in Bangladesh.

Latest GM plants and traits

THE ISAAA GM Approval Database lists over 600 approvals for GM crops for cultivation, food, feed, and processing. The highest number of approvals was recorded in 2022.

In the last five years, several notable GM plant have been approved in specific countries, including the TELA maize in Nigeria, Golden Rice in the Philippines, TR4-resistant banana in Australia, yieldenhanced eucalyptus in Brazil, and the glowing petunia in the US. The TELA maize project being implemented by the African Agricultural Technology Foundation and partners has released four transgenic maize varieties with stem-

borer and fall armyworm resistance and drought tolerance traits in Nigeria this year.

Golden Rice, also known as “Malusog Rice” in the Philippines, was approved for cultivation in 2021. Because of its high beta carotene content, it has been targetted as a complementary means to combat vitamin A deficiency.

Developed by experts from the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice), Malusog Rice can provide up to 50 percent of the estimated average vitamin A requirement in young children most vulnerable to vitamin A deficiency.

GM Cavendish banana QCAV-4 resistant to the fungal disease Fusarium wilt tropical race 4 (TR4), or Panama disease, has been licensed in Australia for commercial cultivation in 2024. It is the world’s first GM banana for planting and the first biotech fruit approved for cultivation in Australia.

FuturaGene developed another GM eucalyptus with volumetric wood increase, herbicide tolerance, insect resistance, and antibiotic resistance traits that has been approved for cultivation in Brazil in 2024. It is improved to deliver optimized derivatives exhibiting accelerated growth and producing significantly more wood than conventional eucalyptus.

Firefly Petunias look white in the day but are genetically engineered to glow green in the dark. Light Bio announced the first shipping of 50,000 glowing petunias in April 2024.

US FDA: Decongestant in many cold medicines doesn’t work

W

ASHINGTON—Changes are coming to the cold and cough aisle of your local pharmacy: US officials are moving to phase out the leading decongestant found in hundreds of over-the-counter medicines, concluding that it doesn’t actually relieve nasal congestion.

Phenylephrine is used in popular versions of Sudafed, Dayquil and other medications, but experts have long questioned its effectiveness.

Last month the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) formally proposed revoking its use in pills and liquid solutions, kicking off a process that’s likely to force drugmakers to remove or reformulate products.

It’s a win for skeptical academics, including researchers at the University of Florida who petitioned the FDA to revisit the drug’s use in 2007 and again in 2015.

For consumers it will likely mean switching to alternatives, including an older decongestant that was moved behind the pharmacy counter nearly 20 years ago.

Doctors say Americans will be better off without phenylephrine, which is often combined with other medicines to treat cold, flu, fever and allergies.

“People walk into the drugstore today and see 55,000 medicines on the shelf and they pick one that is definitely not going to work,” said Dr. Brian Schroer of the Cleveland Clinic.

“You take away that option and it will be easier for them to self-direct toward products that really will help them.”

Why is FDA doing this now?

THE FDA decision was expected after federal advisers last year voted unanimously that oral phenylephrine medications haven’t been shown to relieve congestion.

Experts reviewed several recent, large studies indicating that phenylephrine was no better than a placebo at clearing nasal passageways. They also revisited studies from the 1960s and 1970s that supported the drug’s initial use, finding numerous flaws and questionable data.

The panel’s opinion only applied to phenylephrine in oral medications, which account for roughly $1.8 billion in annual US sales.

The drug is still considered effective in nasal sprays, though those are much less popular.

Phenylephrine wasn’t always the top choice for cold and allergy products. Many were originally formulated with a different drug, pseudoephedrine.

But a 2006 law required pharmacies to move pseudoephedrine products behind the counter, citing their potential to be processed into methamphetamine.

Companies, such as Johnson & Johnson and Bayer, decided to reformulate their products to keep them readily available on store shelves—and labeled many of them as “PE” versions of familiar brand names.

What are some alternatives for congestion?

CONSUMERS who still want to take pills or syrups for relief will probably need to

head to the pharmacy counter—where the pseudoephedrine-containing versions of Sudafed, Claritin D and other products remain available without a prescription. Purchasers need to provide a photo ID. Beyond those products, most of the other options are over-the-counter nasal sprays or solutions.

Saline drops and rinses are a quick way to clear mucus from the nose. For long-term relief from seasonal stuffiness, itching and sneezing, many doctors recommend nasal steroids, sold as Flonase, Nasacort and Rhinocort.

“These medicines are by far the most effective daily treatment for nasal congestion and stuffiness,” Schroer said. “The biggest issue is they’re not great when used on an as-needed basis.”

Nasal steroids generally have to be used daily to be highly effective. For short-term relief, patients can try antihistamine sprays, such as Astepro, which are faster acting.

Phenylephrine-based sprays will also remain on pharmacy shelves.

Why doesn’t phenylephrine work when taken by mouth?

THE experts who challenged the drug’s effectiveness say it’s quickly broken down and rendered ineffective when it hits the stomach.

“This is a good drug, but not when it’s swallowed,” said Leslie Hendeles, professor emeritus at the University of Florida’s College of Pharmacy, where he co-authored several papers on the ingredient.

Key contributions of biotech crops

ACCORDING to PG Economics, biotech crops contributed to food security, sustainability, and climate change solutions by increasing crop productivity by $261.3 billion; conserving biodiversity by saving 183 million hectares of land; providing a better environment by saving 748.6 million kg active ingredient of pesticides from being released into the environment; reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 39 billion kg, equivalent to taking 25.9 million cars off the road for one year; and helping alleviate poverty by uplifting the economic situation of more than 17 million small farmers and their families totaling about 65 million people.

Pitfalls and possibilities

LEGAL challenges in countries, such as the Philippines and Kenya, have caused delays in the cultivation of GM crops, as well as, in bringing benefits to farmers and consumers.

On the other hand, the GM crop market in China anticipates high adoption in the coming years. A total of 81 new cultivation approvals have been granted in 2023 and 2024 for maize and soybeans, apart from the renewal of biosafety certificates for previously approved crops.

Australia also contributes to the favor-

“It’s inactivated in the gut and doesn’t get into the bloodstream, so it can’t get to the nose.”

When Hendeles and his colleagues first petitioned the FDA on phenylephrine, they suggested a higher dose might be effective.

But subsequent studies showed that even doses 400 percent higher than those currently recommended don’t treat stuffiness.

The FDA and other researchers concluded that pushing the dosage even higher might carry safety risks.

“If you’re using very high doses, the risk is raising blood pressure so high that it could be hazardous to patients,” said Randy Hatton, a University of Florida professor who co-led the research on phenylephrine.

Because of its cardiovascular effects, the drug is sometimes used to treat dangerously low blood pressure during surgery, Hatton noted.

What happens next?

ORAL phenylephrine medicines will still be with us for a while.

Government regulators must follow a public, multistep process to remove the ingredient from FDA’s list of drugs approved for over-the-counter decongestants.

For six months, the FDA must take comments on its proposal, including from consumers and companies. Then, the FDA must review the feedback before writing a final order. Even after that decision is finalized, companies will likely have a year or more to remove or reformulate products.

Drugmakers could further delay the process by requesting additional FDA hearings.

Matthew Perrone/Associated Press

able adoption of GM crops in the AsiaPacific region with the approval of new crops such as banana, Indian mustard, and chrysanthemum.

Latin American countries, particularly Brazil and Argentina, continue to model excellent adoption rates in the region, paralleled with regulatory cooperation.

The US, the top producer of GM crops globally, is also expected to maintain its position as a leader in GM crop adoption with continuous enhancements in its guidelines and targets. As of 2023, the USDA Economic Research Service reported that over 90 percent of the US maize, cotton (upland), and soybeans were genetically engineered varieties.

With the latest addition in biotechadopting countries from Africa and intensive R&D initiatives focused on the region, more African countries are expected to join the list in the next few years.

The new infographics can be downloaded on ISAAA website. Countries Approving GM Crop Cultivation and Contributions of Biotech Crops to Food Security, Sustainability, and Climate Change Solutions.

Kristine Grace Tome, Janine Cyren Escasura, and Clement Dionglay work at ISAAA Inc. Acknowledgements to Dr. Margaret Karembu and Dr. Paul Chege of ISAAA AfriCenter for updates in Africa.

Strengthen scientific education through collaboration, innovation–CHEd chief

By Bless Aubrey Ogerio

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HE Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) emphasized the importance of fostering innovation and collaboration in higher education to enhance the global competitiveness of Filipino students and institutions.

CHEd Commissioner Shirley Agrupis urged universities to form partnerships with local and international institutions to drive scientific advancements.

“In advancing education, partnerships and innovation are more crucial than ever to make higher education accessible, relevant, and future-focused,” she said in her keynote message at the recent Rizal Technological University’s (RTU) Innovation Day. Agrupis highlighted the role of institutions like the Department of Science and Technology in strengthening agriculture, climate resilience, health sciences, and digital transformation programs.

Pointing out CHEd’s initiatives, she mentioned the Transnational Higher Education Law and the Policy Framework for Internationalization, which streamline international collaborations.

“Through our innovative partnerships, including 81 government-togovernment agreements across Canada, the United States, Europe, and the Asia Pacific, we provide opportunities for joint research, joint curriculum development and exchanges that benefit thousands of students,” the CHEd official said.

Higher education institutions were told to maximize the benefits of such programs.

“I encourage the university to really take advantage of this [collaboration] without limiting the implementation of every framework and guidelines of CHEd,” she urged.

At the RTU event, DOST Undersecretary Leah Buendia discussed challenges and successes in developing the local startup ecosystem.

Meanwhile, University of the Philippines Diliman Professor Ian Kendrich Fontanilla presented research on using eDNA detection for ecological monitoring, in collaboration with RTU. DOST National Capital Region regional director Romelen Tresvalles highlighted DOST-supported RTU innovations, including additive manufacturing programs, research fairs, scientific events, and new projects.

Faith

Sunday

A6 Sunday, December 29, 2024

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

Popes and Jubilees: Opening of the Holy Door in history

By Amedeo Lomonaco

P

OPE Francis on December 24 inaugurated the 2025 Holy Year, reviving an ancient church tradition encouraging the faithful to make pilgrimages to Rome.

One of the symbolic images of every Jubilee is that of the pontiff crossing the threshold of the Holy Door, which will stay open throughout the year to allow around 32 million pilgrims projected to visit Rome to pass through.

This tradition is a moment deeply rooted in the Middle Ages.

The first pilgrim to cross the threshold is always the bishop of Rome. According to a description from 1450 by Giovanni Rucellai of Viterbo, it was Pope Martin V in 1423 who first opened the Holy Door during a Jubilee year, at the Basilica of St. John Lateran.

