BusinessMirror February 13, 2021

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‘FOR LOVE OF PEACE

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IN MINDANAO’ UNVEILED during the celebration of the 100th year of Philippine Independence on June 12, 1998, the Commemorative Monument of Peace and Unity by Davaoeño sculptor Kublai Milan symbolizes the harmonious coexistence between the indigenous inhabitants and migrant people of multicultural Mindanao. HUGO MAES | DREAMSTIME.COM

A BARMM transition period sans extension threatens to spur war jitters anew in volatile South

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By Manuel T. Cayon

AVAO CITY—Bangsamoro leaders and several networks of peace advocates are knocking on the doors of Malacañang and Congress to grant them a little more time to galvanize the gains they have achieved in less than three years, stressing the time frame given them to do their job is “too constricting” compared to other nations who accomplished similar feats in more than 10 years.

At least one academe-based peace group, the Al-Qalam Institute at the Ateneo de Davao University, said a final evaluation for an exit agreement was unlikely to happen at the end of the transition in 2022 because of the bureaucratic delays on the part of the national government and the one-year lockdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

While the Bangsamoro (literally, Moro nation) revolutionary-turned-autonomous regional government leaders and peace advocates won’t say it yet, the peace process in Mindanao will be placed again in a rather perilous situation without an extended term for the transition process.

Mary Ann Arnado, executive director of the Mindanao People’s Caucus, said the call for extension has become more necessary and for all the valid reasons to allow a little bit more time for the new Bangsamoro autonomous region to demonstrate to its combat constituents and all Filipino Muslims that its move was entirely correct to sit down with the government for a fi-

nal peace settlement in Mindanao.

The current Bangsamoro region has granted autonomous governance to the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) as part of the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro, which was the final peace agreement, signed in 2014. It would take four more years, in September 2018, for Congress to ratify the Bangsamoro Organic Law, to officially start the transition process.

The previous Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) was originally granted to the first Moro revolutionary organization, the Nur Misuari-led Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), but the Moro leader griped years later that the national government has not complied with its promises under the 1996 Final Peace Agreement.

Transition

EXTENDING the transition for even another three years may still be short, but may at least give enough breathing space to continue what Bangsamoro leaders and peace advocates have started

PESO EXCHANGE RATES n US 48.0400

MILF Chairman and currently BARMM Chief Minister Murad Ebrahim inspects a crude anti-tank rocket-propelled grenade launcher during the first decommissioning of MILF combatants and weapons in 2015. Behind him is former President Benigno Aquino III. FILE PHOTO BY MANUEL CAYON

as part of the “gargantuan” tasks of the normalization process, foremost of which is the decommissioning of the 40,000 armed fighters and ancillary units of the MILF, and the crafting of the Parliamentary form of autonomous government.

Either one of these may take

decades to firm up, even as the national government could not even take off with its planned charter amendments by any administration, BARMM leaders would say.

“Just imagine, 17 long years of negotiation, can we implement what has been in the law for just three years?” pointed out Moha-

gher Iqbal, who was the MILF chief negotiator and currently minister of education of BARMM. He said the MILF was originally pushing for a six-year transition but accepted nonetheless the three-year transition, which the MILF described as too short. “Pag hindi ho tayo ma-extend, hilaw po ang implementation ng normalization process [If we don’t extend, the implementation of the normalization process will be halfbaked],” he said.

“Of course, this is not a blame game. [We are not blaming the government], neither are we blaming the MILF. Because we are already partners, not just in the implementation of the Bangsamoro Organic Law but even in the implementation of the agreement between the government and the MILF,” he emphasized.

Iqbal made the comment last year after the Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA) passed Resolution 332 urging the House of Representatives and the Senate of the Philippines to extend the Bangsamoro transition period from year 2022 to 2025, to provide the BTA with sufficient time to complete its mandate.

This resolution followed the statement of MILF Chairman and current Bangsamoro Chief Minister Ahod Murad Ebrahim that “in the normalization, there [is] much to be sought.”

“We have two tracks of challenge in the peace process: the governance track and the normalization track,” Ebrahim said. “The first track would be the governance aspect—this is erecting the Bangsamoro government, organizing the BARMM. There is that other track that is more comprehensive, the normalization track.”

“In normalization, there is the decommissioning of the BIAF

[Bangsamoro Islamic Armed Forces], dismantling of private armies, establishing the police force for the region. There is rehabilitation of combatants after they are decommissioned, including amnesty. Much is involved and tied up in normalization,” Ebrahim pointed out.

He anticipated that the normalization process would be placed on the backburner once more with the holding of the forthcoming 2022 national and local elections.

“That would be a problem,” Ebrahim said.

For example, the initially decommissioned 12,000 BIAF combatants have yet to receive the P1million economic package for each that the national government had promised in exchange for their return to civilian life, he said. “That’s the challenge, how to convince the other combatants who are now saying that nothing has happened.

They are now saying, why should we submit to decommissioning?”

Ebrahim added: “That’s why, when at the end of the transition, everything in the normalization process should have been implemented to coincide with the terms of the transition.”

The League of Municipalities of the Philippines (LMP) chapter in Tawi-Tawi, Sangguniang Panlalawigan of Tawi-Tawi, and Sangguniang Panlalawigan of Maguindanao have all supported the resolution while passing their separate calls for extension, Iqbal continued.

Peace in peril?

IN the thick of the governmentMILF negotiation, Misuari surfaced to demand compliance from Malacañang with the latter’s alleged failed promises in their separate peace agreement in 1996. Misuari said the government failed Continued on A2

n JAPAN 0.4594 n UK 66.4729 n HK 6.1970 n CHINA 7.4663 n SINGAPORE 36.2183 n AUSTRALIA 37.0917 n EU 58.2245 n SAUDI ARABIA 12.8083

Source: BSP (February 11, 2021)

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A2 Saturday, February 13, 2021

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‘For love of peace in Mindanao’ Continued from A1

in its mini-Marshall plan to pour economic and financial assistance to remove the ARMM from the notorious tag of being the poorest region in the country. The powerful 56-nation pan-Arabic Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) has also asked the government to look into the gripes of the MNLF. The OIC has been a facilitator and mediator in the government-MNLF peace negotiation.

In the case of the MILF, a failed decommissioning of its combatants alone may bear serious consequences to peace.

In a gathering of MILF fighters in Darapanan in 2008 to discuss the peace process it was entering with government, a unit of young fighters in formation were visibly impassioned to continue fighting than remain with the peace negotiations.

It must also be recalled that it was the younger generation of Moro fighters who formed their own groups to manifest their dismay with their fathers who entered into a peace agreement, and who later expressed their disappointment over the government’s perceived failure to comply with the provisions of the peace agreement.

This was seen in the formation of the Abu Sayyaf Group when Misuari agreed to a peace settlement in 1996; of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters when the Supreme Court thumbed down in 2008 the Memorandum of Agree-

ment on Ancestral Domain; and of the Maute Group, which opted to tread the path of terrorism and laid siege to Marawi City for five months in 2017.

Far from over

IF the transition is ended by next year over the objections of concerned parties, there would be no exit agreement to be signed that would show the complied terms of the peace agreement with the MILF, said Kenny Lloyd Angon, deputy executive director of the Al-Qalam Institute. The exit agreement is a final document showing that a program, or agreement, has been fully implemented and complied with.

But currently, the process is still far from full compliance and implementation, he said, citing reports of widespread delays caused by the realities of the peace process, a situation further aggravated by the now year-long Covid-19 pandemic.

“We cannot sign an exit agreement with this, where the needed processes in the transition and access to government services in the BARMM have been stopped by the pandemic,” Angon said.

He added the peace process alone had been a painstaking process at implementing policies and trying to persuade both policy makers, traditional politicians and the communities to accept the new terms under the peace agreement.

“This alone has been taking up much time and delaying timetables

THIS February 22, 2019, file photo shows Carlito Galvez, chairman of the Government Peace Process; House Speaker Gloria Macapagal Arroyo; President Rodrigo Duterte; Murad Ebrahim, chairman of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front; Ghazali Jaafar, vice chairman for political affairs and chairman of the Bangsamoro Transition Commission; and other Muslim rebel leaders flashing the peace sign following oath-taking ceremony for the creation of the Bangsamoro Transition Authority at the Malacañang in Manila. The Muslim rebels will serve as administrators of a new Muslim autonomous region in a delicate milestone to settle one of Asia’s longest-raging rebellions. Several commanders, including Commander Bravo, long wanted for deadly attacks, were given safety passes to be able to travel to Manila and join the ceremony. AP/BULLIT MARQUEZ

that make it impossible to comply with and finish all that have been agreed on the negotiation table by 2021,” Angon told a media briefing at the Waterfront Insular Hotel Davao, where representatives of Bangsamoro organizations gathered to plan the campaign to persuade the national government to agree to extend the transition period by another three years.

He said schools like the Ateneo de Davao University would likely come up with statements supporting calls for the extension of the Bangsamoro transition.

Add the delaying factor related to the restrictions of the pandemic, which is likely to go beyond one year in containing the infection even with the introduction of the vaccine in the first quarter.

“For example, the transition period would need a lot of movement of personnel and services, but the restrictions in travel already hindered it. It’s stopping the access to the processes of the transition and government services,” Angon noted.

In countries that underwent peace processes, it took them between five and years for the transition, he pointed out.

Under the government-MILF peace agreement, a transition has been mandated to allow the smooth transfer of governance— from the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao to the BARMM. The transition should allow the gradual phasing in of new government rules and regulations to govern and manage an autonomous region for Filipino Muslims in the South.

“By 2025, if the extension would be granted, we should already expect the full decommissioning of the 40,000 armed fighters of the MILF, and the full transition of the MILF camps into civilian communities. This would allow the smooth transition also of the way of life for the former combatants to adapt to the new ways of civilian life,” Arnado said.

“We would be seeing the full dividends of the peace process being enjoyed by the victims of the war, through the funds and services to the communities, from availability of water and food facilities, to schools and infrastructure that have been long denied to these former battlegrounds and neglected villages,” she added.

The fruit of the full dividends of the peace process “would be the peace in the communities themselves where this is absent during those years of conflict,” the MPC official added.

Arnado is hopeful the bill filed in Congress by veteran lawmakers would be fully appreciated by the rest of Congress.

In December last year, lawyer Naguib Sinarimbo, spokesman of BARMM, said the national government and the Bangsamoro government were distracted in implementing their respective commitments to the normalization and mandates to the transition due to the Covid-19.

Sinarimbo, who is also the minister of the Ministry of the Interior and Local Government (MILG), said, “Pati sa atin po medyo na disturb ’yung focus natin doon sa pagpapatibay ng institusyon ng awtonomiya ng Bangsamoro government, and then ’yung paglalatag ng mga programa na maramdaman ng mga kababayan natin sa baba [Our focus on institution building for the Bangsamoro government and implementation of programs in the grassroot communities was somehow disturbed].”

He said Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr., who heads the Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process (Opapp), has acknowledged the delays in the normalization track in the peace agreement between the government of the Republic of the Philippines (GPH) and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

Sinarimbo said some of the national government’s obligations to the normalization were not fulfilled, and was taking more time to be completely implemented. These include the delay in the decommissioning process of former combatants of the MILF and transforming the six MILF camps into civilian use, the organizing of Joint Peace and Security Teams and the turnover of the so-called “opt-in territories.”

“The bureaucracy moves in a way that is not as fast as our desire,” Sinarimbo said, partly in Filipino, as she noted that the obligations of the national government “cannot be fulfilled in the three-year transition term of 2019 until 2022.”

On the part of the Bangsa­ moro, the lawyer said the 80-mem-

ber Bangsamoro Transition Authority Parliament was mandated to enact six priority codes to strengthen the regional autonomous government. But “as of the moment, the Administrative Code has been approved and the five others are still either under deliberations, and consultations with stakeholders and experts.”

Sessions of the Parliament were cancelled many times due to the threats of Covid-19, resulting in even slower steps in creating the priority legislations, he added.

The other priority codes that need to be passed during the transition period include Bangsa­moro Education Code, Bangsamoro Electoral Code, Local Government Code, Civil Service Code, and Revenue Code.

Certify as urgent

“WE have to educate the people, especially in the discussion on how to elect people in the Parliamentary form of government.