At the Vatican Basilica, the opening of the Holy Door was first documented on Christmas of 1499, when Pope Alexander VI ordered the Holy Door to be opened not only at St. John Lateran but also at other Roman basilicas.

“I am the gate: Whoever enters through me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture” (From the Gospel of John).

The opening of the Holy Door

THE opening of the Holy Door by the Pope marks the beginning of the Jubilee. The Holy Year of 2025 includes this ritual, followed by the celebration of Holy Mass on Christmas Eve inside St. Peter’s Basilica.

The inner wall sealing the Holy Door was recently dismantled, and the metal box containing the key

to open the door was retrieved.

The pope symbolically pushes the door open, while the traditional use of a hammer to strike the brick seal on the outside has been discontinued for safet y reasons.

After the ceremony, the door remains open for the entire year to allow pilgrims to pass through.

This gesture signifies a complete experience of the indulgence associated with the Holy Year.

Crossing this threshold also symbolizes the journey of conversion, sealed by the encounter with Christ, the “door,” uniting us with the Father.

The Jubilees are part of a profound histor y of faith that opens its doors to the world— a journey in which the steps of the pontiff join those of the people of God, along the paths of forgiveness.

The Jubilee of 1900

ONE of the main objectives of the Jubilee of 1900 consisted in taking on the challenges of modernization.

On December 24, 1899, the Holy Door was opened. From the early morning hours, as reported in the Christmas edition of L’Osservatore Romano, “an unusual bustle” could be seen throughout the city.

Carriages belonging to cardinals, bishops, diplomats, and nobility, as well as many pilgrims on foot or using public transportation, headed toward “the largest temple of Christianity.”

In St. Peter’s Square, the sight of carriages flowing from nearby streets became “imposing.”

Pope Leo XIII, “first and alone,” crossed the Holy Door and entered

commemorated the passion and resurrection of Christ. On March 25, 1983, Pope John Paul II opened the Holy Door, emphasizing its symbolic nature as an entry into a state of grace and salvation.

the basilica. Once the ceremony ended, the doors were opened to allow the faithful to enter.

The Holy Year of 1925

ON December 24, 1924, Christmas Eve, Pope Pius XI opened the Holy Door in St. Peter’s Basilica. The solemn ceremony, according to the Vatican’s newspaper, marked the beginning of the Holy Year.

The rite took place in the portico of St. Peter’s, with the papal throne on one side of the Holy Door and the choir of the Pontifical Musical Chapel in the background.

Before entering the portico, the pope ascended seated on the sedia gestatoria (portable throne) under a canopy. After the singing of “Veni Creator,” Pius XI approached the Holy Door, received a hammer gifted by the catholic bishops from across the world, and struck the Holy Door three times while pronouncing the ritual words before crossing the threshold and inaugurating the Jubilee.

The Jubilee of 1933

MARKING the 1900th anniversary of Christ’s death, an extraordinary Jubilee was proclaimed in 1933. Over 2 million pilgrims arrived in Rome for that Holy Year.

On April 3, the opening of the Holy Door marked the beginning of the Jubilee of Redemption.

L’Osservatore Romano noted that “the attendance at St. Peter’s, St. John’s, St. Paul’s, and St. Mary Major was enormous” on that day.

Hours after the inaugural ceremony, Pius XI received 500 pilgrims from Milan in a special audience.

The Holy Year of 1950

ON December 24, 19 49, t he

The Jubilee of 2000

ARCHIVE photo of Pope John Paul II opening the Holy Door in 1983. VATICAN NEWS

Christian world rejoiced before the “exceptional gift of grace,” as Pope Pius XII opened the Holy Door with three symbolic strikes of a hammer.

After performing the initial rites in the Sistine Chapel, the pope proceeded to the Holy Door, striking it while singing verses like “Open to me the gates of righteousness.”

At the third strike, the brick wall sealing the door crumbled, and the pontiff, holding a candle symbolizing faith and charity, crossed the threshold, inaugurating the Jubilee.

The Jubilee of 1975

DEDICATED to reconciliation, the Holy Year of 1975 began on Christmas Eve 1974 with Pope Paul VI opening the Holy Door.

The rite included the singing of invocations to the Holy Spirit and the blessing of the doorposts with holy water before the pope crossed the threshold.

The Holy Year of 1983

IN 1983, an extraordinary Jubilee

ON Christmas Eve 1999, Pope John Paul II opened the Holy Door for the Great Jubilee of 2000. The act symbolized 2 millennia of history condensed into a solemn moment. This was the last Jubilee Year.

The pope’s prayerful crossing of the threshold was met with worldwide applause, signifying hope for the new millennium.

The Holy Year of 2015

THE extraordinary or special Jubilee of Mercy began on November 29, 2015, with Pope Francis opening the Holy Door of Notre-Dame Cathedral in Bangui, Central African Republic.

On December 8, he opened the Holy Door at St. Peter’s Basilica, joined by Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI in a symbolic gesture of continuity.

The Holy Year of 2025 seeks to continue this tradition, emphasizing God’s love and the hope of salvation in Christ.

The next Jubilee Year is planned for 2033 to commemorate the anniversary of the crucifixion of Christ.

Indulgences

PILGRIMS who participate can obtain “indulgences”—the centuries-old feature of the Catholic Church related to the forgiveness of sins that roughly amounts to a “get out of Purgatory free” card, according to the Associated Press.

The last regular Jubilee was in 2000, when St. John Paul II ushered in the church ’s third millennium.

Francis declared a special Jubilee in 2015-2016 dedicated to mercy and the next one planned is in 2033, to commemorate the anniversary of the crucifixion of Christ.

According to church teaching, Catholics who confess their sins are forgiven and released from the eternal or spiritual punishment of damnation. An indulgence is designed to remove the “temporal ” punishment of sin that may remain—the consequence of the wrongdoing that might disrupt the sinner’s relationships with others.

According to the norms issued for the 2025 Jubilee, Catholics can obtain an indulgence if they: * Undertake a pious pilgrimage, participating in Masses and other sacraments, at any of the four papal basilicas in Rome or the Holy Land, or other sacred Jubilee sites “so as to manifest the great need for conversion and reconciliation.” * Participate in works of charity, mercy or penance, such as visiting prisoners, sick people or elderly people or undertaking corporal works of mercy “to feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, welcome the stranger, heal the sick, visit the imprisoned and bury the dead.” * Abstain, in a spirit of penance, for at least one day of the week from “futile distractions,” such as social media, or from “superfluous consumption,” such as fasting; or donating the proportionate sum to the poor or to help migrants.

Vatican News with The Associated Press

At 88, 8 plus 8 interesting things about Pope Francis

By Almudena Martínez-Bordiú

D

ID you know Pope Francis was a nightclub bouncer, his favorite movie is “La Strada” by Federico Fellini, and that he doesn’t watch television? On the occasion of his 88th birthday on December 17, these and other interesting facts about Pope Francis are highlighted below.

1. How did he discover his vocation?

ON the feast of St. Matthew the Apostle, Pope Francis discovered his vocation to the priesthood after going to confession when he was 16 years old. It happened on Sept.

21, 1953. It was Student Day in Argentina, which coincides with the day when spring begins in the southern hemisphere and is celebrated with a big party.

“Before going to the party, I passed by the parish I attended and I found a priest I didn’t know and I felt the need to go to confession. This was for me an experience of encounter: I found Someone who was waiting for me.”

“I don’t know what happened, I don’t remember, I don’t know why that priest was there, whom I didn’t know, why I had felt that desire to go to confession, but the truth is that Someone was waiting for me.

He had been waiting for me for a long time.

After confession I felt that something had changed,” the Holy Father shared.

He said that after that confession he said that he was no longer himself: “I had heard something like a voice, a call: I was convinced that I had to be a priest.”

2. What is his favorite dish?

NOVEMBER 19, 2022, was one of those rare occasions when Pope Francis left the Vatican without an official program.

The reason? A family reunion in Asti, the Italian city where his cousin Daniela di Tiglione lives, who was celebrating her 90th birthday.

On that occasion, Pope Francis was able to enjoy his favorite dish: Bagna Cauda, a typical Piedmont dish prepared with anchovies, oil, and garlic and used as a sauce for vegetables.

3. A passion for tango B E F O R E being ordained a priest, e s p e c i a l l y d u r i n g h i s y o u t h , Po p e Francis enjoyed tango, one of the most emblematic dances of Argentina. He also liked the milonga, another typical dance from his homeland.

4. He was a bouncer in a nightclub LIKE any young man, Jorge Bergoglio worked various jobs to earn his first salary.

Although his first job was scrubbing the floors of the hosiery company where his father worked, in 2013 he confessed to a group of young people that he was also a bouncer at a nightclub. Thanks to that experience, he began “to guide the disillusioned to the Church.”

5. He’s missing a lung WHEN he was 21, he had to have a lung removed due to an infection, which has caused him to suffer from some breathing difficulties in recent years.

6. He has refused forgiveness only once ON more than one occasion, Pope Francis has encouraged priests to forgive “everything” in the confessional and to “not torture” the faithful in the confessional.

During an interview on Italian television in January, he stated that in his more than 50 years as a priest he has refused forgiveness only once, “because of the hypocrisy of the person.”

7. The prayer he says every day to keep his good humor ON several occasions, Pope Francis has praised a good sense of humor and stressed that sadness is not a Christian disposition.

He has even gone so far as to say that the “hallmark of a Christian” is joy and not being a sourpuss.

To be good-humored, he says a prayer from St. Thomas More every day, a prayer he has referred to in numerous public appearances, most recently with the president of France, Emmanuel Macron.

“Lord, give me a sense of humor. Grant me the grace to understand a joke, to discover in life a bit of joy, and be able to share it with others,” the Holy Father prays every day.

8. St. Joseph, his help in difficulties THERE is an image of St. Joseph that Pope Francis is very fond of that shows the “silent” saint lying down asleep.

During his apostolic trip to the Philippines, the pontiff referred to St. Joseph as “a strong man of silence” and said that he keeps this figurine on his desk.

“Even when he sleeps, he takes care of the Church,” he said.

“When I have a problem, a difficulty, I write a little note and put it under St. Joseph

so that he can dream about it. In other words, I tell him: Pray for this problem!” the Holy Father confessed.

he announced that he had signed his resignation in case his health did not allow him to continue exercising his ministry.

9. Pope Francis favors taking a daily nap POPE Francis usually goes to bed at 9 p.m. and wakes up around 4 a.m. He sleeps about six hours a day, as he usually reads for an hour after going to bed, until 10 p.m.

“Later I need a nap. I have to sleep for 40 minutes to an hour. I take off my shoes and fall into bed. And I also sleep deeply and wake up alone. On days when I don’t take a nap, I notice it,” he once said.

13. What is his favorite movie?

“LA STRADA” by Federico Fellini, winner of the Oscar for best foreign film in 1957.