This needs time, for this alone,” said the League of Bangsamoro Organizations, which attended the Multi-Stakeholders Consultation on the Bangsamoro Transition Period held on February 5, 2021, in Davao City.

Other consultations were being held this quarter in Lanao del Sur and Lanao del Norte, Maguindanao, Basilan and Sulu.

Senator Aquilino Pimentel III has filed Senate Bill 0219 and Sen. Richard Gordon filed Bill 2025 seeking the extension of the transition, and these bills are being discussed at the committee on local government. Meanwhile, House bills 8116, 8117, 8161 and 8277 are being tackled by the House committees on suffrage and electoral reforms, on Muslim affairs, and peace and reconciliation.

Arnado has called on President Duterte to certify as urgent the bills pending in both Senate and the House of Representatives before Congress goes on recess on June 4.

“He has a huge and historic role here to ensure that what he envisioned for a peaceful Minda­ nao would see fruition to the end,” she added, citing the President’s interjection into the peace process that led to the fast pace in the implementation of the agreement during his term.

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www.businessmirror.com.ph • Editor: Vittorio V. Vitug

Bill rushed sparing LGUs from procurement rules to hasten Covid vax buy

By Butch Fernandez

S

ENATORS and Executive officials have agreed to push early passage of a law exempting local government units (LGUs) from certain provisions of the Procurement Act to shield them from legal liability as they fast-track moves to obtain vaccines for constituents.

Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri on Friday clarified the scope of Senate Bill 2042, which he filed earlier this week, granting the exemption for a limited period, or until September 2021.

Zubiri noted that at Thursday’s Finance committee hearing led by Sen. Sonny Angara to tackle his bill—a similar one was filed by Sen. Imee Marcos—representatives of the government procurement board said the Executive is working on increasing the level of advance payments that will be allowed, from 15 percent to 50 percent, for emergency purchases, partly to help the LGUs hasten their rollouts without breaking the law.

“Senate Bill 2042 is not going to give LGUs precedence over the national government in terms of vaccine procurement. It’s still the national government that will lead—LGUs still need to follow the national guidelines for vaccine deployment set by the Department of Health and the National Task Force against Covid-19,” Zubiri said, partly in Filipino.

“So no one should fear inequitable distribution.

Whether through the national government or the LGUs, our frontliners will still be prioritized for vaccination. The vaccines purchased by LGUs will augment the supply of the national government.

LGUs who will not be able to purchase vaccines on their own will still be covered by the national government vaccine roll out,” he said.

“This bill was requested by all our LGUs. Around 70 local government units are in negotiations with vaccine suppliers and they need to deposit advance payments to secure them. Otherwise, we will lose the allocation. They are requesting that they also be exempted from the requirement of purchasing goods and services from suppliers with the lowest bid. This is not possible with the Covid-19 vaccine as it is supply-driven. It is impossible because the lowest price is not always available.

“In fact, in the hearing yesterday [February 11], the Government Procurement Policy Board [GPPB] disclosed that the Office of the President is also drafting a memorandum order that will authorize an increase in the advance payment for coronavirus vaccines. Under the Auditing Code and Memorandum Circular 172, Series of 2005, only a 15-percent advance payment is permitted. Under bill, the advance payment, particularly on Covid-19 vaccines, will be increased to 50 percent,” Zubiri said.

He noted that Section 338 of the Local Government Code prohibits advance payments: “No money shall be paid on account of any contract under which no services have been rendered or goods delivered.” The bill exempts the LGUs from such provision for vaccine procurement during the state of national calamity or the pandemic.

No formal deals signed

Also in Thursday’s hearing, senators learned the Duterte administration still has no formal “supply agreement” covering delivery of the awaited Covid-19 vaccine supply, but vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. assured them they have term sheets that embody an initial “locked-in” arrangement of supply, and are looking at 108 million doses in all from these.

Health Secretary Francisco Duque and Galvez admitted under questioning by senators that the Duterte administration has yet to sign a final supply deal with manufacturers of the vaccines.

Galvez, however, assured senators that negotiations are still ongoing to forge a final supply agreement for Sinovac, Covovax, Moderna

and AstraZeneca.

The absence of any supply agreement means, according to Minority Leader Franklin M. Drilon, there is no firm commitment as yet of any vaccine coming to the country soon and the awaited supplies are all based on Galvez’s good relations with suppliers.

Senators were told the only sure supply involved the 600,000 doses of Sinovac vaccines expected to arrive on February 23. Such does not require any supply agreement because it is a donation of the China government.

Galvez told senators that upon the Sinovac’s scheduled arrival on February 23, there will still be at least two to three days of technical inspection.

This will be followed by the vaccination, assuming Sinovac gets its emergency use authorization (EUA) by that time.

Lowest-bid rule

The Zubiri bill also exempts LGUs from sticking to the “lowest-bid” provision of the law, given the unique circumstance of the pandemic, when “the cheapest may not be available” owing to the mad rush for vaccines globally. The bill, however, makes the exemption possible only until September 2020, and most senators are inclined to extend this by a few months more.

Quirino Gov. Dax Cua, president of the League of Provinces, said “our LGUs are willing to take risks” just to protect their people, “but huwag naman sanang makasuhan [but we hope they won’t end up with lawsuits].”

A similar sentiment was earlier aired by San Juan Mayor Francis Zamora when the CODE team (Coordinated Operations to Defeat Epidemic) of Galvez and other officials visited his city on Wednesday.

Later in the Senate Finance committee hearing, panel chair Angara asked Atty. Fortunata Rubico of the Commission on Audit (COA) for the agency’s view on SB 2042. Rubico said the “COA has no comment” on the bill, but, as with the Bayanihan law, “will issue guidance for our auditors” once a law is enacted so they can properly implement it.

‘Beauty’ of tripartite

In his presentation, Galvez reiterated the “beauty of the tripartite setup,” especially now that all vaccines being secured for early rollout are covered only by emergency use authorization (EUA) from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), not a full commercial license yet.

First, Galvez said, the national government has better leverage in negotiating and, when the LGU orders are negotiated for as one, the NG can demand the lowest prices possible—a hard feat, given it is a sellers’ market worldwide as countries scramble to quickly roll out immunization drives to push back the spread of Covid-19.

Second, Galvez explained that pharmaceutical firms do not want to deal bilaterally with LGUs because they are looking for indemnification shields in case of adverse reactions, considering that their products are not yet completely ready for full commercial licensing and are just covered by EUAs. “The EUA is not yet a full marketing approval,” Dr. Jaime Montoya of the Philippine Council for Health Research Development (PCHRD) weighed in. In effect, he said, the national government, in being party to the tripartite agreements, assumes the liability for adverse reaction for using vaccines covered only by EUA and not fully licensed.

Galvez said indemnification provisions are crucial for pharmaceutical firms still scarred by the “Sanofi episode” in the anti-dengue vaccine Dengvaxia. The French pharma giant is facing lawsuits over allegations it rushed the rollout in 2016 of Dengvaxia on 700,000 Filipinos without final conclusion of the last-stage clinical trials.

‘T

At present, the bank that issued the ATM card is charging the fee for each transaction.

Two big banks, acting as owners of over 6,700 ATMs, have already announced on their websites that effective April 7, they will be imposing a fee of P18 per withdrawal transaction on cardholders of other banks, up P7 from the P11 they are currently collecting.

Other banks are expected to follow suit, unless the BSP suspends the implementation of MB Resolution 1680, according to Campos.

“The banks can afford to keep their ATM charges at current levels,” Campos said.

“Right now, the government, including Congress, is working very hard to extend Filipinos every possible relief and spare them from more difficulties,” Campos said.

Campos cited the passage by the House of a bill postponing the implementation of previously scheduled increases in the contributions of Filipinos to the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. and the Social Security System.

A3

PHL may soon allow cinemas and theme parks to resume T

he Philippines w ill soon allow c inemas, t heme pa rk s and conferences to resume as it seeks to further reopen an economy t hat suf fered a record contraction last year.

It will also expand the seating capacity of religious gatherings to a maximum of 50 percen from the current 30 percent starting February 15, presidential spokesman Harry Roque said in a statement issued on Friday.

President Duterte is worried about the economy and aims for an immediate recovery, Roque said earlier this week.

The country’s task force overseeing measures to curb the coronavirus pandemic also approved the reopening of driving schools, interactivegame arcades, libraries, museums, and cultural centers.

T heir resumption, along w ith

cinemas, parks and conferences are subject to guidelines by agencies and local governments where they operate, according to Roque. He didn’t specify a date for the reopening of these sectors.

W hile the Philippines has the second-worst outbreak in Southeast Asia, the reported daily infections have been below 2,300 in the past three months. T he countr y added 1,734 cases on February 11 to 543,282, with total fatalities at 11,469.

‘Limited’ face-to-face classes in HEIs

The Commission on Higher Education (CHED) and the Department of Health have issued a joint memorandum circular (JMC) for the conduct of limited face-to-face classes for Higher Education Institutions

(HEIs) offering medicine and allied health sciences, as well as universities in areas under modified general community quarantine (MGCQ ).

In a JMC signed on Februar y 10, CHED Chairman Prospero J. de Vera III and Health Secretary Francisco T. Duque III also reminded that the limited face-to-face classes will not be mandatory for the students.

School will also be required to have an alternative educational set-up for those who cannot attend the class physically.

To make sure that the health protocols w ill be strictly obser ved once the classes start, de Vera inspected some classrooms and other school facilities early this month.

Expected to attend face-to-face classes are students taking up medicine, nursing, medical technology or

medical laboratory science, physical therapy, midwifery and public health.

De Vera said that only those subjects that will be needing actual practice w ill be allowed to attend face-to-face classes and that they should be ages 20 and above.

T he CHED off icia l a lso reminded t he sc hool s to coord i n ate f i rst w it h t hei r respec t ive loc a l gover n ment s before st a r t i ng t hei r face -to -face c l a sses.

For more details the guidelines can be checked on this link: https:// ched.gov.ph/w p-content/uploads/ CHED -DOH-Joint-MemorandumCircular-No.-2021-001-Guidelines-onthe-Gradual-Reopening-of-Campusesof-Higher-Education-Institutions-forLimited-Face-to-Face-Classes-duringthe-COVID-19-Pandemic.pdf.

Bloomberg News with Claudeth Mocon-Ciriaco

IPOPHL reports increase in piracy, counterfeiting cases amid pandemic

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eports and complaints on suspected counterfeiting and piracy filed at the Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IPOPHL) surged to 121 in 2020 as the pandemic presented lucrative opportunities for illicit traders.

Data from IPOPHL’s IP Rights Enforcement Office (IEO) show that the majority, or 67, of the alleged violations concerned counterfeiting, while the remaining 54 were on the illegal sharing and selling of copyrighted works.

Of these, four were verified complaints from intellectual property (IP) rights holders—which is a first step to pursuing sanctions—while the remaining 117 were reports from consumers and concerned citizens.

About 116 were disposed of or saw completed appropriate action from IPOPHL and the IP owners, while five cases are pending verification for appropriate action.

Of the total counterfeiting reports, alleged fake apparels were the most reported with 39 or about 77 percent, followed by gadgets with seven, or 10 percent and cosmetics with six, or 9 percent.

Meanwhile, movies and shows were the most reported for alleged piracy with 22, accounting for 40 percent in the category. E-books trailed behind

with 14 reports, or a 25-percent share, followed by software products with 9 percent or 16 percent.

Some 90 percent of the reports and complaints were sold and marketed online, with Facebook (61 percent), unpopular web sites (13 percent) Shopee (12 percent), Lazada (7 percent) and YouTube (2 percent) as the top platforms used.

To note, IPOPHL introduced a new reporting system to narrow down the focus to only counterfeiting and piracy, making the 2020 data uncomparable to previous years which included other IP infringement cases such as confusingly similar marks.

Even with this change, IPOPHL Deputy Director General Teodoro C. Pascua noted there remains an “obviously striking surge” in counterfeiting and piracy activities as the 2020 figure, despite factoring in less variables, surpassed the 100 reports and complaints received by IEO from 2016 to 2019.

“The exponential growth in online activities during the pandemic created the perfect entry point for pirates and counterfeiters as they took advantage of both legitimate [e.g, e-commerce sites, social media] and illicit avenues [e.g, dark web sites],” Pascua said.

“In addition, the disruption in supply chains gave

counterfeiters an opportunity to fill the gap with substandard, IP infringing products. The environment was equally lucrative for content pirates as people sought to find free sources of entertainment with many spending most of their time at home,” he added.

Action plan

The National Committee on Intellectual Property Rights (NCIPR)—which IPOPHL Director General Rowel S. Barba currently heads as the permanent representative of Trade Secretar y Ramon M. Lopez who chairs the NCIPR—will be focusing on five key strategies to deter fakes and piracy throughout the year: 1. Enhance capacities of NCIPR members on IP enforcement, from screening the online space to building investigative tactics for proven violations to proceed to criminal prosecution; 2. Strengthen collaboration with pertinent government partners to raise awareness and ensure government regulations do not hamper but, instead, streamline enforcement action; 3. Help IP right holders develop and efficiently

Marcos pushes early passage of measure on early voting

S

en . I m e e M a rco s h a s c a l l e d f o r t h e swift passage of a law on early voting to complement the government’s mass vaccination program and ensure the smooth and safe conduct of national elections next year.

Marcos, who chairs the Senate committee on electoral reforms and people’s participation, said the rollout of vaccines alone is “no guarantee that the 2022 elections would not become a multiple, super-spreader event.”

“Planning for elections has become more complicated due to the pandemic. As our committee report shall be completed shortly, may I urge President Duterte to certify the urgency of passing an early voting law and make a smooth and safe transition of leadership part of his legacy,” Marcos said.

“The delay in passing such a law denies the

Commission on Elections [Comelec] ample time to plan pandemic-related measures and fix a proper budget to put them in place,” Marcos explained.

“Run-throughs may be needed. Haphazard preparations and resulting voter confusion will undermine the legitimacy of the elections,” the senator added.

Marcos filed Senate Bill 1104 in October last year to allow early voting for senior citizens and persons with disabilities (PWDs) but said she intends to include health workers, military and police personnel, poll watchers, and the media when the bill is taken up in the Senate.

“Expanding the list of groups eligible for early voting will reduce crowding on election day and fur ther mitigate the health risks in nex t year’s polls,” Marcos said.

“Moreover, new voting precincts that will accommodate fewer people will need to be created and new voting venues identified, to comply with social distancing and other safety protocols,” the senator added.

Arrangements for about 400,000 Filipino seafarers as well as voters returning to the provinces amid the differing quarantine protocols of local government units will also need to be settled, she said.

Marcos expressed optimism that the “sluggish registration of new voters” would also improve before the September deadline, if a law for early voting is passed.

In 2019, the Philippine Statistics Authority recorded more than 8 million senior citizens and PWDs who chose not to cast their votes than flock to polling precincts with the general public.

Mahinog, Camiguin LGU, LandBank tie up for local development projects Mahinog Mayor Rogerio C. Acle (left) and LandBank Camiguin Branch Manager Adrian Lloyd O. Tan (right) sign five loan agreements to finance the local government’s construction and improvement of infrastructure projects, and the purchase of two units of heavy equipment.

Lawmaker warns of ATM ‘bill shock’ his is a bad time for banks to be nickeland-diming pandemic-weary Filipinos.”

Makati City Rep. Luis Campos Jr. made the remark on Thursday as he asked the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) to consider deferring the implementation of a new automated teller machine (ATM) charging model that will cause user fees to spike up to 63 percent starting April.

“Our sense is, it might be more prudent to put off the effectivity of the new ATM charging model to spare Filipinos the aggravation, considering the extremely adverse economic backdrop of mounting joblessness and rising food prices,” Campos, a member of the House committee on banks and financial intermediaries, said in a news statement.

The BSP, through Monetary Board Resolution 1680 dated December 22, 2020, approved the shift from issuer-based to acquirer-based ATM charging model effective, April, 7, 2021.

Under the new charging model, the bank that owns the ATM will be the one charging a fee for each withdrawal or balance inquiry.

Saturday, February 13, 2021

M

AHINOG, Camiguin—Endowed with rich agricultural land and alluring natural attractions, this 5th class municipality in northern Mindanao has great potential for growth.

But due to limited financial resources, the municipal government is challenged to pursue high-impact projects that will boost its local economy.

This year, some of the town’s development projects under its Comprehensive Development Plan (CDP) are expected to materialize with the recent signing of a loan agreement comprising five term loans for a maximum total of P50.3 million between the local government and Land Bank of the Philippines (LandBank).

Mahinog Mayor Rogerio C. Acle and LandBank Camiguin Branch Manager Adrian Lloyd O. Tan led the loan signing last November 26, 2020, together with other local government officials.

“May mga dreams ako for my municipality na gustong matupad katulad na lang ng pagpapatayo ng mga infrastructure projects.

Ang problema ay hindi namin ma -pursue dahil limited ang resources, specifically sa budget. Kaya noong nalaman ko na pwedeng mangutang sa government bank gaya ng LandBank, nagpursige kaming kumpletuhin ang mga requirements,” Mahinog Mayor Acle said.

The loan will help the local government unit (LGU) of Mahinog acquire a brand-new 10-wheeler dump truck and an excavator with breaker. These will be used to maintain various roads and other infrastructure across the town to ensure easy access and timely transport of goods from farms to the market, and to reduce transportation costs for local farmers.

A separate term loan shall finance the construction of a two-story commercial building with a total floor area of 1,291 square meters. The building, which will be divided into various spaces and offered for lease to small and medium enterprises and traders, is expected to promote commercial activities and attract investments to the town.

Another term loan is allocated for the

completion of the town’s unfinished Queobe Training Center. The loan will help finish the construction of the center’s training hall, convert the existing mini-training hall into rooms, and expand the dormitory to accommodate more training participants. A portion of the loan will also be used to acquire furniture, fixtures, kitchen equipment and other related paraphernalia needed in the training center.

Adjacent to the municipality’s Queobe Training Center is the Katunggan Park, an eco-park with existing boardwalk and picnic sheds for tourists and trainees. Through one of the term loans from LandBank, the local government is targeting to complete this year the construction of a 104-squaremeter canteen building and a 48-square-meter picnic shed within the park.

Finally, LandBank also granted the Mahinog LGU a term loan for the land development of the proposed Benoni Public Market and Transport Terminal. This involves filling up the remaining 3,700 square meters of the 1-hectare area with embankment so that a transport terminal and a public market building can be built in the future. The project aims to decongest the national highway fronting the Benoni Port, which is the gateway to the entire island of Camiguin.

“LandBank continues to extend necessary credit assistance to local government units for small to large scale development projects. We believe that through these initiatives, we can multiply efforts in spurring local economic activity and growth, especially in the countryside,” said LandBank President and CEO Cecilia C. Borromeo.

As of December 31, 2020, LandBank has extended P54.47 billion in outstanding loans to LGUs nationwide. This includes P19.86 billion for agri-aqua projects, as well as P5.89 billion and P5.34 billion for transportation and health-care projects, respectively.

implement an IP rights enforcement strategy that is responsive to the times, including keeping them abreast of the evolving trends in counterfeiting and piracy operations; 4. Engage with intermediaries such as e-commerce platforms, payment gateways and internet service providers, among others, to develop a coordinative, proactive mechanism; and 5. Help improve border controls.

“As intellectual property products have been identified as a major growth driver to the economy in the fourth quarter of an exceptionally tumultuous year, there must be a renewed urgency for a wider crackdown on counterfeiting and piracy,” Barba said.

“The crackdown we need must engage the active participation of regulating bodies, enforcement authorities, local governments, lawmakers, intermediaries and IP right holders themselves.

Together, we must develop effective offensive strategies that compel nationwide action to safeguard IPs, the very tools that can jump start our recovery and revitalize the Philippine economic growth story,” Barba added.

OPAPP, UNDP provide rice assistance to decommissioned MILF combatants

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arapanan, Sultan Kudarat—The Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process (OPAPP), the Task Force for the Decommissioned Combatants (TFDCC), the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in the Philippines carried out a ceremonial turnover of rice assistance to 106 decommissioned MILF-Bangsamoro Islamic Armed Forces (BIAF) combatants in Camp Darapanan, Sultan Kudarat, as part of the OPAPP-UNDP Support to Peacebuilding and Normalization (SPAN) program.

Under the initiative, 12,145 decommissioned combatants (DC) will receive P16 million worth of rice assistance to help ease the adverse socioeconomic impacts caused by the pandemic and to sustain the efforts for a peaceful transition and normalization in the Bangsamoro.

In his turnover message, OPAPP Undersecretary David B. Diciano, head of the Joint Normalization Division and chairman of the Government’s Peace Implementing Panel (GPIP), noted that the rice assistance is just a fraction of the continuous socioeconomic support that will be provided to the DC, and that a needs assessment is being conducted by the TFDCC to develop more appropriate and sustainable and socioeconomic interventions for the DCs. Minister Abdulraof Macacua, Barmm executive secretary, in his acceptance message, told the DCs that the activity was “another development in quest for a successful peace endeavor towards normalization.”

A total of 40,000 former combatants are expected to be decommissioned under the Annex of Normalization of the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB). Through this process, the DCs will be provided the opportunities to transition to sustainable livelihoods and to become productive citizens of society.

So far, over 12,000 MILF combatants were already decommissioned during the second phase of normalization. For 2021, the third phase will include over 14,000 former MILF combatants.

“There is so much to be done. UNDP will remain faithful to its promise to make meaningful contributions to lasting peace and development and to achieve an inclusive society especially in the Bangsamoro,” said Allen Mariano, SPAN officer-incharge of UNDP Philippines.

UNDP Philippines has been a steadfast supporter of the Philippine government and the MILF throughout the peace process.

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Saturday, February 13, 2021

The World BusinessMirror

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

Biden urged to legalize migrants as part of infrastructure plan

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group of more than 60 economists urged President Joe Biden to create a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants in his forthcoming economic and infrastructure plan, arguing it would raise US wages, productivity and tax revenue.

T he economists, inc lud ing President Barack Obama’s former top economist Jason Furman and David Kallick of the Fiscal Policy Institute, which champions liberal economic policies, made the proposal in a letter to the W hite House obtained by Bloomberg News. Legalizing millions of immigrants—especially those in jobs considered essential dur ing the pandemic—wou ld strengthen the economy while providing them with workplace protections, they argued.

“Offering them the chance to earn citizenship will help to ensure that the economic recovery reaches all corners of society, including those that have disproportionately been on the front lines of the pandemic and yet left out of prior relief bills, and establishes a more stable and equitable foundation on which future economic success can be built,” the economists wrote in the letter, which was sent to the White House on Thursday.

The economists addressed the letter to Biden’s top economic adviser Brian Deese and Covid-19 response coordinator Jeff Zients, as well as the president’s picks to

lead the White House budget office and Council of Economic Advisers, Neera Tanden and Cecilia Rouse, respectively.

The liberal Center for American Progress, which has been run by Tanden, and FWD.us, an immigration advocacy group founded by technology and business leaders, got together on the letter, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The letter shows that the administration is facing pressure from the left to include a broad range of issues in its so-called Build Back Better package, a sweeping inf rastr uct ure a nd spending plan that Biden proposed during the 2020 campaign.

The legislation is expected to follow on the heels of the $1.9 trillion “American Rescue Plan” that the president is currently pushing through Congress in his opening bid to resuscitate the economy.

Adding a route to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, however, could complicate passage of the infrastructure bill because most congressional Republicans regard such proposals as improper “amnesty” for people who migrated to the US without

authorization.

The letter also demonstrates a willingness among administration allies to break up Biden’s proposed immigration overhaul into smaller pieces, in order to get key parts passed into law. A citizenship path for the roughly 11 million immigrants living illegally in the US, including those with Temporary Protected Status and people brought to the US as children, known as Dreamers, is included in a comprehensive immigration plan Biden announced on his first day in office.