10. What is his favorite soccer team?

E V E N though he no longer lives in Argentina, Pope Francis continues to root for the San Lorenzo de Almagro team from Buenos Aires. He keeps up to date thanks to a Swiss Guard who informs him of the team’s news every week, since the pope doesn’t watch the games.

In fact, during an audience at the Vatican in September, a delegation from the San Lorenzo club asked the Holy Father for his blessing to name the club’s next stadium after him.

11. The day his life was saved AT the age of 44, Pope Francis suffered from gangrene of the gallbladder, a serious complication that occurs when the tissue of this organ of the digestive system becomes necrotic due to an interruption of blood flow.

“I felt like I was dying,” said the Holy Father, referring to the night in 1980 when he was operated on by Dr. Juan Carlos Parodi, an eminent Argentine surgeon who saved the life of then-Father Jorge Mario Bergoglio. In 2014, 34 years later, the two held a private meeting in the Vatican.

12. Where does he want to be buried?

UNLIKE many pontiffs throughout the history of the Church, whose coffins are in the crypts of the Vatican in the grottoes under St. Peter’s Basilica, the Holy Father revealed that he has had his tomb prepared in St. Mary Major Basilica in Rome due to the great devotion he has to the Virgin Salus Populi Romani (protectress of the Roman people), to whom he made a promise.

In addition, in December 2022, the pontiff gave an inter view in which

14. He doesn’t watch television because of a promise to Our Lady of Mount Carmel Pope Francis says he hasn’t watched television since July 15, 1990, when he promised Our Lady of Mount Carmel that he would no longer do so. The Holy Father made this promise because he “felt that God was asking me to do it.”

15. He went to therapy at age 42 In the book interview “Politics and Society”

by Frenchman Dominique Wolton, Pope Francis recounted that, when he was provincial of the Society of Jesus in Argentina, he went to therapy for six months with a Jewish psychologist. “She was very good, very professional,” the Holy Father said.

16. An ‘incognito’ pope on the streets of Rome IN 2013, the year he was elected bishop of Rome, a Vatican source informed the “Huffington Post” that Pope Francis went out at night dressed as a priest to give alms and help the poor on the streets of Rome.

Suicide bombers planned to attack the pope Meanwhile, Pope Francis marked his 88th birthday with revelations that he almost didn’t make it, the Associated Press said.

Ac c o rd i n g t o e xc e r p t s f ro m h i s u p c o m i n g a u t o b i o g r a p h y, s u i c i d e bombers had planned to attack him during his March 2021 visit to Iraq, but were killed before striking.

Italian daily “Corriere della Sera” ran excerpts of “Hope: The Autobiography,” written with Italian author Carlo Musso, which is being released in more than 80 countries next month.

IFrancis recalled his historic March 2021 trip to Iraq, the first ever by a pope. Covid-19 was still raging and security concerns were high, especially in Mosul.

According to Italian publisher Mondadori, “Hope” is the first autobiography ever published by a pope. Catholic News Agency with Associated Press

RABBI PETER TARLOW lights a candle on a menorah during a Chicanukah event at Holocaust Museum Houston on December 19, in Houston. AP/ANNIE MULLIGAN

Hanukkah: How it is celebrated around the world

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ANUKKAH—also spelled Chanukah or other transliterations from Hebrew—is Judaism’s “festival of lights.” On eight consecutive nightfalls, Jews gather with family and friends to light one additional candle in the menorah—a multibranched candelabra.

In Hebrew, Hanukkah means “dedication,” and the holiday marks the rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem in the second century BC, after a small group of Jewish fighters liberated it from occupying foreign forces.

With the tiny supply of ritually pure oil that they found in the temple, they lit the menorah—and it stayed lit for eight days.

The ritual of lighting a nightly candle, as well as the emphasis on cooking foods in oil such as potato pancakes called latkes, memorialize this miraculously long-lasting oil.

The dates of the holiday are based on Hebrew month of Kislev, which usually coincides with November-December in the Gregorian calendar.

This year, Hanukkah is celebrated from December 25, through January 2, 2025. It’s only the fifth time since 1900 that Hanukkah has fallen on Christmas Day. Why is Hanukkah so late this year? The reason is that the Jewish calendar is based on lunar cycles, and is not in sync with the Gregorian calendar which sets Christmas on December 25. Hanukkah always begins on the 25th day of the Jewish month of Kislev, a date which occurs between late November and late December on the Gregorian calendar.

Jews across the religious observance spectrum—from Reform to Conservative to Orthodox—focus on the same theme of bringing light into the darkness and emphasizing that even a small, against-the-odds effort can have a transforming effect.

For this reason, even though the Talmud reflects a dispute over the order of lighting, most start with one candle and increase the lighting by one more candle each night while reciting or chanting special blessings.

The candles are added from right to left, but lit from left to right on the menorah, thus always starting with the newest light.

The special menorah used for Hanukkah has eight branches, with a ninth place for the candle called shamash from which all others are lit.

The tradition calls for candles with a real flame, though some also use electric ones in public displays, such as in hospitals, for safety reasons.

How is Hanukkah celebrated? A menorah is lit in each household and traditionally is placed where it can be seen from the outside, such as a doorway or windowsill, to symbolize the spreading of God’s light to all nations.

The lighting of menorahs in city streets and parks has become more prominent in recent years in countries around the world, including in front of public landmarks.

In addition to menorah lightings, giving to charity and social works are also part of the celebration for many, reflecting the belief that the Jewish people are called by God to help make the world better for all. AP

Biodiversity Sunday BusinessMirror

Asean Champions of Biodiversity Media Category 2014

Sunday, December 29, 2024 A7

Editor: Lyn Resurreccion

Climate change is making plants less nutritious It could already be hurting grazing animals.

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By Ellen Welti

ORE than one-third of all animals on Earth, from beetles to cows to elephants, depend on plant-based diets. Plants are a low-calorie food source, so it can be challenging for animals to consume enough energy to meet their needs.

Now climate change is reducing the nutritional value of some foods that plant eaters rely on.

Human activities are increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide levels and raising global temperatures. As a result, many plants are growing faster across ecosystems worldwide.

Some studies suggest that this “greening of the Earth” could partially offset rising greenhouse gas emissions by storing more carbon in plants. However, there’s a trade-off: These fasttracked plants can contain fewer nutrients per bite.

I’m an ecolog ist and work with colleagues to examine how nutrient dilution could affect species across the food web. Our focus is on responses in plantfeeding populations, from tiny grasshoppers to giant pandas.

We believe long-term changes in the nutritional value of plants may be an underappreciated cause of shrinking animal populations.

T hese c h a nges i n pl a nts a ren’t v i su a l ly e v ident , l i ke r ising sea s. Nor a re t hey sudden a nd imm inent, l i ke hu r r ic a nes or heat waves. But t hey c a n h ave i mpor t a nt i mpacts over t ime.

Pl a nt- eat i ng a n i m a l s m ay need more time to find and consume food if their usual meal becomes less nutritious, exposing themselves to greater risks from predators and other stresses in the process.

Reduced nutritional values can also make animals less fit, reducing their ability to grow, reproduce and survive.

Rising carbon, falling nutrients

RESEARCH has already shown that climate change is causing nut r ie nt d i lut ion i n hu m a n food crops.

Declines in micronutrients, which play important roles in growth and health, are a particular concern: Long-term records of crop nutritional values have revealed declines in copper, magnesium, iron and zinc.

In particular, human deficiencies in iron, zinc and protein are expected to increase in the coming decades because of rising carbon dioxide levels.

These declines are expected to have broad impacts on human health and even survival, with the strongest effects among populations that are highly dependent on rice and wheat, such as in East and Central Asia.

The nutritional value of livestock feed is also declining. Cattle spend a lot of time eating and often have a hard time finding enough protein to meet their needs.

Protein concentrations are falling in grasses across rangelands around the world. This trend threatens both livestock and ranchers, reducing animals’ weight gains and costing producers money.

Nutrient dilution affects wild species too. Here are some examples.

Dependent on bamboo

GIANT pandas are a threatened species with great cultural value.

Because they reproduce at low rates and need large, connected swaths of bamboo as habitat, they are classified as a vulnerable species whose survival is threatened by land conversion for farming and development.

Pandas also could become a poster animal for the threat of nutrient dilution.

The giant panda is considered an “umbrella species,” which means that conserving panda habitat benefits many other animals and plants that also live in bamboo groves.

Famously, giant pandas are entirely dependent on bamboo and spend large portions of their days eating it. Now, rising temperatures are reducing bamboo’s nutritional value and making it harder for the plant to survive.

Mixed prospects for insects

INSECTS are essential members of the web of life that pollinate many f lowering plants, ser ve as a food source for birds and a n i m a l s, a nd per for m ot her important ecological ser vices.

Around the world, many insect species are declining in devel-

A KOALA climbing in Great Otway National Park, Victoria, Australia. Koalas are among animals that have simple, single-chambered stomachs and rely on microbes in their intestines to extract nutrients from high-fiber food. WIKIPEDIA CC BY SA 3.0

oped areas, where their habitat has been converted to farms or cities, as well as in natural areas.

In zones that are less affected by human activity, evidence suggests that changes in plant chemistry may play a role in decreasing insect numbers.

Many insects are plant feeders that are likely to be affected by reduced plant nutritional value.

Experiments have found that when carbon dioxide levels increase, insect populations decline, at least partly due to lower-quality food supplies.

Not all insect species are declining, however, and not all plant-feeding insects respond in the same way to nutrient dilution.

Insects that chew leaves, such as grasshoppers and caterpillars, suffer the most negative effects, including reduced reproduction and smaller body sizes.

In contrast, locusts prefer carbon-rich plants, so rising carbon dioxide levels could cause increases in locust outbreaks.

Some insects, including aphids and cicadas, feed on phloem—the living tissue inside plants that carries food made in the leaves to other parts of the plant—and may also benefit from carbon-rich plants.

Uneven impacts

DECLINES in plant food quality are most likely to affect places where nutrients already are scarce and animals struggle now to meet their nutritional needs.

These zones include the ancient soils of Australia, along with tropical areas such as the Amazon and Congo basins.

Nutrient dilution is also an issue in the open ocean, where rapidly warming waters are reducing

the nutritional content of giant sea kelp.

Certain types of plant-feeding animals are likely to face greater declines because they need higherquality food.

Rodents, rabbits, koalas, horses, rhinoceroses and elephants are all hind-gut fermenter—animals that have simple, single-chambered stomachs and rely on microbes in their intestines to extract nutrients from high-fiber food.

These species need more nutrient-dense food than ruminant— grazers like cattle, sheep, goats and bison, with four-chambered stomachs that digest their food in stages.