Pandemic work cited

The economists said that a broad path to citizenship would benefit the economy, but called relief for essential workers especially important. Almost three in four undocumented immigrants in the work force—roughly 5 million people—work in essential jobs including construction, food services and farming, according a study from the Center for American Progress. “ T h e C o v i d -1 9 p a n d e m i c has made plain how our public health and economic fates are inextricably tied together, and how harmful shortcomings in one part of our economy affect us all,” the economists said in the letter. “The inverse is also true: conferring citizenship will bring expansive benefits to communities across the country, not only for the individuals directly affected, but for the larger systems—families, and the work force—that they comprise.”

Biden on Thursday urged Congress to move quickly on a large infrastructure improvement plan

in a meeting with four senators, declaring that China is poised to “eat our lunch” otherwise.

Biden said he spoke with Chinese President Xi Jinping for about two hours in a call on Wednesday.

“If we don’t get moving, they’re going to eat our lunch,” he told reporters in the Oval Office, describing Chinese plans to invest billions of dollars in rail projects, automobile manufacturing and environmental improvements.

“It used to be that infrastruct ure wasn’t a Democrat ic or Republican issue,” Biden said.

“We’re going to see what we can put together.

Infrastructure-related stocks have rallied this year. United Rentals Inc., which rents equipment to the construction industry, jumped 19 percent this year through Wednesday, the biggest gain on a Standard & Poor’s index of US industrial companies. Martin Marietta Materials Inc., which supplies aggregates such as sand and gravel, climbed 11 percent, while rival Vulcan Materials Co. gained 7.4 percent.

The senators joining him were Tom Carper, a Delaware Democrat who chairs the Environment and Public Works Committee; Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, the senior Republican on the panel; James Inhofe of Oklahoma, a Republican who is a former chairman of the committee; and Ben Cardin of Maryland, chairman of the Small Business Committee.

“It was ver y good, ver y good a nd one re a son i s t h at I ’ve known the president forever, and we’ve worked together before,” Inhofe told reporters later in the Senate.

House panel clears $1,400 stimulus payments and family tax credits

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he House Ways and Means Committee advanced legislation that would infuse households with hundreds of billions of dollars of cash through direct payments and tax credits, a key plank of President Joe Biden’s Covid-19 relief package.

The panel on Thursday approved measures providing $593.5 billion in benefits, most of which is made up of $1,400 stimulus payments, along with advance tax credits for children that will be sent to households on a monthly basis.

The measures passed on a 24-18 party-line vote.

A dozen House committees are working on different elements of Biden’s $1.9-trillion rescue proposal, and Thursday’s component is one of several under the jurisdiction of the ways and means panel. The committees plan to complete their work on Friday, with the full House voting on the overall package the week of February 22.

“The $600 rebates that Congress delivered in December didn’t do enough,” Representative

Suzan DelBene, a Washington State Democrat, said during the ways and means committee’s debate on Thursday, referring to stimulus checks approved in the last round of pandemic assistance. “This is critical relief to help families weather this crisis.”

The legislation also expands tax credits for low-income workers and families paying for care for children or adults. Tax benefits for health care and paid sick leave get expanded, as well as an extension of incentives to help employers keep workers on the job.

Democrats say the payments are critical to help bolster household income amid the elevated unemployment rate and additional costs burdening American families.

Republicans have criticized the proposal, saying it includes many items Democrats have championed before the pandemic and that many higher-income households that aren’t struggling would benefit.

The Internal Revenue Service is planning to issue the stimulus payments as quickly as possible if the legislation is signed into law.

Households would get the child tax credit in the form of a $300 a month payment for children five and under or $250 a month for those six and older starting in July. That amounts to a $3,600 benefit for younger children or $3,000 for older ones—an increase from the current $2,000 maximum credit. The tax break is currently paid out as a tax refund, rather than in monthly payments.

About two-thirds of the benefits would go to households making up to $91,000 a year, according to estimates from the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center. About 11 percent would go to the top 20 percent of taxpayers—or those making about $164,000 or more, the research found.

Democrats are hoping to make the monthly tax-credit payments a permanent annual feature in follow-up legislation.

The committee also approved legislation that would bail out multi-employer pension plans that are on the verge of collapse. The measure would help pension plans sponsored by several employers and managed by a collective bargaining agreement by giving loans to insolvent plans so they can continue to distribute the promised retirement benefits.

The legislation is a top priorit y for ways and means Chairman Richard Neal, a Massachusetts Democrat who has been anxious to address pension security since he took over the committee this year. The change would help millions of retired workers concentrated in industrial states, such as Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

The bill would also give single-employer pensions more time to make up losses and grants them more favorable rules to calculate their liabilities, which are inflated while interest rates remain low. Bloomberg News

Greener pastures: Shell eyes steady drop in oil business

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ONDON—Royal Dutch Shell, one of the multinationals that has defined the oil industry, is slowly turning away from the fossil fuel that made its fortune over the decades but also worsened a global climate crisis.

The company said Thursday that its production of oil peaked before the coronavirus pandemic and will fall steadily as it attempts an ambitious pivot toward less polluting forms of energy. It’s a milestone for the company and reflects the urgency facing governments and companies to reduce climate-warming emissions.

Shell unveiled new plans for reaching its goal of being carbon neutral by 2050 that include a 1-percent to 2-percent drop annually in oil output. It will eliminate seven of its 13 refineries and aims to cut production of gasoline and diesel fuel by 55

percent over the next decade.

The plan is part of a wider push, particularly among European oil companies, to overhaul their operations to reduce carbon emissions blamed for global warming while still making money.

BP said last year that it wants to eliminate or offset all carbon emissions from its operations and the oil and gas it sells to customers by 2050.

Critics say energy companies have been moving too slowly to cut carbon emissions amid a United Nations drive to limit temperature increases to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) over pre-industrial levels.

“Our accelerated strategy will drive down carbon emissions and will deliver value for our shareholders, our customers and wider society,” Shell’s CEO, Ben van

Beurden, said in a news statement.

Shell plans to increase production of liquefied natural gas, low-carbon fuels such as bioethanol and hydrogen as it seeks to eliminate or offset all carbon emissions from the company’s operations and the products it sells.

It plans to increase its network of electric vehicle charging stations to about 500,000 by 2025 from 60,000 today and double electricity sales to retail and business customers. Shell said it will invest $100 million annually in “nature-based solutions” that protect or redevelop forests, wetlands and grasslands that take carbon out of the atmosphere.

David Elmes, a professor at Warwick Business School in England who heads the Global Energy Research Network, said Shell’s plan to reduce emissions is “ticking all the boxes” but the question remains whether

the company will be able to make the shift lucrative enough for shareholders used to generous dividends.

The plan includes bets on new technologies such as capture carbon and storage that need a lot of investment.

“Today’s plan is certainly a transformation, the question is can they afford it,” he said.

Environmental activists said the plan was still not ambitious enough considering the speed with which global emissions need to be cut.

Greenpeace noted that Shell did not say it would cut production outright, just let it fade as the global economy moves toward other forms of power, like renewable energy. It also questioned Shell’s reliance on tree-planting to offset carbon emissions as unrealistic. AP

Marion Koopmans, right, and Peter Ben Embarek, center, of the World Health Organization team say farewell to their Chinese counterpart Liang Wannian, left, after a WHO-China Joint Study Press Conference held at the end of the WHO mission in Wuhan, China, on February 9. AP

EXPLAINER:

What the WHO coronavirus experts learned in Wuhan

By Emily Wang Fujiyama & Ken Moritsugu The Associated Press

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UHAN, China—A World Health Organization (WHO) team has left China after gaining some new insights into the origins of the coronavirus pandemic that has killed more than 2.3 million people—but with the major questions still unanswered.

The visit was politically sensitive for China—which is concerned about any allegations it didn’t handle the initial outbreak properly—and has been closely watched around the world.

Team member Peter Daszak sounded upbeat on arriving at the airport Wednesday at the end of the four-week trip to the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where the first Covid-19 cases were detected in December 2019.

“We have clear leads on what the next steps should be,” he said.

“We know a lot more after the work that’s been done.”

The team’s major conclusions seemed to confirm what most researchers had already surmised about the virus. The visit was never expected to definitively pinpoint the origin of the pandemic—an undertaking that, based on others, could take years.

Here’s a look at the theories the team explored during their visit:

The bats

The mission to Wuhan did not change a major theory about where the virus came from. Scientists think bats are the most likely carriers, and that they passed it on to another animal, which passed it on to humans. While there are other possibilities—a bat could have infected a human directly, for instance—the path through a second animal remains the most likely scenario, according to the WHO team and its Chinese counterparts. The question is what animal and where.

The market

The Huanan Seafood Market had a cluster of cases at the start of the outbreak and was initially suspected as the place where people first became infected. The discovery of earlier cases has all but ruled out that theory, but researchers still want to know how this early cluster happened.

The market dealt mainly in frozen seafood but also sold domesticated wildlife. That included rabbits, which are known to be susceptible to the virus, and bamboo rats and ferret badgers, which are suspected of being susceptible. At the WHO mission’s closing news conference Tuesday, one team member said some of these animals have been traced to farms or traders in regions that are home to bats that carry the virus that is the closest known

relative of the one that causes Covid-19.

The virus could also have been introduced to the market by an infected person. Chinese health officials note that only surfaces at the market tested positive for the virus, not any of the animal products. A Chinese official said Tuesday there appeared to be cases elsewhere in Wuhan around the same time as the market cluster, so the transfer of the virus from animals to humans could have happened elsewhere.

The lab

The Chinese and the international experts concluded it is extremely unlikely the v ir us leaked from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a lab with an extensive collection of virus samples.

Former President Donald Trump and officials in his administration were among those who floated that possibility—prompting angry denials from China. And most experts have long been skeptical of it.

In making its determination, the team said that such leaks are extremely rare and there’s no evidence the virus existed in that lab or any lab anywhere in the world when the pandemic began. It also reviewed safety protocols at the institute, leading the team to conclude “it was very unlikely that anything could escape from such a place,” WHO team leader Peter Ben Embarek said.

The cold chain

The joint investigation left open the possibility that the virus could have been spread to humans through frozen food products, a bit of a surprise as foreign experts have generally played down the risk.

It’s a theory that has been widely promoted by Chinese officials, who have detected the virus on imported frozen food packaging and seized on that to suggest the virus could have come to China from abroad.

WHO team member Marion Koopmans noted that it still wouldn’t answer the question of where the virus came from originally. “Its not the cold chain by itself, that cannot be,” she said at the airport. “The virus has to come from somewhere.”

The data

The mission has been dogged by questions about how much freedom China would give the researchers to visit the places and talk to the people they wanted to.

In the end, they appeared satisfied with the arrangements, at least in their public comments. Team member Thea Koelsen Fischer said she did not get to see raw data and had to rely on an analysis of the data that was presented to her.

But she said that would be true in most countries.

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Kim lays blame at Cabinet execs for N. Korea’s economic decline

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EOUL, South Korea—North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ripped into the performance of his Cabinet and fired a senior economic official he appointed a month ago, saying they’d failed to come up with new ideas to salvage an economy in decay.

The report by state media on Friday comes during the toughest period of Kim’s nine-year rule. The diplomacy he had hoped would lift US-led sanctions over his nuclear program is stalemated, and pandemic border closures and cropkilling natural disasters last year deepened the damage to an economy broken by decades of policy failures.

Some analysts say the current challenges may set up conditions for an economic perfect storm in the North that destabilizes markets and triggers public panic and unrest.

The current challenges had forced Kim to publicly admit that past economic plans hadn’t succeeded. A new five-year plan to develop the economy was issued during the ruling Workers’ Party congress in January, but Kim’s comments during the party’s Central Committee meeting that ended Thursday were rich with frustration with how the plans were being executed so far.

During Thursday’s session, K im lamented that the Cabinet was failing in its role as the key institution managing the economy, saying it was producing unworkable plans, while displaying no “ innovative viewpoint and clear tactics.”

He said the Cabinet’s targets for agricultural production this year were set unrea listica l ly high, considering limited supplies in farming materials and other unfavorable conditions.

He said the Cabinet’s targets for electricity production was set too low, showing a lack of urgency when shortages could stall work at coal mines and

other industries.

“The Cabinet failed to play a leading role in mapping out plans of key economic fields and almost mechanically brought together the numbers drafted by the ministries,” the KCNA paraphrased Kim as saying.

The KCNA also said that O Su Yong was named as the new director of the Central Committee’s Department of Economic Affairs during this week’s meeting, replacing Kim Tu Il who was appointed in January.

Kim Jong Un during the January party congress called for reasserting greater state control over the economy, boosting agricultural production and prioritizing the development of chemicals and metal industries.

He also vowed all-out efforts to bolster his nuclear weapons program in comments that were seen as an attempt to pressure the new Biden administration.

Sectors such as metal and chemicals would be crucial to North Korean hopes to revitalize industrial production that has been decimated by sanctions and halted imports of factory materials amid the pandemic.

However, most experts agree that North Korea’s new development plans aren’t meaningfully different from its previous ones that lacked in substance.

South Korean intelligence officials have said there are also signs that the North is taking dramatic steps to strengthen government control over markets, including suppressing the use of US dol l a rs a nd ot her foreig n c u r renc ies.

Such measures, which are apparently aimed at forcing people to exchange their foreign currency savings for the North Korean won, demonstrate the government’s sense of urgency over its depleting foreign currency reserves, analysts say. AP

China bans BBC World News broadcasts in retaliatory move

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EIJING — China has banned BBC World News from airing in China, one week after threatening to retaliate for the revocation of the British broadcasting license for China’s state-owned CGTN. The National Radio and Television Administration said in a news statement dated midnight Friday that BBC World News coverage of China had violated requirements that news reporting be true and impartial and undermined China’s national interests and ethnic solidarity.

The BBC already is generally not viewable in China outside of some hotels, businesses and residential compounds for foreigners. It wasn’t immediately clear if the ban would affect reception in those facilities.

The Chinese government has criticized recent BBC reports on the Covid-19 pandemic in China and on allegations of forced labor and sexual abuse in the Xinjiang region, home to the Uighurs and other predominantly Muslim ethnic groups.

“The channel fails to meet t he requ irements to broadcast in China as an overseas channel,” the R adio and Telev ision Administration said, add ing it wou ld not acce pt BBC ’s broadcast appl icat ion for t he ne x t yea r.

UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab called the move “an unacceptable curtailing of media freedom” that would “only damage

China’s reputation in the eyes of the world.”

Br itain’s communications watchdog, Ofcom, revoked the license for CGTN, China’s Englishlanguage satellite news channel, on February 4. It cited links to China’s ruling Communist Party among the reasons.

A Chinese Foreign Ministr y spokesman said the next day that Ofcom had acted on “political grounds based on ideological bias” and that China reser ves the right to re s p ond to protec t t he r ights a nd i nt e re s t s of C h i ne s e me d i a .

L osing its Br it ish broadcast ing l icense was a major setbac k for CGT N. T he c ha nnel has a European operations hub in West L ondon a nd is pa r t a gover nment push to e x pa nd C h i n a’s sof t power and bur nish its image abroad.

US State Department spokesman Ned Price called it troubling that media operations were restr icted inside China while “Beijing’s leaders use free and open media environments overseas to promote misinformation.”

He called on the Chinese government to allow its population free access to the media and the Internet. “Media freedom is an important right and it’s key to ensuring an informed citizenry, an i n for med c it i z en r y t h at ca n sha re t heir ideas f reely amongst themselves and w ith t heir leaders,” Price said. AP

Saturday, February 13, 2021

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White House names generals targeted by Myanmar sanctions

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he Biden administration announced Thursday that new sanctions against Myanmar will target the country’s top military officials who ordered this month’s coup in the Southeast Asian country.

The sanctions name top military commander Min Aung Hlaing and his deputy Soe Win, as well as four members of the State Administration Council. The executive order signed by President Joe Biden also allows the Treasury Department to target the spouses and adult children of those being sanctioned.

The move will prevent the generals from accessing more than $1 billion in Myanmar government funds held in the United States.

The sanctions also will affect the Myanmar Ruby Enterprise and Myanmar Imperial Jade Co., businesses controlled by the regime.

“Today’s sanctions need not be permanent,” the White House said in a news statement. “Burma’s military should immediately restore power to the democratically elected government, end the state of emergency, release all those unjustly detained, and ensure peaceful protestors are not met with violence.”

The military cited the government’s failure to act on unsubstantiated allegations of widespread voter fraud as part of the reason for the February 1 takeover of the government and declaration of a one-year state of emergency. The generals maintain the actions are legally justified, and have cited an article in the constitution that allows the military to take over in times of emergency.

President Win Myint, de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi and other civilian officials were arrested in what Biden administration said earlier this month was a coup. The declaration set the stage for the administration to levy the new sanctions.

It remains to be seen what, if any, impact the sanctions will have. Many of the military leaders are already under sanctions because of attacks against the Muslim Rohingya minority.

To that end, Biden is trying to muster global pressure. Biden

discussed the situation with China’s President Xi Jinping during a broad-ranging two-hour conversation on Wednesday and with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi earlier this week.

T he W hite House also announced that USAID is redirecting $42.4 million of assistance that had been slated for Myanmar, funding that was intended to support efforts to overhaul the nation’s economic policy, as well as programs that support civil society and the private sector.

USAID, however, is keeping in place $69 million to support health care, food security, independent media, and peace and reconciliation efforts.

Facebook Inc. , meanwhile, said it will significantly reduce the distribution of content from profiles and pages run by the Myanmar military, treating it as a source of misinformation in the wake of the February 1 coup that deposed the elected government.

While US social networks have often been reluctant to pick sides in political disputes, Facebook is taking direct steps to stop distribution of the military’s narrative in the country. The company is curbing the reach of its information team and spokesman Brigadier-General Zaw Min Tun, adding “this same action will be applied to any additional pages that the

military controls that repeatedly violate our misinformation policies,” it said in a statement.

“Following the military coup in Myanmar on February 1, the situation on the ground remains volatile and Facebook is adapting to meet these events,” Rafael Frankel, director of policy for APAC emerging countries, said in the post.

The Biden administration was quick to denounce the coup in Myanmar and implement sanctions against its leaders. Thousands of protesters have been in the streets in defiance of a military order, demanding the release of political leaders, including Aung San Suu Kyi. The army has responded by detaining more of her aides.

Facebook said it’s treating the situation as an emergency, mobilizing resources including Myanmar nationals with native language skills to respond to any threats swiftly. The Menlo Park, California-based company is prioritizing the prevention of offline harm caused by content shared across its apps and services, while also preserving freedom of expression for local citizens. It is putting additional protections in place for journalists, activists and deposed political leaders and removing misinformation alleging widespread fraud or foreign interference in the country’s November election.

AP and Bloomberg News

Populist party backs Mario Draghi as Italy’s new PM in online vote

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ILAN—Grassroots m e m b e r s o f I t a l y ’s populist 5 -Star Movement, t he l a rgest pol it ic a l force in the Italian Parliament, sig na led their approva l T hursday for a new gover nment to be led by for mer Eu ropea n Cent ra l Ba n k c h ief Ma r io Dragh i.

The movement said in an online vote, 44,177 of its members were in favor of a Draghi-led government and 30,360 were against, for a margin of 59.3 percent to 40.7 percent. The vote binds 5-Star lawmakers in parliament to vote in favor of Draghi’s government when it goes up for a vote of confidence.

The 5-Star Movement is the only political party or movement in Italy with such a system.

Mario Draghi, right, arrives at the Chamber of Deputies in Rome on February 8. Former European Central Bank chief Draghi is consulting Italy’s fractious parties after being tapped

by President Sergio Mattarella to try to pull together a government to guide the debt-riddled country through the health and economic crises it is confronting. AP

Its bylaws call for major decisions to be put to members on a Web platform, a requirement which the movement promotes

as integral to its digital democracy despite repeated fines from Italy’s privacy watchdog for violating privacy rules.

5-Star leaders had urged the rank-and-f i le membership to support Draghi’s efforts to form a new government to replace the one led by Giuseppe Conte, who resigned as premier after losing the support of a small but key coalition partner over the handling of the pandemic. Conte is close to the 5-Stars, who had ministers in both of his governments.

Even without the 5-Star Movement, Draghi had secured enough pledges of support from other parties, both on the right and the left, to win the confidence vote in both houses.

Draghi’s next move is to report back to President Sergio Mattarella to say he has the backing he needs to proceed. It was not clear when that would happen. AP

Hydropower dams face backlash after Himalayan flood tragedy

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he flash flood in India’s Himalayan state of Uttarakhand which killed at least 34 people at the weekend has raised public anger over hydropower projects that the government considers essential to decarbonize the nation’s electricity generation.

The deluge triggered by a glacial burst near a small hamlet in the north Indian state last Sunday swept away bridges and hydropower stations, including the 520-megawatt Tapovan Vishnugad dam of NTPC Ltd. that was nearing completion. Experts say the incident, induced by the effect of global warming on melting glaciers, was made worse by construction of infrastructure.

“Hydropower projects, which use large-scale blasting, tree felling and tunneling, most certainly added to the proportion of the impact,” said Himanshu Thakkar, coordinator of the New Delhi-based South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People, which studies the

social and environmental impact of water-related projects. “They became a force multiplier in the destruction.”

Heightened public concer n about dams complicates India’s plan to wean the nation off coal, with its emission of greenhouse gases and toxic pollutants that are blamed for thousands of premature deaths each year. While the nation has made record investments in solar and wind power, hydroelectricity, with its ability to quickly ramp up and down, is seen as a vital component of an emission-neutral future to offset the intermittent supply from other renewable sources.

Efforts to use natural gas, a relatively low-emission alternative to coal, have often proven too expensive in India.

But new large dam projects have come under increasing criticism worldwide in the past few decades for their ecological and social impact.

Uttarakhand, known for its Hindu temples and yoga retreats, has suffered deadly floods before.

In June 2013, a massive cloudburst lasting several days led to torrential flooding in one of the state’s most popular pilgrimage areas. More than 5,000 people are thought to have been killed in the deluges, which prompted India’s top court to put a moratorium on new hydro dams in the state.

“The 2013 floods in Uttarakhand were supposed to be like India’s Fukushima moment for hydropower projects in the ecologically sensitive Himalayan region,” Debasish Mishra, a Mumbai-based partner at Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu. “The repeated occurrences of such events tell us that the risk of building such large projects is way too high.”

India should instead focus on technologies such as pumped storage, batteries and hydrogen for balancing the grid, Mishra said.

As these technologies become ec-

onomically viable, it will further weaken the case for large dams.

“There’s no doubt that hydropower dams need thorough environmental due diligence. But such mishaps shouldn’t hide the inherent advantages of such projects,” said S.D. Dubey, former chairman of India’s Central Electricity Authority. “These are sources of clean power, can help in grid balancing and can help reduce the impact from floods, if planned well. Had it not been for the Tehri dam, the impact of Uttarakhand floods in 2013 would have been far more devastating.”

Large hydro projects generated about 14 percent of India’s electricity in the six months ended in October, compared with 65 percent from coal and only 11 percent from other renewables, according to the government. While solar and wind power are growing rapidly, the proportion of power generated by big hydro projects has barely changed since 2007. Bloomberg News

A6 Saturday, February 13, 2021

ExportUnlimited BusinessMirror

Senate bill cites export-grade quality of Davao City-made chocos, Davao region’s cacao yield

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EN. Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa strongly supports the move to make Davao City the chocolate capital and entire Davao region as the cacao capital of the country considering the world-class cacao-based products that are produced in the said areas which have won various international awards and recognition.

In co-sponsoring Senate Bill 1741, or “An Act Declaring the City of Davao As the Chocolate Capital of the Philippines and the Entire Region XI [Davao Region] As the Cacao Capital of the Philippines,” dela Rosa, who is a native of Davao, said that apart from the various kinds

of fruits that are being harvested in the region, the province also boasts of its high-quality cacao, which is a main ingredient in producing export grade chocolate.

“Mindanao, especially Davao, is known to be the fruit basket of the Philippines. Whenever you think of

Davao, you might picture durian, pomelo, mangosteen, tuna, President Duterte, or the Kadayawan festival. As a native of the Davao Region, I can proudly say that we are more than that,” the Mindanaoan lawmaker said.

“The Davao region produces and exports banana, pineapple, mango, and coconut, among others. Recently, Davao City has also come to boast of a booming world-class cacao and chocolate industry,” dela Rosa continued.