Smaller animals also typically require more nutrient-dense food than larger ones, because they have faster metabolisms and consume more energy per unit of body mass.

Sma l ler anima ls a lso have shorter guts, so they can’t as easily extract all the nutrients from food.

More research is needed to understand what role nutrient dilution may be playing in declines of individual species, including experiments that artificially increase carbon dioxide levels and studies that monitor long-term changes in plant chemistry alongside animals in the field.

Over the longer term, it will be important to understand how nutrient dilution is altering entire food webs, including shifts in plant species and traits, effects on other animal groups such as predators, and changes in species interactions.

Changes in plant nutritional value as a result of rising carbon dioxide levels could have far-reaching impacts throughout ecosystems worldwide. Smithsonian Institution/The Conversation (CC) via AP

Can UN summits save the planet? Faltering 2024 talks bring questions about the process

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HE world’s nations keep faltering in their efforts to join together to save the planet from several environmental crises.

In the past few months United Nations-sponsored negotiations to tackle climate change, plastic pollution, loss of global species and a growing number of deserts have either outright failed or come out with limited outcomes that didn’t address the scale of the problems.

It’s been three years since activist Greta Thunberg dismissed global talks as “blah-blah-blah,” which became a rallying cry for young environmentalists.

“If you are not feeling some kind of grief about what’s going on, you’re obviously not understanding what’s going on,” said climate negotiations veteran analyst Alden Meyer of the European think-tank E3G. He said he’s been watching humanity “collectively fail as a species.”

The Associated Press interviewed more than 20 experts and they called multilateral environmentalism broken because of a cumbersome consensus process, the power of the fossil fuel industry, geopolitical changes and the massive size of the problems they are trying to fix.

Progress is being made, especially on climate change, but it’s too little, too slow and in stutter steps, United Nations officials and others said.

“Is it frustrating? Yes. Is it difficult? Yes,” said United Nations Environment Programme Executive Director Inger Andersen.

But it is the “only way” in which smaller and poorer nations get a seat at the table with powerful rich countries, she said. “I wouldn’t classify it as an outright failure.”

Failed meetings

IT’S a far cry from the hopeful days of 1987 when the world adopted a treaty that is now reversing the dangerous loss of stratospheric ozone by banning certain chemicals.

That was followed by a 1992 Earth summit that set up a United Nations system for negotiating environmental problems, especially climate change called Conference of Parties (COPs). A flurry of these conferences in a row fell relatively flat.

The biodiversity COP in Cali, Colombia, in October ran out of time, ending with no big agreement except to recognize Indigenous people’s efforts.

November’s climate change COP in Baku, Azerbaijan, on paper reached its key goal of increasing financing for poor nations to cope with warming, but the limited amount left developing nations upset and analysts saying it wasn’t nearly enough.

A plastics pollution meeting in Busan, South Korea, the next week got many nations saying they wanted to do something, but

didn’t in the end.

And the conference on desertification in R iyadh, Saudi Arabia also failed to reach an agreement on how to deal with drought.

“We can sum up all these four multilateral meetings of 2024 that we are still failing,” said Johan Rockstrom, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany.

Nine years ago, when more than 190 nations came together to adopt the historic Paris agreement, countries had a mindset that realized a healthy planet benefitted every one, but “we’ve lost track of that,” said former UN climate secretary Christiana Figueres, who shepherded that deal.

“We’re now entering as though we were gladiators in the Colosseum with an attitude of fighting and confrontation. And that mindset is not very productive,” Figueres added.

A broken system

PANAM A lead negotiator Juan Carlos Monterrey was part of all four meetings and said the entire system is “fundamentally broken.”

“It feels like we have lost our way, not only as countries and governments, but as humanity.

It feels like we no longer care for each other,” Monterrey said from the desert meeting in Riyadh.

Monter re y sa id he t h i n k s

countries like his are going to have to f ight env ironmenta l problems on their own or with just small groups of nations.

Others are embracing the idea of “climate clubs” which is a group of countries working together, but not quite the whole world.

“We need to find alternative pathways,” Harjeet Singh, of the Fossil Fuels Non Proliferation Treaty said, pointing to a climate case before the International Court of Justice.

Figueres said one group of lawyers has filed 140 climate changeoriented legal actions in courts across the world. “ The UN system is the worst system except for all the others. They don’t have another,” former Ireland President Mar y Robinson, a member of the advocacy group The Elders, told The Associated Press.

But former US Vice President Al Gore said: “We can’t keep doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.”

Problems with consensus

THIRTY years ago when the climate conferences started there was debate over how decisions should be adopted.

A prominent fossil fuel industry lobbyist and Saudi Arabia pushed hard to kill the idea of majority or supermajority vote and instead adopt the idea of consensus so that every country more or less had to be on board, said

climate negotiations historian Joanna Depledge at Cambridge University in England.

“Through that they managed to stymie, to weaken the negotiations,” Depledge said.

The nature of consensus is “we end up moving at the pace of the slowest,” said PowerShift Africa’s Mohamed Adow.

Gore, Depledge and others are advocating for new rules to make COP decisions by supermajority rule, not consensus. But past efforts have failed.

“Multilateralism isn’t dead, but it is being held hostage by a very small number of countries trying to prevent progress,” Gore said.

“There’s no greater example of this than the way that the fossil fuel industry has hijacked policymaking at all levels.’’

For 27 years, climate negotiations agreements never specifically mentioned “fossil fuels” as the cause of global warming, nor called for their elimination. Then after sharp fights last year in Dubai, it called for a transition away from fossil fuels.

A changing world

PART of the problem is that in the 1980s there were two superpower nations and they had “enough common interest among themselves to knock heads together and to make something happen,” said Princeton University climate scientist and international affairs professor Michael

Oppenheimer.

Now, “the world is much more fractured and power is much more diversified,” Depledge said. “Everybody is shouting with their own national circumstances.”

But at the same time, those shout ing nat ions—a nd businesses and the economy in general—are doing much more at home to fight climate change regard less of what ’s done at COPs, Figueres said.

Former top US negotiator Jonathan Pershing, now environment program director at the Hewlett Foundation, points to “the long arc” of enormous progress made.

(The Associated Press receives support for climate coverage from Hewlett).

UN Climate Secretary Simon Stiell told AP, “Let’s not forget that without UN-convened global cooperation, we would be headed for up to 5 degrees Celsius [9 degrees Fahrenheit] of global heating [above pre-industrial levels]—a death sentence for most of humanity.”

All the experts told The AP that they still have hope—either because of or despite what’s happened so far. “ To be hopeless is to give up on the lives of people today,” sa id c l imate act iv ist Mit zi Jonelle Tan. “ To be hopeless is to give up on my family, on our experiences here. To give up is to give up life.” Seth Borenstein And Sibi Arasu/Associated Press

Sports

NFL players sharing faith, spread their love of Jesus LA28 a good four years away A but Yulo’s all locked, loaded BusinessMirror

A8 | S

unday, December 29, 2024 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao

he’s been able to do in the media and spreading Jesus’ love has been awesome to see,” Bates said.

Harbaugh started his latest postgame news conference, reminding reporters and anyone watching or listening that Christmas was coming up and shared the prayer the Ravens had just heard in the locker room.

“It’s a big football week, all right?

It’s also a big life week,” Harbaugh said.

“It’s a big spiritual week.”

Cousins has professed his faith publicly, dating back to his college years at Michigan State and continuing in the NFL with Washington, Minnesota and the Falcons.

“We all have a platform,” Cousins said earlier this month. “We all try to steward it the best we can. I just want to be able to give a reason to people who ask for the hope that I have.

Although Christianity is the dominate religion at all levels of the sport, some Jewish and Muslim players have also used their platform to publicly share their faith. Recently, for example, Jake Retzlaff became the first Jewish quarterback to play for Brigham Young University, the Utah private school run by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He has embraced his role as an ambassador of Judaism in football.

In the NFL, Bates’ story is perhaps one of the most unique in league history.

He grew up about 30 miles northwest of Houston in Tomball, Texas, and played soccer at Central Arkansas before switching sports and transferring twice.

Bates was a kickoff specialist for two seasons at Texas State and for one year at Arkansas, earning All-SEC honors in 2022.

His hometown Texans signed him on Aug. 1, 2023, and waived him 11 days later to send him searching for a new career in the brick business. AP

LLEN PARK, Michigan— Jake Bates was standing on the turf in his hometown of Houston when asked to reflect on an unlikely journey from learning how to sell bricks to making game-winning kicks for the Detroit Lions.

Bates used his platform as an National Football League (NFL) player to spread his love of Jesus in a primetime interview on NBC after lifting the Lions to a win over the Texans with a 52-yard field goal as time expired.

A month later, Bates told The Associated Press it is a duty to share his Christian faith.

“This doesn’t happen without Jesus and by this, I mean any of this, like, living doesn’t happen without Jesus dying on the cross,” Bates said recently at the team’s practice facility. “He put us on a stage to glorify his name.”

The NFL is filled with players and coaches who feel the same way.

Quarterbacks CJ Stroud of Houston, Kirk Cousins of Atlanta and Lamar Jackson of Baltimore along with Ravens coach John Harbaugh are among the many in the league who speak publicly about their Christian beliefs.

Stroud, in particular, has been a source of inspiration for Bates.

He especially admires how the quarterback regularly credits Jesus at press conferences.

“What

J

By Josef Ramos

ANUARY means back to serious work for Paris 2024 Olympics double gold medalist gymnast Carlos Yulo.

His thoughts, like his impeccable skills that won him the floor exercise and vault gold medals in Paris in August, are soaring fast forward to Los Angeles 2028.

“Definitely, I will be there 100 percent again in the Los Angeles Olympics,” Yulo told BusinessMirror on Friday. “It’s still a long way, but I must be healthy all the time and be free from injuries.”

Yulo’s has never been bothered by any serious injuries since his Olympic debut in Tokyo 2020 that led to a remarkably historic performance not only for himself but for the Philippines in world sports history.

Up ahead for the 24-year-old Yulo are three world and Asian championships, the 2026 Nagoya Asian Games, at least two Southeast Asian Games and an assortment of international gymnastics competitions where he aims to keep his world ranking up there among the elite.

He’s gone into a respite from the gym of sorts following his success in Paris, but has always kept his body in shape the last four months of “vacation.”

“He [Yulo] never forgets to stretch while at home,” said Cynthia Carrion-Norton, president of the Gymnastis Association of the Philippines

SHOHEI OHTANI: Obviously all the hard work has paid off. AP

No more pain. No more swelling. No more tears.

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assisted replacement performed by Martin Roche, a South Florida-based orthopedist specializing in complex knee disorders. Part of the bone in her right knee was cut off and replaced by two titanium pieces. A month later, she was planning her comeback.