He further noted that the Philippines, which is located along the “cocoa belt,” has pioneered cacao planting in Asia, making it “a respected exporter of premium quality raw cacao and chocolate” today.

“Cacao is one of the trees that only grow in countries located in the tropics near the equator, called the ‘cocoa belt.’ The Philippines, being one of these tropical countries,

took advantage of its location on the map and pioneered the planting of cacao in Asia. From starting out as a pioneer cacao planter, the Philippines is now a respected exporter of premium quality raw cacao and chocolate,” dela Rosa explained.

The senator highlighted that Davao City’s Malagos Chocolate bagged 7 international awards in 2019. It also placed second in the 100 percent unsweetened drink category and third in the sweetened drink category of the prestigious International Chocolate Competition of the Academy of Chocolate in London in 2017.

“Hindi na po Swiss o Belgian chocolate ang hahanapin ng mga chocolate lovers all over the world—Philippine or Davao chocolate na po,” he added.

The senator said that Davao region has been producing 80 percent of the country’s cacao produce, while 10 percent comes

from the rest of Mindanao and the remaining 10 percent from Luzon and the Visayas regions.

On Tuesday, February 9, SBN 1741 was sponsored by Sen. Cynthia Villar, chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Food, and Agrarian Reform. Once approved, dela Rosa said, the measure will recognize the Filipino cacao farmers and growers with great respect and appreciation, worth more than what any international award could give.

“After all, it is to them that we owe the honor we enjoy today, the honor of producing chocolate that ranks among the world’s best, truly deserving of chocolate’s other name: ‘food for the gods.’ Needless to say, we are not gods, Mr. President. However, enjoying every piece of smooth, bittersweet chocolate derived from Davao cacao certainly helps us to come quite close,” dela Rosa said in closing.

An oil country no more? Algerian energy exports decline rapidly

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LGERIA’S energy exports are plunging, threatening more financial suffering for the Opec member and a potential repeat of the mass demonstrations that toppled the president two years ago.

The North African nation’s struggling to keep up shipments of oil and gas—the lifeblood of the economy —as years of mismanagement and a lack of investment take their toll.

The decrease is so severe that Algeria might cease to be a crude exporter within a decade, according to Cherif Belmihoub, a minister in charge of economic projections.

“Algeria is no longer an oil country,” he told state radio last month.

B e n c h m a r k B r e nt c r u d e edged above $60 a barrel on Monday for the first time in more than a year, but prices are still less than half what Algeria needs to balance its budget, according to the International Monetary Fund. Its fiscal break-even of $135 a barrel is higher than that of any other producer in the Arab world, the IMF calculates.

“Algeria’s leadership is being battered relentlessly,” said Jalel Harchaoui, a senior fellow at the Geneva-based Global Initiative, a nongovernment organization. “For the first time in about two decades, Algiers must make politically painful and symbolically charged decisions in order to find dollars.”

The nation’s exports of crude and liquefied natural gas each declined

around 30 percent in 2020, according to Bloomberg ship-tracking data.

The trend’s continued this year. Oil sales abroad fell to just 290,000 barrels a day last month, 36 percent less than in December and the smallest figure since at least 2017.

Algeria and other members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries agreed to cut production last year as the corona-

virus pandemic grounded planes and shut down factories. Yet, while the majority of Opec nations breached their quotas, Algeria mostly failed to reach its cap. Overall oil output rose slightly in January but is still around the lowest since 2002.

With its production anemic, Algeria may miss out on the recent recovery in crude. Brent futures have climbed more than 50 percent since

the start of November thanks to the rollout of Covid-19 vaccines and rising demand in China.

The nation also failed to take advantage of surging LNG prices in midJanuary because it lacked surplus gas to sell on the spot market, traders said.

Algeria’s gas output fell in 2019 to at least a decade-low, according to the Gas Exporting Countries Forum. At the same time, the country

is burning more of the fuel in local power plants as its population rises, leaving less room for exports.

Prime Minister Abdelaziz Djerad has ordered spending cuts to stabilize the country’s finances. But his government is wary of reducing subsidies on power and food.

“Algeria has one of the largest welfare budgets per capita of its Opec peers,” said Bill Farren-Price, a director at energy research firm Enverus. Sustaining social spending “will be essential if mass protests are to be avoided.”

State energy firm Sonatrach said it aims to boost gas exports by around 25 percent this year, even while slashing spending. The company’s past efforts to raise energy production have been hindered by frequent changes of management. It’s had four chief executive officers in the last two years and 12 since 2010.

“Constant changes at the top of Sonatrach have not made it easy to manage the sector,” said FarrenPrice. “There are a lot of pressures.”

A spokesman for the company declined to comment.

Outside investors

ALGERIA has hinted at allowing more foreign investment in the energy sector. But it remains one of Africa’s most closed-off economies, and politicians are reluctant to let international companies exert more control over the country’s resources.

Bloomberg News

EU top official admits she regrets ‘mistakes’ over vaccine export gaffe

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RUSSELS—The European Union’s top official expressed regret for creating a row with Britain last month when the bloc briefly considered applying an emergency restriction on exports of Covid-19 vaccines also to the UK’s Northern Ireland.

Amid a dispute with AngloSwedish drugmaker AstraZeneca, the EU introduced tighter rules on exports of Covid-19 vaccines that could hit shipments to nations like the United Kingdom. To implement its plan, EU officials thought about also introducing controls on exports to Northern Ireland from Ireland, which is part of the EU. That would have created a hard border. And since the Brexit deal guarantees that goods flow freely between the EU and Northern Ireland to protect the Irish peace process, the plans sparked concerns and outrage in Britain, Northern Ireland and Ireland.

Amid the outcry, the EU reversed its decision.

Speaking at the European Parliament on Wednesday, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said she was sorry for the confusion.

“The bottom line is that mistakes were made in the process leading up to the decision,” von der Leyen said.

“And I deeply regret that. But in the end we got it right.”

Von der Leyen spoke a day after Britain’s chief Brexit minister said that relations between the United Kingdom and the EU have suffered from turbulence since their economic divorce six weeks ago, Britain left the EU politically just over a year ago, and quit the bloc’s economic structures on December 31, 2020.

Since then, customs and veterinary checks have been imposed on goods moving between Britain and EU member-nations— and on some British goods going to Northern Ireland because it shares a border with Ireland.

T he checks have unsettled the delicate political balance in Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK and where some people identify as British and some as Irish. The new measures are opposed by pro-British Unionists, who say they drive a wedge between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK. Northern Ireland authorities halted veterinary checks and withdrew border staff from ports for several days this month after threatening graffiti appeared referring to port workers as targets. AP

OurTime BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Technology executive refuses to slow down after retirement

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By Rizal Raoul S. Reyes

FTER his retirement from IBM Philippines, Floyd Patrick Piedad decided to remain active in the technology sector as he felt that technology is in his DNA. Leverag ing his fami liar it y with technology start-ups, Piedad founded an Internet value added service company in 1996. Seven years later, he established an international software outsourcing company. This came naturally for him considering that in his 30-year career in the technology industry, he held different management and senior positions in multinational companies, where he established outsource teams for US-based start-ups.

Piedad is a non-believer in slowing down after retirement. Currently, he is managing a little-known Filipino software firm that has been pivotal in helping some local companies safely and successfully conduct their business in the time of the Covid-19 pandemic.

In this endeavor, he joined forces with Calixto Chikiamco, CEO and founder of Kustom360, a successful entrepreneur who built one of the premier digital music production companies serving the Japanese market.

Piedad said that cloud-based software Kustom360, which has been operational for more than six years, allows businesses to easi ly sc hedu le f ield assig nments, get reports from field

personnel in real time through their mobile device, and analyze the performance of their service or products in remote locations.

These are all achieved while observing social distancing rules and eliminating physical contact with customers.

Field employees can submit reports through the Kustom360 mobile app that works even offline.

Back office employees, managers and business owners can readily access the reports through the Web app, whether they are working from home or in the office.

“When I was invited to join the company last year at the height of the lockdowns and community quarantines, I immediately saw Kustom360’s potential in enabling companies to not only survive, but even thrive, in today’s very difficult business operating environment,” Piedad said in an e-mail interview with the BusinessMirror.

Now that he has taken the reins as the new president and COO of Kustom360, he has big plans for the company.

“The company not only gave me the opportunity to help our country’s struggling businesses, but also gave me the challenge to take a homegrown software prod-

PIEDAD

uct to the global market,” he said.

Although there are lots of companies offering digital solutions, Piedad said there are only few available solutions designed for SMEs that do not have the budget, skills, and time to implement complex and expensive software. He said Kustom360 can address the needs of SMEs, such as the immediate digitization of paper forms used when interacting with customers or getting data from the field.

Since Kustom360 is hosted in the cloud, no software needs to be developed, installed, and customized by the client. On day one, an existing paper form can be made digital, using a dragand-drop intuitive user interface running on any web browser.

This form can then be assigned to field personnel, who will be able to access it via their mobile device and submit them remotely without much effort.

He said Kustom360 has evolved over the last six years.

The set of features and functions were developed hand-inhand with their clients, and so the business benefits are tangible and impactful. To date, it has helped dozens of companies

in different industries such as consumer goods, manufacturing, retail, franchise, micro-finance and property management.

“We have more than 2.5 terrabytes of client data managed by our software, from clients as far back as six and a half years ago who continue to be with us today.

More than a hundred thousand reports are posted by field personnel monthly, representing over 1,300 different types of forms that have been customized by our clients,” Piedad explained.

Kustom360 includes features such as itineraries, location tagging, date and time stamps, calculated fields, media (photo, audio, video) and signature capture, audit trails, and other tools that allow businesses to effectively digitize field reporting. The software is available as a monthly subscription, based on the number of users. There are no up-front installation or development fees, nor any long-term contract commitments necessary.

For 2021, Kustom360 aims to break into the international markets. Born in the cloud, Piedad said Kustom360 will leverage the cloud to quickly scale its capacity and performance to meet the demands of clients.

To achieve this, Piedad said they will be seeking strategic investors who can help them establish a foothold in the Asia-Pacific and European markets.

“There is a $2-billion market out there for field service management software in 2021, with expected annual growth at 12.6 percent. And that growth already takes into account the negative impact of the global pandemic,” he said.

World’s second-oldest person survives Covid-19 at age 116

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ARIS —A 116-year-old French nun who is believed to be the world’s second-oldest person has survived Covid-19 and is looking forward to celebrating her 117th birthday on Thursday.

The Gerontology Research Group, which validates details of people thought to be 110 or older, lists Frenchwoman Lucile Randon— Sister André’s birth name—as the

second-oldest known living person in the world.

French media report that Sister André tested positive for the virus in mid-January in the southern French city of Toulon. But just three weeks later, the nun is considered recovered.

“I didn’t even realize I had it,” she told French newspaper Var-Matin.

Sister A ndré, who is blind

Lets make ‘edible’ cities

By Nick Tayag

MY SIXTY-ZEN’S WORTH

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IVING in the city doesn’t pay.

It costs. A large part of this cost is the expensive food that you need to buy. A cynic friend pointed out to me: you can always buy junk food, which is cheaper and is available everywhere.

In one news program, an ordinary worker earning minimum wage of around P500 was followed by the camera as he was buying ingredients for his family’s daily meal at the neighborhood palengke, struggling to fit everything within his daily wage and is left with P8.

What about his transportation fare, cost of electricity and water? Not to mention the load for the Internet for his kids’ education? The point was well made.

Cost of meat and vegetables is

now so way out of the reach of our neighborhood liempo cum kimchi home delivery suki that he has recently closed down his burgeoning enterprise.

It leads me to think: Can’t we bring the farm to the city? Can’t we, city dwellers, grow and produce our own food?

If I remember right, there used to be an urban farming project in Quezon City, which has large tracts of empty lands. Why not start thinking again of urban farming and let a million backyards and idle lands bloom with vegetables and fruits?

Crazy? Maybe, but why not?

After all, the pandemic has already catalyzed the emergence of plantitos and plantitas. Why stop with growing indoor plants? Why

and uses a wheelchair, did not even worr y when she received her diagnosis.

“She didn’t ask me about her health, but about her habits,” David Tavella, the communications manager for the care home where the nun, told the newspaper. “For example, she wanted to know if meal or bedtime schedules would change. She showed no fear of

not move on to urban gardening and farming.

Think of these immediate benefits to your family. When you grow your own food, you don’t need to spend a lot of money to get the healthy and nutritious vegetables, herbs and fruits that you need.

These are low in cholesterol, high in fiber, and have beneficial vitamins and nutrients. Imagine plucking the fresh produce whenever they are ready for harvest, so you don’t need to worry about the shelf life.

Then, you can even sell excess produce to other people. It can also create a source of livelihood for people in your neighborhood. Why not form a mini farming cooperative?

Urban farming is a perfect solution for vacant and underutilized lots scattered throughout cities. Let each city look for unused idle empty lands and convert them into communal gardens or farms. Then let the community take care of these mini farms, which now become a source of their vegetables and fruits at very low cost. Let’s face it, many city dwellers are migrants from rural provinces and have farming know-how. Some of the idle lands or some areas in the city parks can also be converted into fishing ponds.

In Japanese supermarkets,

the disease. On the other hand, she was very concerned about the other residents.”

Not all of the homes residents shared Sister André’s luck. In January, 81 of the 88 residents tested positive for the virus, and about 10 of them died, according to Var-Matin.

Once doctors declared the nun no longer infected, she was allowed to attend Mass. AP

there is a certain space reserved for the produce of local farmers or gardeners. They even post the pictures of the farmers so people get to know them. Maybe we can do the same here.

Or we can designate or even build a specific place as farmers’ markets where produce of neighborhoods can be sold on certain days. This will give a run for the money of middlemen who bring vegetables and fruits from far-flung farms. It will definitely make the cost of food items in the usual palengke or supermarkets within the budgets of the ordinary housewife.

Urban gardening can help alleviate rising food costs by providing city dwellers the opportunity to grow and harvest their own fresh and nutritious food at a fraction of what the same produce would otherwise cost at the palengke or supermarket.

It will also benefit local food service enterprises, as they will have a steady source of inexpensive basic items for their food offerings.

In Detroit City, one patch of land, 12 vacant houses were removed to grow food. The result: almost 200,000 kilograms of produce for 2,000 local families, provided volunteer experience to 8,000

Editor: Angel R. Calso • Saturday, February 13, 2021 A7

Coronavirus cases drop at US homes for elderly and infirm

By Jay Reeves

The Associated Press

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IRMINGHAM, Alaska— Coronavirus cases have dropped at US nursing homes and other long-term care facilities over the past few weeks, offering a glimmer of hope that health officials attribute to the start of vaccinations, an easing of the post-holiday surge and better prevention, among other reasons.

More than 153,000 residents of the country’s nursing homes and assisted living centers have died of Covid-19, accounting for 36 percent of the US pandemic death toll, according to the Covid Tracking Project.

Many of the roughly 2 million people who live at such facilities remain cut off from loved ones because of the risk of infection. The virus still kills thousands of them weekly.

The overall trend for long-term care residents is improving, though, with fewer new cases recorded and fewer facilities reporting outbreaks. Coupled with better figures for the country overall, it’s cause for optimism even if it’s too early to declare victory.

“We definitely think there’s hope and there’s light at the end of the tunnel,” said Marty Wright, who heads a nursing home trade group in West Virginia.

Nursing homes have been a priority since vaccinations began in mid-December, and the federal government says 1.5 million long-term care residents have already received at least an initial dose.

Researchers and industry leaders say they are seeing marked improvements after months in which some nursing homes lost dozens of residents to the disease and had to keep others in semi-isolation for protection. Some 2,000 nursing homes are now virus-free, or about 13 percent nationally, according to an industry group, and many are dealing with far fewer cases than before.

In West Virginia, where about 30 percent of the state’s roughly 2,080 Covid-19 deaths occurred at longterm care centers, fewer outbreaks are happening and fewer residents are requiring hospitalization, said Wright, chief executive of the West Virginia Health Care Association.

Pennsylvania-based Genesis HealthCare, which operates more than 325 nursing homes, assisted-living facilities or senior living communities in 24 states, has seen similar improvements, said spokeswoman Lori Mayer.

The American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living, an industry trade

residents and made the area livable again, aside from being edible.

There’s a study published in the journal Earth’s Future and led by the Arizona State University and Google. If well planned, the study concludes that “urban farms could supply almost the entire recommended consumption of vegetables for city dwellers, while cutting food waste and reducing emissions from the transportation of agricultural products.” Not to mention making cities more livable because of increased vegetation cover and other positive things that will solve many urban environmental problems.

But there is also another good reason for cultivating food gardens at home or in our neighborhood.

It’s educational for our urban children who don’t even know or care where their food comes from.

A small backyard garden can help them get educated about growing food. That’s a unique skill to have in today’s world. It can educate our children about sustainable food and the health benefits. That’s something worth learning and teaching.

Exposure to urban gardening and farming will also make farming cool for young people. In the words of economist Cielito Habito, it will give the “benefit of drawing young

THIS photo provided by Mark Badger shows him, right, posing with his 91-year-old father, Billy, at the Pioneers Home in Anchorage, Alaska, on February 5, 2021. Mark was able to see his father for the first time in months after the care facility again allowed family members to begin visiting their loved ones in person. MARK BADGER VIA AP

organization, said Thursday that data from about 800 nursing homes where initial vaccine doses were administered in late December offered promising results. Cases among residents fell by 48 percent at homes where immunizations had occurred, compared to a 21-percent decline at non-vaccinated facilities nearby.

Meanwhile, cases among employees dropped by 33 percent at vaccinated homes, compared to 18 percent at non-vaccinated facilities.

After reaching a high of almost 73,600 new weekly cases in longterm care facilities nationwide in mid-December, the number was down 31 percent by late January, to about 50,000 new cases per week, an Associated Press analysis found.

Still, the most recent weekly count is 18 percent higher than the seven-day period that ended on Thanksgiving, when numbers started climbing.

The weekly count of new deaths remains stubbornly high, with a record 7,042 recorded during the seven-day span that ended January 14 and only a slight decline since.

By comparison, for the seven days that ended on Thanksgiving, 3,181 deaths were recorded. More encouragingly, the Covid Tracking Project found that only 251 facilities reported new outbreaks recently, compared to 1,410 in early January.

Dr. David Gifford, chief medical officer for the national association, said the numbers show signs for hope since they indicate vaccines might decrease the spread of Covid-19, a finding not shown in trials.

people back to farming, as opportunities in the “digitalization” of agriculture and agribusiness make it more exciting for millennials and Gen Z to immerse themselves in and create wealth in the farms.”

What if you don’t have a huge backyard? Urban gardening experts say that you don’t need a lot of space to grow your own food. There are techniques like vertical gardening, container gardening, rooftop gardening, and hydroponic gardening that make good use of space. A little Pinoy abilidad will do it.

Let’s transform our cities into vibrant and “edible” landscapes, revamp our backyards and balconies and rooftops into garden oases.

Let’s engage our urban youth by giving them opportunities to gain hands-on experience growing food and learn the importance of eating a healthy, balanced diet.

Let’s connect with other people who grow it!

I long to see the day when we can see urban farms—plots, indoor vertical farms and rooftop gardens nestled among busy streets and skyscrapers.

Let’s make growers and farmers out of urban dwellers. Let us create a city that grows and produces what it eats.

Education BusinessMirror

A8 Saturday, February 13, 2021

Editor: Mike Policarpio

More Tesda scholars in M. Manila get starter kits

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By Roderick L. Abad

HE Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (Tesda) handed over this week starter toolkits to more Special Training for Employment Program (Step) scholars in Metro Manila.

Under the theme “Pagbibigay sa mga Minamahal na Magsasanay,” the agency’s ceremonial turnover on February 10 marked the massive distribution for student-beneficiaries in the National Capital Region (NCR).

Tesda Secretary Isidro S. Lapeña personally gave the toolkits to several Step graduates who finished hilot (wellness massage) National Certificate (NC) II, coldmeals preparation (leading to NC II), plumbing NC I, shielded metal-arc welding NC I, facial treatment (leading to beauty care NC II), as well as electrical installation and maintenance NC II. “With these new set of toolkits, you will be able to practice and put to good use the train-

ing and competencies you have gained from Tesda,” Lapeña said.

“Hopefully, this will also pave the way for a more comfortable life for all of you. The same thing that the President, Mayor Rodrigo Roa Duterte, envisions: a comfortable life for all Filipinos,” he said.

The Tesda chief is optimistic the said event will inspire others who would like to pursue or start their own small businesses.

Tesda Deputy Director General for Operations Lina Sarmiento, Tesda-NCR Regional Director Florencio F. Sunico Jr., and the six district directors who accompanied the scholars in receiving their toolkits, joined Lapeña at the ceremony.

Sunico clarified that Tesda

World Bank accepts entries for Digital Skills Innovation Awards-SE Asia

Santo Tomas U has most number of accredited programs in NCR, PHL

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INGAPORE—The World Bank introduced on February 1 its inaugural Digital Skills Innovation Awards to recognize the contribution and accomplishments of training programs to develop digital skills in Southeast Asia. “[The region’s] digital economy is expanding at an unprecedented pace, and countries across the region are recognizing this growth as critical to stimulate economic recovery post-pandemic,” said World Bank Senior Digital Development Specialist Natasha Beschorner. “Therefore, it is more important than ever before to equip Southeast Asians with the right skill sets to thrive in a rapidly changing digital landscape.”

The Digital Sk ills Innovation Awards honors training excellence to advance the digital proficiencies of Southeast Asians, as countries in the region look to tap the digital economy to stay ahead of the game.

Southeast Asia’s private or public organizations providing training in technical or nontechnical skills required in the digital economy are encouraged to apply. Award nominations will be reviewed by a judging panel consisting of experts from the academic, information and communication technology, and international development sectors.

Nominations open today and close on March 31. Winners will be invited to present their programs at an inaugural regional virtual conference on digital skills in May. For more information about the 2021 World Bank Digital Skills Innovation Awards and to submit a nomination, visit http:// www.worldbank.org/digitalskills4sea.

The Digital Sk ills Innovation Awards—part of a region-wide initiative to inform policy-makers on digital-skills development programs around Southeast Asia—is sup ported by the Digital Development Partnership with Denmark, Finland, Germany, Google, the Global System for Mobile Communications Association, Israel, Japan, Korea, Microsoft, Norway, Sweden, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom.

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HE University of Santo Tomas (UST) maintained its status in 2020 as having the highest number of accredited programs in both the National Capital Region (NCR) and the Philippines with 48 programs, according to the Philippine Association of Colleges and Universities Commission on Accreditation

TESDA Secretary Isidro Lapeña (left) hands over a starter toolkit to a Special Training for Employment Program graduate.

District Offices in Metro Manila have already started their distribution when the Step starter toolkits arrived last month.

“Here in NCR, we will continue to distribute Step starter toolkits until all of our 21,846 Step graduates have received theirs. [The items will] help our graduates set their career in motion,” he said.

“Other benefits these scholars receive apart from the toolkits are

(PACUCOA).

The Royal and Pontifical University was recognized for five achievements during the 31st General Assembly of PACUCOA through an online conference on December 4, 2020, with the theme, “Quality Assurance in a Digital World.”

The oldest Catholic learning institution in Asia also remained

UST has the highest number of programs accredited by PACUCOA.

free entrepreneurship training and training allowances.”

Lapeña has directed all Tesda regional and provincial offices to contact immediately all the rest of the toolkit recipients nationwide and urged the Step 2019 graduates to contact them as well: “Please get in touch with the provincial offices nearest you, so you can immediately get your toolkits.”

as the only one with the highest number of Level IV-reaccredited programs at 26 in the Philippines, and the one with the highest number of candidate programs in the country. UST was also commended for having the first Bachelor of Science in Entrepreneurship program at Level-III Reaccredited Status in NCR. PACUCOA’s five-level accreditation system has Level IV as its highest. Among the criteria assessed are teaching and learning outcomes, research productivity, community service, linkages and consortia, career planning and development for students, as well as the planning process.

For the duration of the accredited status, UST—as a higher-education institution—has full autonomy for the Level IV program, and has the authority to offer new graduate programs allied to existing Level IV programs.