“It’s a lot better than my nonexistent cartilage,” said Vonn, one of the most successful skiers of all time with 82 World Cup wins. “I’ve talked to a lot of skiers already about it and I really think that it could be something that should be considered.

“I feel amazing. I mean, obviously not everyone responds the same way to surgeries. For some reason, I bounce back pretty well from surgery.

But I think it’s something to seriously consider for athletes that have a lot of knee problems.”

Knee replacements are usually reserved for older people Andrea Panzeri, the Italian Winter Sports Federation’s head physician and an orthopedist who

has operated numerous times on Vonn’s good friend and fellow downhiller, Sofia Goggia, said knee replacements are usually performed on patients older than 50.

“This is definitely the first time in World Cup history that such a young athlete has raced with one,” Panzeri told The Associated Press. “And I’m not aware of any other elite-level athletes in other sports competing with one, either.”

Panzeri performs knee replacements. But he had never even thought about doing one on a World Cup skier—until he saw Vonn competing with one.

“Partial prosthetics, like the halfknee ones, are definitely the ones that offer the best performance and we’re seeing that [with Vonn],” Panzeri said.

“I don’t think her decision is going to change pro sports. But it could provide more motivation for so-called ‘normal’ people to try a prosthetic.”

Three-time Grand Slam tennis champion Andy Murray played with an artificial hip at the end of his career.

Vonn’s former skiing teammate Julia Mancuso also redid her hip a few months after she retired in 2018 and maintains an active lifestyle.

“I, for sure, would have considered a comeback if I didn’t have kids,” Mancuso told The AP recently. “So I can totally relate to Lindsey.”

But Panzeri said that “hips have different biomechanics than a knee and many more people are able to play sports with a hip prosthetic than a knee prosthetic.” AP LINDSAY VONN is talking up her knee replacement surgery—the first of its kind in World Cup skiing—as a new frontier for the sport. AP

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OS ANGELES—Shohei Ohtani is keeping elite company.

The Japanese superstar caps 2024 by winning The Associated Press Male Athlete of the Year for the third time, tying him with basketball great Michael Jordan—he trails only fourtime winners Lance Armstrong, Tiger Woods and LeBron James.

“I’m very honored,” Ohtani said through translator Matt Hidaka in an exclusive interview with the AP. ”Obviously all the hard work has paid off.

Maybe next year, I’ll get the award again.”

In balloting by 74 sports journalists from the AP and its members, Ohtani received 48 votes. He previously won the award in 2023 and 2021, when he was with the Angels.

“Growing up in Japan, I did follow Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods,” he said. “I would see their accolades and how they were successful in the United States.”

The AP honor has been given out since 1931. Golfer Babe Didrikson won six times, the most by a man or woman.

Swimmer Léon Marchand of France, who won four gold medals at the Paris Olympics, was second with 10 votes in balloting announced Monday. Golfer Scottie Scheffler, whose victories this year included the Masters and an Olympic gold medal, was third with nine.

Moving from the beleaguered Los Angeles Angels to the powerhouse Los Angeles Dodgers, Ohtani won his third Most Valuable Player award and first in the National League, led his new team to its eighth World Series championship and created Major League Baseball’s 50/50 club by hitting 54 home runs and stealing 59 bases.

CARLOS YULO won’t sit on his laurels from Paris 2024. AP

Ohtani named AP’s best male athlete of 2024, 1 shy of record

THE Detroit Lions’ Jake Bates says Jesus puts him on a stage to glorify His name. AP

T. MORITZ, Switzerland— When Lindsey Vonn last raced on the World Cup circuit nearly six years ago, the constant pain in her knee left her in tears and led to retirement.

Flash forward to Vonn’s comeback race on a titanium knee at age 40, and the American skiing standout couldn’t have felt more different.

No more pain. No more swelling.

No more tears.

“The last few years of my career were so much different than they are right now. I’m skiing without thinking about my knee, which I really haven’t done since I first tore my ACL in 2013.

So it’s been a long time that I felt this good,” Vonn said after placing 14th in a super-G in St. Moritz. “I’m a little bit older, but honestly I’m a hell of a lot stronger than I once was.”

So much stronger that she’s talking up her knee replacement surgery—the first of its kind in World Cup skiing—as a new frontier for the sport.

In April, Vonn had a robot-

who added Yulo and his coach, Aldrin Casteñeda, will hit the gymnastics gym in Intramuros right after the holidays.

“Carlos will start training by Januar y,” Carrion-Norton said.

“And he’ ll no longer get himself a foreign coach as he works his way to L A in 2028.”

Instead, Carrion-Norton said, Yulo will travel the world to continue finetuning his routines while attending training camps in Europe and the Americas.

The LA 2028 spotlight won’t, however, be on Yulo alone in 2025— weightlifter Hidilyn Diaz-Naranjo, the Philippines’ first Olympic gold medalist, set aside retirement at age 33 and her missing the Paris Games.

“I’ll still go for it and let’s see how my body responses,” DiazNaranjo told BusinessMirror in an article last month.

Diaz-Naranjo, like Yulo, is always in shape and lifts weights while training potential proteges in her weightlifting center in Jala-Jala.

Ohtani signed a then-record $700 million, 10-year contract with the Dodgers in December 2023. Already a two-way superstar, he embellished his reputation even further despite not pitching all season while he rehabilitated from a second major right elbow surgery he had in September 2023.

Ohtani went wild on offense, making every at-bat a must-see moment. The 6-foot-4 designated hitter batted a career-high .310 while easily surpassing his previous career highs in home runs and stolen bases.

In September, he reached the previously unheard of 50/50 mark in a performance for the ages. Against the Miami Marlins in Florida, Ohtani went 6 for 6 with three homers, 10 RBIs, two stolen bases and 17 total bases.

“It wouldn’t shock me if he went 60/60 and 20 wins a year from now,” Brad Ausmus, who managed the Angels in 2019 during Ohtani’s second season in Anaheim, said recently. “This guy is the greatest athlete to ever play the sport of baseball and there’s not a close second.”

Ohtani said he knew the Dodgers’ franchise record for most homers in a season was 49. His previous best was 46, set in 2021.

“I kind of wanted to get over that bar,” he said. “I was pleasantly surprised I was able to pass that record.”

Ohtani carried the Dodgers offensively during the regular season, and he stayed healthy until Game 2 of the World Series. He injured his left shoulder trying to steal second base against the New York Yankees and finished the Series playing hurt.

He underwent surgery a few days after the Dodgers celebrated their

championship in early November.

“I don’t have full range of motion yet, but it feels a lot better,” he told the AP. “There’s no pain. There’s obviously still a little bit of tightness, but slowly but surely it’s getting better.”

Ohtani recently received an updated rehab schedule, and he’s focused on the near-term.

“It’s the small steps that I think are very important to get me to the ultimate goal, which is to just get back healthy,” he said.

Ohtani is also throwing in the 70 mph range, which is typical for pitchers early in the offseason.

“I’m going to continue to ramp up slowly,” he said.

The Dodgers’ rotation for next season is in flux, and Ohtani is waiting to see how it shakes out.

“We may go with a five-man rotation with a bullpen [game], which is what we did a lot during this season or we may have a six-man rotation,” he said. “But it’s all about balancing out when we can get rest and recuperate.

We’ll see where that takes us along the playoff chase. I’ve got to obviously pace myself, but again that situation will guide us to how we get there.”

The Dodgers open the 2025 season in Japan, where Ohtani is even more closely watched.

“My personal goal is to be fully healthy by the time the opening games do start,” he said. “To be able to pitch and hit would be great, but the situation will kind of guide itself.”

Each time Ohtani comes to the plate or steps on the mound, there’s great pressure and expectation for him to perform spectacular feats. AP

BusinessMirror

December 29, 2024

2024 in pop culturE In a bruising year, we sought out fantasy, escapism—and cute little animals

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BusinessMirror DECEMBER 29, 2024

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YOUR MUSI

LARGER THAN LIFE Japanese singer Fujii Kaze brought the love in Manila debut concert

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By Ica Hontiveros-Cheng

ECAUSE of my love for anime, I have been listening to Japanese music since I was around eight to nine years old. I would buy bootleg cassette tapes of anime soundtracks in Greenhills and I would blissfully play Japanese songs at home, much to my mom’s chagrin.

As I grew older, I understood my mother’s hesitation about my preference in music. I would be seen as weird, or strange would be different from my peers who were all crazy about boy bands and American popular music. And while I didn’t really mind being seen as different, I couldn’t deny feeling the strange looks people gave me, or the

whispers behind my back.

I’ve often written about this experience and while the current trends in music seem to be in my favor, with the rise and universality of Korean Pop, Japanese Pop will always be my first love. Although it hasn’t shared the same limelight as its Korean counterpart, we have seen artists like Hikaru Utada in the early 2000s and recently One Ok Rock break into the mainstream. And now we have singer-songwriter and pianist Fujii Kaze, who broke into the global scene with his song ‘Shinunoga E-Wa’ which became viral on TikTok in July 2022.

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Flowers in a garden

Fujii Kaze’s popularity saw the addition of Manila in his ‘Best of Fuji Kaze 2020-2024 Asia Tour’ and was slated for December 10 at the Mall of Asia Arena, a venue that often hosts Korean artists.

Still, Kazetarians (Fujii Kaze fans) came dressed in the same flowy, flower child ensembles Fujii Kaze is known for, while others came dressed in Japanese haoris, others even had paper fans with the Japanese flag in the middle. The concert easily became a dance party with many audience members dancing to Kaze’s fresh and easy-going songs which had influences of pop, R&B, jazz, some hints

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of classical music, and even a dose of city pop.

“Maganda Kayo!” (You are beautiful!)

Kaze told the crowd in Filipino.

It was Kaze’s first time in Manila and he continued to tell the crowd: “Please Manila, everything starts with your mind, your heart, your feeling. We gonna be good, we gonna be alright. (Manila) Please love yourself,” Kaze reminded the audience.

“Don’t be embarrassed to be cute.”

Kaze told the crowd, inviting them to place their face in their cupped hands, looking like a flower in a garden, this, of course, is a nod to his song ‘Garden’.

Large on screen, larger than life in person

A MASTER at playing the piano, which he started playing at a young age (he also played the saxophone, and the keytar during the concert) Kaze is unlike most Japanese musicians with his Western influences and ideals, he is almost like a flower child with his flowy ethereal ensembles and his messages of self-love which he shared in his live performances, in impressive English I might add.

Many of Fuji Kaze’s visuals during his concert have him shot up close, at a lower angle, so he seems close and large on screen and to the audience, almost like Godzilla towering over buildings. He also employed a ‘hall of mirrors’ effect, so the audience saw multiple images of his androgynous face and his lanky frame on the screen as he danced and let the music move him.

‘You guys are the loudest’ Kaze told the crowd, who erupted in applause, he was equally impressed when the crowd started singing, without any prompt or clue, or instruction Whitney Houston’s “I Have Nothing” which he played as a transition to his hit “Shinunoga E-Wa.”

FUJII Kaze “Manila you are such good singers,” Kaze said.

While many artists who have performed in Manila will always remember us as good (and loud) singers, Kaze has another reason to remember us Filipinos, as the crowd was calling for ‘one more song’ and ‘encore’ as is always the case in concerts, Kaze unfiltered obliged but without first calling the audience ‘a greedy b-tch’ this was met with laughs from the crowd.

As an encore, Kaze performed his song ‘SAYONARA Baby’, for the Japanese you use ‘Sayonara’ as a farewell to someone whom you would not be seeing again, but the translation of his lyrics speak of “Sayonara’ (Good bye) as a word of love” and perhaps this is the Western influence in him speaking.

“Goodbye is the word of love I can give to you Of course I wanted to stay with you forever But nobody can escape from escapes eventually So, I’m not gonna show my tears, sayonara baby” Fuji Kaze sings to his audience, and everyone in the Mall of Asia Arena knows it certainly won’t be the last time.

BUSINESS

Pepe Diokno’s movie-musical treatment in ‘Isang Himala’ is groundbreaking

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Ample screen time

BUT while “Isang Himala” succeeds in launching the film debut of “Pinoy Pop Superstar” champion and stage luminary Aicelle Santos as Elsa, it likewise gives ample screen time to the acting and singing skills of Neomi Gonzales as Elsa’s acolyte Chayong; Kakki Teodoro as girlie bar owner Nimia; Bituin Escalante as Elsa’s mother Saling; David Ezra as the

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MAY ‘HIMALA’

SHMAEL Bernal’s 1982 film “Himala” was supposed to be anti-religion but turned into an overwhelming testament to a people’s faith.

I didn’t get to watch “Himala: Isang Musikal,” the 2003 stage adaptation which the film’s writer, 2022 National Artist Ricky Lee, also authored, with original music

by Vincent de Jesus, and which had several successful runs until 2019.

And so, I entered Robinsons Galleria Cinema 3 with excitement, expecting to see with fresh eyes Jose Lorenzo “Pepe” Diokno’s film version of the musical with its main theatrical cast complete.

It’s not right to compare it with Hollywood iterations of movie musicals. But “Isang Himala” —at least in the Philippine setting — is groundbreaking in the sense that Diokno captures the marriage of film and theater with equality. He achieves the near-perfect balance of the actors’ acute sensitivity onscreen and their larger-than-life sentiments while singing.

The plot does not deviate much from Bernal’s film which starred Nora Aunor as Elsa, a poor girl from the fictional town of Cupang who claims to have seen an apparition of the Virgin Mary, goes to miraculously heal all forms of ailments and unintentionally spawns a cult and religious commercialism around her.

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Photos: CreaZion Studios/Facebook

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SCENES from “Isang Himala” with Aicelle Santos as Elsa documentary filmmaker Orly; and other talented theater actors as the villagers.

Santos essays the contrasting personalities of Elsa with flair — swinging from headstrong Marian devotee when confronted with difficult questions (“Why not Jesus himself appearing to you, instead of his mother?”) to a kind of doubting Thomas (“Where are you, show yourself!”) in her most trying moments. Her breakdown scene while singing is catharsis defined.

Gonzales is also effective as Chayong, another conflicted character who almost leaves Elsa’s side to run away with her boyfriend Pilo (Victor Robinson III), only to go mad after being raped with Elsa. She sounds ethereal in her spot number, “Sa Ihip ng Hangin,” a prelude to her shocking death.

But it’s one of the antagonists, Teodoro as Nimia, whose backstory provides the counterpoint to the wave of religious fanaticism that engulfs Cupang. In her solo number at her bar, Teodoro personifies lust through De Jesus’ steamy lyrics: “Ang tunay na himala ay nasa gitna ng aking hita…”

In another instance, Nimia’s recollection of her childhood friendship with Elsa and Chayong has unusual but vivid images: “Parang kanin na dikit-dikit…”

Showcase

THE musical numbers, in fact, transcend “Isang Himala” into a grand showcase of the best of Filipino songwriting.

This triumph is matched by Diokno’s deftness in direction. The buildup to the moment when Elsa fails to heal a child in the throes of death creates tension that is sustained till the film ends.

Amid the layers of interlocking stories of the characters (Joel Saracho in a cameo as proprietor of an improvised hotel who gets murdered), “Isang Himala” is an engaging tale of how faith waxes and wanes. People lose it when their expectations are not met.

Which is why Elsa declares the original film’s most famous lines: “Walang himala. Ang himala ay nasa puso ng tao.”

Add these crucial ones which I don’t remember hearing in the 1982 film: “Ang bawat tao ay pugad ng himala.”

Something must be said about casting theater actors in “Isang Himala.”

First, to quote critic Noel Vera, who wrote about Bernal’s “Himala” after introducing it at the IndioBravo Filipino Film Festival in 2009: “The crowd scenes have been oft mentioned, but I feel the need to mention it yet again — it’s almost a principal character, this evolving,

pulsating, ululating, many-limbed creature that pulls and tears and tramples everything around it; its character evolves constantly, from the orderly masses that wait outside Elsa’s house to the panicked mob that swarms like startled ants over the little sand hill where Elsa has her visions to — most alarming of all — the praying faithful crossing the sand on bare knees, sending their petitions heavenwards in an act of futile desperation.”

That crowd was also composed mostly of theater actors, with Joel Lamangan hired specifically to direct the sequences.

The throng in “Isang Himala” seems smaller but no less impressive — moving and talking and emoting like most of the great ensemble acting in Philippine theater which happens to be more alive than film lately.

Oh, Ate Guy opens and ends “Isang Himala” with a voiceover.

And is that Raquel Villavicencio (production designer in the Bernal film) who appears and says something foreboding in the epilogue?

“Isang Himala” is a shoo-in for Best Picture in the ongoing Metro Manila Film Festival.

2024 in pop culture In a bruising year, we sought out fantasy, escapism—and cute little animals

By Jocelyn Noveck

The Associated Press

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EW YORK—I’ll get you, my pretty! And your little pygmy hippo, too!

Forgive us the shameless attempt to link the fantasy hit Wicked to the delightful Moo Deng. But, hear us out—there’s something the two have in common as the year draws to a close. Escapism. Whether we found it on the yellow brick road, or in videos from a Thailand zoo, or perhaps in unlikely Olympic heroes, we gravitated toward fantasy and feel-good pop culture moments this year.

There were new trends, as always. “Brat summer” became a thing, as did “demure, mindful.” And for some inexplicable reason, we became obsessed with celebrity lookalike contests.

There were breakups—Bennifer is, again, a thing of the past—and reunions: Oasis, please try to stay together for the tour. And some things stayed, remarkably, the same: Taylor Swift and Beyoncé kept on breaking records and making history.

So, after a year where much changed but some things held steady, here’s our annual, very selective trip down pop culture memory lane:

Singer Celine Dion performs from the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France, during the opening ceremony of the 2024 Summer Olympics on July 26. Photos by AP

January

It starts as a cheery tweet from a beloved Sesame Street figure: “ELMO is just checking in! How is everybody doing?” The answers hint at something deeper and more worrisome. “Not great, Elmo. Not great,” says one milder reply. Doing much better is the viral phenomenon called “Barbenheimer,” which makes its awards season debut at the Golden Globes. But perhaps the most poignant moment comes from neither film: Lily Gladstone, first Indigenous winner of best actress in a drama for Killers of the Flower Moon, begins her remarks in the language of her tribe, Blackfeet Nation.

March

“What was I made for?” Billie Eilish sings at the Oscars, channeling Barbie. And what was Ken made for? Not entirely clear—but it’s clear Ryan Gosling was made to play him. His singalong version of “I’m Just Ken” is one of the most entertaining Oscar musical moments in years. Still, Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer prevails, a rare case of the top prize going to a blockbuster studio film.

Will it happen again in 2025? Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande sure hope so; as presenters, they make a sly reference to their upcoming juggernaut, Wicked.

Speaking of marketing, people are ob-

Ariana Grande (left) and Cynthia Erivo pose for the photographers prior to the premiere of Wicked at Auditorio Nacional in Mexico City on November 11. sessed with that bizarre Dune popcorn bucket. And Beyoncé carves her space in country music with “Act II: Cowboy Carter,” which will make her the first Black woman to top the Billboard country chart.

May

If the Wicked tour is in full force, another one stops in its tracks: Jennifer Lopez cancels her summer tour amid reports of both poor ticket sales and trouble in her marriage to Ben Affleck. It’s been an eventful year for J.Lo, who’s released an album and movie called This is me… Now—both reflections on her renewed love with Affleck.

June

Welcome to Brat Summer SUMMER! Charli XCX releases her hit “Brat” album, with its lime green cover, and launches a thousand memes. Collins Dictionary defines “brat,” its word of the year, as “characterized by a confident, independent, and hedonistic attitude.” At the celeb-heavy Taylor Swift shows in London, we see Prince William shaking it off, which is either charming or cringe, you decide.

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Two-month-old baby hippo Moo Deng plays with a zookeeper in the Khao Kheow Open Zoo in Chonburi province, Thailand, on September 19.

July

Bonjour, it’s Olympics time! In Paris! An audacious opening ceremony along the Seine is punctuated by a fabulous Celin Dion, perched on the Eiffel Tower, singing her heart out—in the rain, too. Controversy swirls over a scene critics feel mocks Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper (organizers say it does not). Olympic stars are born—including bespectacled “pommel horse guy” gymnast Stephen Nedoroscik, who nets two bronze medals and comparisons to Clark Kent. Also capturing hearts: yep, Moo Deng, born this month. Her name means “bouncy pork.”

August

BENNIFER is no more. After two decades, two engagements and two weddings, J.Lo files for divorce. One union dissolves, another returns: Oasis announces a reunion tour. Will they be “Demure, mindful”? Everyone seems to want to get in on TikToker Jools LeBron’s act—even the White House press team.

Back at the Olympics, in the new sport of breaking, we meet Australia’s Raygun, arguably neither demure nor mindful with her “kangaroo” move.

December 29, 2024

November

Maya Rudolph does a pretty good Kamala Harris laugh on Saturday Night Live, but you know who does it better? Harris herself. The Democratic candidate makes a surprise cameo three days before the U.S. presidential election, following in the footsteps of Hillary Clinton, Sarah Palin and others. As for Moo Deng, she doesn’t have her own TV series yet, but our favorite pygmy hippo is generating plenty of merch. And that brings us back to ….

December

Wicked! Director Jon M. Chu’s emeraldhued fantasy remains very very popular, to quote one of its buzzy show tunes, dancing through life and defying gravity at the multiplex. Moviegoers also come for Gladiator II and, in a veritable tidal wave, Disney’s Moana 2, which beckons us back to the seas of Oceania. Once again, 2024 seems to be telling us: Give people some whimsy, a place to escape, maybe some catchy tunes—and no one knows how far they’ll go. n Cover photo by Tobias Reinert on Pexels.com

Sunday, December 29, 2024 | Edited by Jose F. Lacaba

Manuel “Manny” Baldemor

Cover story

Christmas is in the heart The colors of Manuel Baldemor

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Of artists & great performances Focus on conductor Gerard Salonga and operatic tenor Diomedes Saraza, Jr.

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Manny Baldemor &

n Christmas eve, Luisito Mendoza, a Lalamove delivery man from Valenzuela, boarded his motorcycle to deliver a pata (braised pork) dish in Quezon City. It was already 11 pm, close to Christmas, but Luisito did not mind.

He was going to make one last delivery so he and his son could have some money for their noche buena.

As Luisito stood by the house, the man who took the dish gave him a P500 bill. He was told that the amount paid for the P350 delivery charge, with P50 as tip. The man then asked Luisito for P100 as change.

The old man was perplexed. He had no change and all the stores in the vicinity had closed. He called the lady who gave the order to him.

“Wala po akong panukli. Lumuwas lang po ako para magkaroon kami ng anak ko ng konting pera ngayong Pasko [I have no change.

I just went out tonight so that my son and I will have a little money this Christmas],” he tearfully said.

The woman told him, “Wag nyo na po suklian. Ako na bahala magpaliwanag sa sister ko. Sa inyo na po yung sukli [You don’t have to give change. I will explain to my sister.]

You can have the P150. It’s our Christmas gift to you.”

It was my youngest sister who sent the Christmas dish and she was crying when she told me the story. “Humagulgol yung matanda noong sabihin ko na sa kanya na yung sukli [The old man was beside himself in tears, when I told him he could keep the change]. For us, P150 is not a huge sum of money. But for the old man and his son, it was really something.”

Christmas 2024 has been a hard one for many Filipinos. Noticeable are the absence of Yuletide lanterns or colorful lights in most houses. And what was once a common sight of children making their way in the streets to sing Christmas carols for coins has become scarce.

“Bihira na ang nakikita kong mga bata na nagka-caroling sa mga bahay-bahay, Madami pa rin ang mga batang namamalimos sa kalsada, kumakatok sa mga kotse. [Seldom do I see children caroling in houses. But there are many children in the streets, begging

as they knock on car windows],” my older brother said.

CHRISTMAS & CHILDREN For almost 20 years, Christmas has become synonymous with children for prominent, multi-media, Filipino visual artist Manuel “Manny” Baldemor.

Manny has lent his brilliant talent as a painter to create artworks that have been reproduced as greeting cards and distributed globally by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).

Also famous for his sculpture, writings, wood prints, and wood carvings, Manny’s beautif u l execution of the UNICEF Christmas cards captured the nostalgia of writing personal messages, sending greeting cards, and making someone’s day.

In the age of the internet, there is something quaint and personal in receiving in your mail an actual Christmas greeting card. As Manny mentioned: “Pag may sumulat sa’yo, sigurado kang kaibigan mo siya [You can be sure that person is your friend if he writes to you].”

FOLK ARTIST-PAINTER Born on March 26, 1947 in Paete, Laguna, Manny Baldemor graduated in 1968 at the University of Santo Tomas College of Architecture and Fine Arts, with a degree in Painting.

To support his college studies, Manny did academic plates for his classmates and worked on the side as a Mabini Artist.

He began his career in publication by working as a layout artist and editorial cartoonist for the Philippine Graphic during his final year in college.

As noted in the Ateneo Art Gallery website, “Baldemor is believed to be the most traveled Filipino artist; exhibited as soloist

in over 30 cities, including Paris, Copenhagen, and Cairo.”

It is further stated on the website that, “multiple murals of his can be found in institutions worldwide: Pasasalamat (1997) at the United Nations building in Vienna, and most notably, Philippine People Power (2009) at the Basilica of St. Therese de Lisieux in France, to name a few. He has received a total of 20 awards and several grants, participated in over a hundred oneman exhibits, engaged in over twenty group exhibits, written two books, and has been featured in over 10 books and publications.”

Manny has served as artist-in-residence in over five countries—Chile, Estonia, France, Israel, Japan, Singapore, Switzerland, Portugal, and Mexico.

Dubbed by art critic Leonides Benesa as a “folk artist,” Manny’s works feature folk art characters rendered in simplified geometric forms, often depicting his hometown and people, their daily activities and traditions.

ART TO SERVE CHILDREN Conducting its mission in over 190 countries and territories, UNICEF works to protect the rights of every child, everywhere, especially the most disadvantaged children and in the toughest places to reach.

It relies on voluntary donations to help children around the world. For over 70

years, it has been releasing limited-edition greeting cards featuring the artwork of various renowned artists.

This tradition began in 1949 with a drawing by a Czech schoolgirl. It has continued to this day, raising funds to support vulnerable children around the world.

UNICEF Philippines addresses the needs of millions of Filipino children facing the daily struggle to survive malnutrition, lack of education, and the devastating effects of climate change and violence against children.

Carli Snyman is the Chief of Private Fundraising and Partnership for UNICEF Philippines She holds a Masters of Marketing Mangement with distinction from the University of the Witwatersrand in her native Johannesburg, South Africa.

Prior to her UNICEF duty station in Manila, Carli worked with Medecins sans Frontieres/Doctors without Borders in South Africa and in Brazil.

Since 2021, UNICEF Philippines has collaborated with iconic Filipino artists to enhance efforts at ensuring that every Filipino child survives, thrives, and fulfils his or her potential.

In 2021, the organization partnered with Robert Alejandro, raising P8.4 million which helped in providing support

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UNICEF Philippines

Pasko ng Pamilya Filipino

Graces from the Land

Christmas Lanterns Festival to children affected by Typhoon Odette.

In 2022, National Artist Larry Alcala’s Slice of Life design was featured and this raised P10.9 million.

In 2023, art pieces from Mauro “Malang” Santos’ private collection were featured, getting about P8 million in donations. The cards did not just capture the hearts of collectors but also funded UNICEF’s lifesaving programs.

The joyful, colorful Manny Baldemor Christmas cards have raised millions for UNICEF this 2024. Every P1,000 donation entitled one to receive a box set of 12 cards, with four designs. Each donation helped support better access to education, immunization, health and nutrition, child protection, and emergency aid for the most vulnerable children in the world.

The 2024 limited-edition UNICEF Cards

Carli Snyman, Chief of Private Fundraising and Partnership, UNICEF Philippines set featured four artworks from Manny’s vast collection: Pasko sa Aming Bayan (1992), Christmas Lanterns Festival (2006), Graces from the Land (2008), and Pasko ng Pamilya Pilipino (2024). The box set contains a total of 12 cards, three pcs per artwork.— Psyche Roxas-Mendoza

Pasko sa Aming Bayan

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Of artists & grea

Focus on conductor Gerard Salonga an

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By Pablo A. Tariman

he year 2024 is drawing to a close and one is filled with the sights and sounds of outstanding, class acts in the world of music and theater.

It has been a busy year for the performing arts, with more than 20 plays and musicales brightening the stages of the country’s top venues—Aliw Theater, Theater at Solaire, CCP Black Box Theater, Cultural Center of the Philippines, Resorts World Manila’s Newport Performing Arts Theater, Rizal Park Open Air Auditorium, Samsung Performing Arts Theater, SM Aura Premier’s Samsung Hall, and SM City North EDSA’s Sky Dome.

What shaped the characters behind some of the popular performing artists of the year? What did performing their muchadmired repertoires mean to audiences and critics alike?

Tony&Nick talked to noted conductor Gerard Salonga and violinist Diomedes Saraza, Jr. for their views on what contributed to their growth as artists.

We quoted critics and what they found amazing about their performances, at times leading to not just one, but three, standing ovations in one evening.

MUSIC MOVIES MAGIC Gerard Salonga led the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra (PPO) in a mixed program of popular and classical warhorses in the concert called Music Movies Magic at the Samsung Theater for Performing Arts.

Handling both classical and pop singers in one concert, Salonga breezed through Dvorak’s Carnival Overture and accompanied, with seamless ease, soprano Camille Lopez Molina in an Andrea Chenier aria. The result was a revelation for Manila audiences who have not seen the conductor for many years.

For several years now, Gerard has been a resident conductor of the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra.

So, what shaped the kind of compleat musician he is now?

It is obvious from his Nov. 22 PPO appearance that he respects both pop and classical musicians. For him, there is no difference.

Pop or classical, he expects the artists to arrive in the rehearsals well prepared. Once everyone connects with each other, music

takes precedence. He admitted to learning a lot working with legendary musicians.

CECILE & LEAH Gerard found conducting Cecile Licad in the Saint Saens G Minor concerto and De Falla’s Night in the Garden of Spain at the Philamlife Auditorium to be among his most memorable performances.

“I still have the recording from that concert! Learning conducting takes time, and I was very fortunate to receive lots of podium time when I really needed it, and lots of very good advice from some very good musicians, not only about the music itself, but how to rehearse it,” Gerard said.

He added: “Learning to work with the musicians can be an overlooked aspect, and I’ve found out that the conductors who know how to draw out the best performances are the ones who know how to work with people and are very sensitive to what’s going on in the room not only musically, but psychologically, as well. Having been able to conduct orchestras from different backgrounds has given me a deeper appreciation of how universal a language music really is.”

That PPO concert was not just about film music but also featured classical gems incorporated in films.

The repertoire included Williams’ Three Holiday Songs from Home Alone, Strauss’ Overture to Die Fledermaus.

Camille Lopez-Molina and Lara Maigue sang classical arias, while Arman Ferrer reprised the old Mario Lanza hit, Be My Love. In that concert, Ferrer was the audience favorite finding new nuances in Be My Love.

Soprano Lara Maigue thrilled with a spotless Vengeance Aria from Mozart’s Magic Flute.

Gerard counts his sister Leah and Cecile Licad as both having a profound influence on him as a musician.

“What I am now as a musician, Lea has always been an example to me of diligence and perseverance. Her natural talents are something everyone appreciates, but not

Like watching Oscar Yatco conducting the national orchestra in the late 80s, Gerard Salong masterfully conducts the Philippines Philharmonic Orchestra last Nov. 22

Premier violinist Diomedes Saraza, Jr. and operatic tenor Arman Ferrer perform with the PPO under Gerard Salonga everyone in the audience is privileged to see how she practices and prepares. Because of all the years spent as her accompanist, it feels natural for me to follow the breathing of singers, and how the syllables melt into one another, or not. She has a very innate sense of harmony, phrase, and dynamics, which is rare, and those are among the things that distinguish her from others. Cecile Licad is not only a good personal friend, but she has (perhaps not consciously) mentored me significantly. From her, I learned about character through articulation and gesture.”

RITE OF PASSAGE Diomedes Saraza, Jr. is my Violinist of the Year for his spotless delineation of the

Sibelius concerto with PPO under Maestro Grzegorz Nowak.

He might as well also be the Concertmaster of the Year. He actually stole the thunder from the Bruch soloist when he essayed the main highlights from the Strauss tone poem.

“The Strauss tone poem Ein Heldenleben is considered a rite of passage for concertmasters. Playing that piece is not just learning the notes. It is also understanding the depth of the tone poem. For me to prepare something like that, I have to be emotionally energized. I cannot just focus on my solo part but also make sure the string section is in sync with what the conductor wants. It’s quite a tough part but it was worth it,” Diomedes said.

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at performances

nd operatic tenor Diomedes Saraza, Jr.

Cecile Licad in focus at Carnegie Hall (Photo by Troi Santos)

DOUBLE OVATIONS This year, Cecile Licad received double ovations in her return engagement at the Manila Metropolitan Theater with Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 again with the PPO with the Polish music director.

Last December 5, she received three standing ovations in one evening at the Carnegie Hall.

The predominantly New York audiences found instant magic in her opener Scriabin Impromptus and conquered all the way from her Chopin Preludes, Joplin numbers and down to her finale, Ravel’s Alborada del grazioso which was met with screaming standing ovations. Indeed, she electrified Carnegie Hall and elicited bottomless pride from Filipinos in the audience.

Inigo Elizalde posted on FB: “An amazing evening of incredible music. Such a fabulous talent!”

Danny Barizo told Licad: “It was a real pleasure listening to you at Carnegie Hall. Your performance was a display of sheer artistry and musicality.”

The ultimate tribute came from genre critic George Grella of the New York Classical Review who noted one of her infrequent and welcome appearances.

“This was the kind of performance that was less about pianistic display than about ideas and meaning, something classical music needs much more. Licad is both an excellent pianist and an excellent musician. The pairing of her chops at the keyboard, which are superb and of her thinking which is both logical and personal. Her playing Thursday night showed she had thought through every

New Yorkers gave Cecile Licad a much-deserved standing ovation, not just once but thrice in one evening. (Photo: Lui Queano) piece, every note, in detail. The result, channeled through her energy, was never less than fascinating. Not every idea was convincing, but there was always an idea with Licad’s stamp on it. And when everything worked, the results were impressive and even revelatory,” he said.

The New York critic emphasized that Licad is one of the few musicians dedicated to the American romantic piano literature and found the programming excellent.

The review’s conclusion: “Last was Ravel’s Alborado del gracioso, music that, like Chopin, seemed to fit Licad perfectly. The thinking and playing were as fine as the Preludes, Licad underlining the shape and placement of each phrase without teetering in mannerism, the sound full of empty spaces and mystery in another superb interpretation. Licad added two encores which were direct continuation of the program, Joplin’s Maple Leaf Rag and Louis Moreau Gottschalk’s Souvenir d’ Andalousie. With a much more regular pulse and the same effervescence, the rag was superb, the right balance of order and freedom. Licad knows Gottschalk probably better than any living pianist, and the showpiece was dazzling and tremendous fun, a triple exclamation points at the end of the evening.”

In 2025, Licad is scheduled to do another national outreach tour in Antipolo City, Iloilo, Nueva Ecija, Davao City and Sorsogon.

After her Philippine outreach concerts, she flies to Portland to provide live music for the silent film Louie with Wynton Marsalis and his jazz ensemble. Louie is the film adaptation of the life and times of Louie Armstrong.

Cecile Licad and son Otavio Meneses, with sold out poster.

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6 Sunday, December 29, 2024

Steering Dual Realities: A Palanca winner’s secret to balancing career and storytelling

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avigating the complexities of circuit boards by day and weaving intricate narratives by night, balancing an engineering career with a passion for creative writing might seem like a daunting feat.

Yet, it’s a thrilling journey where logic meets imagination, and technical precision dances with artistic expression.

This duality is exemplified by Christopher S. Rosales, a licensed electronics and communications engineer who clinched the First Prize in the Maikling Kuwentong Pambata category in the 72nd Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature for his masterpiece “Musikong Bumbong.”

His achievement underscores the beautiful synergy between the analytical mind of an engineer and the boundless creativity of a storyteller, proving that one can indeed excel in both right and left-brain realms.

BALANCING CAREER WITH WRITING When asked how he balances his career with his passion for writing, he emphasized, “Sa tuwing may libreng oras ako, naglalaan talaga ako ng panahon sa pagbabasa at pagsusulat.

Kasi katulad ng ibang mga kasanayan, kapag hindi siya masyadong nagagamit, medyo pumupurol din talaga. Kaya hangga’t maaari, hangga’t makakaya ko, pinaglalaanan ko ng oras ang pagsusulat at pagbabasa [Every free time I get, I devote time to reading and writing.

Like any other expertise, reading and writing requires practice. So, I really devote time to write and to read].”

Regarding his professional career, Christopher mentioned that the concept of engineering has not yet influenced his approach to children’s literature. He believes it is possible to incorporate engineering concepts into other genres like poetry and short stories.

He is excited about the prospect of taking on such a challenge and hopes to integrate these ideas into children’s literature in the future.

A REVOLUTIONARY LEGACY His winning piece, “Musikong Bumbong,” is inspired by true events which happened to a revolutionary band that used bamboo instruments during the Spanish colonial period.

The story revolves around a bamboo named Lawiswis, who loves to sing. Despite being mocked by fellow bamboos, who believe they should only be used for weapons

Licensed electronics and communications engineer Christopher S. Rosales wins First Prize in the Maikling Kuwentong Pambata category at the 72nd Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature, with his piece “Musikong Bumbong.” Now just one win away from the Palanca Awards Hall of Fame, Rosales has an impressive history of First Prize victories, including “Gulayan Klasrum,” in 2010, “Si Berting, Ang Batang Uling,” in 2010, and “Pugon na De-Gulong,” in 2016

and tools, Lawiswis persisted in pursuing his passion, finding a special place in the band’s journey.

The creation of his children’s story was a lengthy process, hindered by a lack of sufficient information. Christopher said he faced a considerable challenge until he stumbled upon a Facebook page that provided insights into the first generation of the Malabon Musikong Bumbong from the Spanish era.

This rich tradition, now referred to as “Musikawayan ng Malabon,” has been preserved to the present.

Determined to gather authentic details, Christopher reached out to Gilbert Ramos, the great-great-grandchild of Felix Ramos, the founder of Malabon Musikong Bumbong, and also a Katipunero.

Through a series of insightful interviews with Gilbert, Christopher was finally able to piece together the narrative and complete his draft, culminating years of dedicated research and perseverance.

JOURNEY TOWARDS THE PALANCA HALL OF FAME With his latest achievement, Christopher is now just one First Prize win away from being inducted into the prestigious Palanca Awards Hall of Fame.

“Hindi ako makapaniwala kasi tuwing sumasali ako, hindi naman ako usually nananalo.

Kapag naman pinalad na manalo, biglang First Prize, kaya talagang nakaka-overwhelm, lalo na’t ang field ko ay engineering at wala akong [I could not believe it because when I submit my

work, I don’t usually win. And luckily, when I win, it is for First Prize so I get overwhelmed.

Especially since my field is engineering and I don’t have] a formal background in creative writing,” he said.

He further said: “Lahat ng natutunan ko ay galing lang sa pagbabasa at pagsasaliksik.

Basta kapag nagsusulat ako, ine-enjoy ko lang talaga ang proseso ng pag-akda. Manalo man o matalo, ang mahalaga ay may ambag sa panitikang Filipino [Everything I learned, I achieved through reading and research. When I write, I really enjoy the process of writing. Win or lose, the important thing is I have contributed to Philippine literature].”

Christopher discovered his passion for writing during High School when his teacher assigned various topics for formal theme exercises. It was through these assignments that he began to appreciate the art of writing.

Additionally, his exposure to diverse types of literature in High School broadened his knowledge and deepened his love for storytelling.

Over time, Rosales drew inspiration from renowned Filipino writers like Dr. Eugene Evasco, Dr. Luis P. Gatmaitan, and Genaro Gojo Cruz, whom he regards as the pillars of children’s literature in the Philippines.

Throughout his writing career, Rosales has published several acclaimed children’s books, such as “Namimingwit sa Langit” and “Si Berting, Ang Batang Uling,” the latter of which won the prestigious Palanca Award for Maikling Kuwentong Pambata in 2010.

His impressive repertoire of First Prizewinning pieces also includes “Gulayan Klasrum,” for Kabataan Sanaysay in 2010 and “Pugon na De-Gulong,” for Sanaysay in 2016.

ADVICE TO ASPIRING WRITERS Creating quality work requires a consistent writing process and routine. For Christopher, this starts with reading.

“Yung utak ko kasi parang nasa dalawang

side: technical side for engineering, at creative side for writing. Para makapag-switch ako doon sa creative side, nagsisimula ako sa pagbabasa, at kapag nakuha ko na yung flow ng ideas, tsaka ko lang sinisimulan magsulat [My mind seems to be operating on two sides: technical, for engineering; creative, for writing. When my thoughts switch to the creative side, I start with reading. After I imbibe the flow of ideas, that is the only time I start writing].”

Christopher also draws immense inspiration in children’s literature from different countries. He is passionate about fostering the same level of enthusiasm and support for children’s literature in the Philippines, aiming to enrich young readers with a diverse array of stories and perspectives.

“Children’s literature continues to grow here in the Philippines. Even stories in the vernacular—from the different provinces— get published. There are publishers who risk publishing these kind of literature. They serve as my inspiration to further nurture Filipino stories and culture through children’s literature,” he said.

It is true that his job and his other responsibilities do not serve as a hindrance to writing and creating meaningful stories. Regardless of the demands of his profession or personal life, the drive to craft compelling narratives can always find a way to flourish.

Christopher offers this advice to aspiring writers who are also balancing other careers: “Mahalaga na malaman mo kung para saan at para kanino ka nagsusulat. Sa ganitong paraan, kahit gaano ka pa ka-busy sa buhay, ang pagnanais mong magsulat at mag-ambag sa panitikan ng Pilipinas ay magiging tila isang kati na hindi mo mapigilang kamutin [It is important to know for what purpose and for whom you write. In this way, no matter how busy you become, your desire to write and to contribute to Philippine literature will remain an insatiable itch that you just have to do something about].”

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8 Sunday, December 29, 2024

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