Globe eLibrary acquaints kids with data privacy, security

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S they now spend more time online for learning and entertainment, Filipino children are now more vulnerable to threats on their wellbeing from cyber criminals who gather personal information.

This prompted Globe eLibrary to include data privacy and security for children in its list of books available for their downloading and reading for free.

Available in both print and electronic formats, Safe Space: A Kid’s Guide to Data Privacy aims to help children ages 7 to 12 better understand the concept of data privacy and security in a fun and engaging way. It includes information on the importance of keeping personal data secure, the way such information may be compromised, measures the child and parents can do to avoid becoming v ictims, and ways to address the concern if such happens.

The book was created through the joint efforts of Globe, the National Privacy Commission, as well as the Center for Art, New Ventures & Sustainable Development. The latter commissioned Liza Flores to render the artwork on the book ’s cover.

“It is important to facilitate deeper learning and awareness about data privacy and security among children as early as possible,” said Globe Chief Sustainability Officer and SVP for Corporate Communications Yoly Crisanto. “That way, they will grow vigilant in protecting themselves on the Internet.”

The inclusion of Safe K ids in Globe eLibrary is part of the ongoing efforts of Globe to keep children safe online. The telco firm, through its Digital Thumbprint Program, helps children, the youth, their parents and teachers learn and practice digital citizenship, online safety, and

responsible use of the Web. Launched in April 2020, Globe eLibrar y primarily helps students get access to resource materials during the pandemic. It contains textbooks on core subjects such as math, science, English, Filipino, music and arts fit for K-12 students, as well as local and international storybooks. It also offers interactive videos on math, science, English, values, as well as hygiene and sanitation incorporating sights and sounds familiar to students to help supplement classroom learning. Some of the videos were developed by teachers themselves.

The eBooks and videos are available for free via https:// globeelibrary.ph/ or the Globe eLibrary mobile app. They may also be downloaded for offline learning. Globe or TM customers may access the eLibrary from their mobile phone without incurring data charges.

France offers graduateprogram scholarships

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EFLECTING the growing interest of Filipinos to pursue graduate studies in France, its embassy in the Philippines announces the offering of two scholarship programs for Academic Year 2021-2022: The PhilFranceDepartment of Science and Technology (DOST) Scholarships for scientists and researchers, as well as the PhilFrance Scholarships for more general fields of study.

Jointly administered by the French Embassy and the department’s Science Education Institute (SEI), the PhilFrance-DOST Scholarship Program aims to encourage Filipino professionals working in academic, research or government institutions to pursue a Master’s or Doctorate degree at French public higher-education institutions (HEIs).

Intending to strengthen exchanges of scientific knowledge and expertise between France and the Philippines, the PhilFranceDOST Scholarship Program prioritizes the following fields of study: agriculture, biological sciences, climate change, forestry, health and medical research, material sciences, natural resources and environment, nuclear application on health, as well as veterinary sciences.

Awardees of the PhilFranceDOST Scholarships are entitled to the following benefits: an exemption from public university registration fees, one round-trip ticket from Manila to France, an exemption from visa-application fees, a monthly living allowance covering the duration of their studies, a relocation allowance, coverage of pre-travel expenses, a health-care package, and priority access to public student accommodations.

Selected candidates of this scholarship must return to the Philippines immediately after completion of their graduate degree to render return service, or a period equivalent to twice the length of time they spent in France for their degree.

Meanwhile, the French Embassy is also accepting applications for the PhilFrance Scholarships.

Launched in 2016, this program is directed to Filipino students and professionals wishing to come to France to pursue Master’s degrees in all academic disciplines taught at French HEIs. It is awarded to highly qualified candidates who have demonstrated strong academic and leadership qualities in their scholarly and professional activities.

Awardees of the PhilFrance Scholarships will be entitled to the following benefits: a tuition subsidy, one round-trip ticket from Manila to France, an exemption from visa-application fees, a monthly living allowance covering the duration of their studies, a health-care package, and priority access to public student accom-

modations.

Since 2016 more than 50 Filipinos have been awarded the PhilFrance Scholarship, which allowed them to pursue graduate degrees in the French language and literature, business, public policy and international development, engineering, mathematics, marine biology, applied chemistry, environmental and ecological sciences, as well as public health.

Details and guidelines on eligibility, benefits, requirements, application calendar and evaluation guidelines for both scholarships are available through the PhilFrance Scholarships Program at www.philfrance-scholarships.com.

This web site also contains useful information for applicants to learn more about HEIs and graduate programs offered in France.

Interested candidates must submit their applications through the PhilFrance Scholarships site no later than March 15.

Why study in France?

FRANCE is an attractive destination for studying abroad because of its rich culture and history, its world-class higher education system, and for being one of the world’s most research-intensive nations. Each year, more than 325,000 international students choose to study there, making it the fourth-most attractive destination for inbound students, according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, or Unesco.

Fluency in French is an advantage, but not a requirement to study in the European country. An increasing number of internationally ranked HEIs offer programs taught in English, while also providing French language courses for international students.

State subsidies allow a more reasonable cost of living for international students in France, compared to other destinations. The country provides free and mandatory social-security coverage in the form of health-care insurance to students of all nationalities who are enrolled at French HEIs. The European country also offers a wide range of specializations in line with priority sectors of the Philippines. These include academic and research programs in STEM or sciences, technology, engineering and math; sustainable development; disaster-risk reduction and mitigation, as well as social innovation and entrepreneurship.

Through information sessions, participation in education fairs and personalized consultations, the Campus France Manila office brings French higher education closer to Filipinos and helps prospective students make more informed decisions about their academic plans. For more information, contact manille@campusfrance.org.

Tourism&Entertainment BusinessMirror

Editor: Carla Mortel-Baricaua

Saturday, February 13, 2021 A9

Romantic Ridge Rendezvous Story & photos

by Bernard L. Supetran

I

t’s this time of the year again when romantic Filipinos put their best foot forward in celebrating the most-awaited Day of the Hearts.

Never mind if we don’t fully understand what the red-letter is all about, and never mind if there are limitations imposed upon us by the Covid-19 pandemic.

For the proverbial simpatiko couples looking for a secluded date place, the top-of-mind destination is Tagaytay City and its fringes because of its cool highland climate, gourmet dishes, boutique accommodation, and the romantic ambiance it never fails to weave.

But with every other couple thinking the same way, the dream date can become memorable in a wrong way. For a consummate getaway, selection of the specific location is key not only for privacy purposes, but also for the physical distancing safety measure we are being told repeatedly.

Tucked in an interior village of Alfonso town, Sonya’s Garden Country Bed and Breakfast is the trailblazer in farm tourism with its green, green grass of home. The not-so-secret garden of entrepreneur Sonya Garcia has expanded over the past two decades and has become an iconic hideaway for those who love organic dining food away from the crowd.

The sprawling property transports you to an assortment of gardens and greenhouses, breezy tent restaurants, the Panaderia bakery which is sought for its premium baked breads, and the Sensuous Spa which renders rejuvenating treatments at a tranquil massage cottage.

Its popular all-you-can eat offering is back, although in the form of refills to prevent close contact with other diners.

Guests can reserve the Proposal Garden for a dinner date, anniversary, wedding proposal, and other elements you can throw

Take a dip in the salt water swimming pool at La Casa Heneral.

The Proposal Garden has the perfect setup in the middle of lush greenery and blooms.

Relax and enjoy the enchanting scenery in The Observatory Tagaytay.

Sonya’s Garden river resort is both relaxing and romantic as it can be.

in for an ultra-romantic moment.

For a complete retreat, spend the night at the Spanish ancestral house-themed rooms adorned with antiques and curio displays.

Conspicuously absent are the airconditioners for natural ventilation, as well as TV and Internet connection so you can spend intimate moments sans gadgets.

Greet the morning with an energizing Zumba or a yoga session, and hie off to the hidden river resort and nipa hut cottage it recently developed situated 6 kms away. Before heading home, you can take home organic farm produce, or namenta l plants, flowers and botanical bath, and other personal care products.

For an extra night in the vicinity, the newly opened La Casa Heneral offers modern amenities at a luxe mansion-like private resort. Located just right beside Sonya’s, the rest house is an opulent three-room, two-story hideaway you can have unto yourselves.

Free-standing Asian sculptures, curio items, and paintings adorn the living area and the well-appointed master bedroom to exude the spirit of the rich Oriental culture. There’s an entertainment area adjacent the veranda with an oversized smart TV for binging on Netflix or YouTube.

If there are family members tagging along, they can occupy

the adjacent room and the chic glass poolside room. As to food and beverage, you can arrange the service with the manager, cook your own, or better yet with Sonya’s Garden or other restaurants within Alfonso under a special setup.

On the other side of the scenic ridge is The Observatory Tagaytay, situated on the slopes of Mystic Hills along Ligaya Drive, an artsy boutique hotel with an abundance of well-manicured greeneries and cozy nooks. Just like its location, it exudes a certain mystic allure for some enchanting evening with your loved one.

Due to its undulating terrain,

it is an enviable spot for stargazing and admiring the Taal Volcano and Lake, which is arguably among the most romantic and timeless natural backdrops lovestruck couples could ever have.

With just a few generously spaced bedrooms, guests can be assured of privacy, solitude and low people density. Be mesmerized by the unobstructed panorama with its Sky Suites which are available with the exclusive rental of the whole house.

As a repurposed countryside vacation house, it evokes a homey and warm soul in keeping with its dictum of “Where graceful living finds its place.”

Much like a contemporary art

gallery, it is punctuated with paintings and art works which can bring out the inner artist and poet in you as you bask in the property’s splendor which is often lacking in a typical midsized hotel.

And with the bespoke lodging comes along a hearty breakfast plate with an international flair.

The placid lake beckons, and you can yield to the call and drive down to the lakeshore town of Talisay to see the enigmatic volcano up close. Better yet, glide across the water and get your feet wet, literally, on a sailboat or kayak at the Taal Lake Yacht Club for an out-of-the-ordinary romantic retreat.

The Farm’s Valentine’s Day treat for couples and singles T

he Farm at San Benito, t he cou nt r y ’s pione e r and multi-awarded ecoluxury medical resort located in Lipa City, Batangas, is offering a unique treat for couples and solo travelers alike for a healthy and memorable Valentine’s Day celebration.

Dubbed “Vitality of the Hearts,” it is an award-winning four-hour couple’s treatment designed to cleanse the body of negative energy, and restore vitality. It starts with acupuncture to release energy blocks, followed by a traditional Filipino couple’s treatment called “Hilot Kasuyo” that strengthens the body’s bio-energy fields, eliminating tiredness, fatigue, and disharmony.

Surprise your very special

The Farm's Acqua Hydrotherapy Sanctuary.

someone and bask on a “Dinner Under the Stars” inclusive of a 5-course vegan or a 3-course sea-

Poolside at The Farm.

food menu the Pesce Restaurant with two glasses of wine in a rich jungle romantic setup.

The Farm has also custom made a program for the heartbroken ones with its special “How to

Heal a Broken Heart” treatment.

Its team of wellness experts will heal your emotional state,

rejuvenate your body and soul and create positive path toward release and contentment. The treatment will focus on the areas of harmonizing flow, empress facial rejuvenation, hilot haplos Filipino indulging scrub, and rose petal body wrap.

The programs are conducted by health experts, medical doctors, and highly experienced hospitality professionals. Guests will receive the trademark servicefrom-the-heart for a relaxing and rejuvenating stay.

For details, v isit www.thefarmatsanbenito.com, ca l l 8884-8074, 0918-8848080, or email info@thefarm.com.ph, or follow The Farm at its social-media accounts on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

A10 Saturday, February 13, 2021 • Editor: Gerard S. Ramos

BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

What is Clubhouse, the buzzy new audio chat app? waiting list to be let into Clubhouse.

This is part of the app’s current appeal—like an exclusive club, only it’s expanding by the minute. The aura has been magnified by the star power of early members such as rap star Drake, actor Jared Leto, actress Tiffany Haddish, and influential technology figures such as venture capitalist Marc Andreessen and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. Although Clubhouse hasn’t divulged how many people are using its service, its app has been downloaded 5.3 million times, according to analytics firm App Annie.

Once you have an invitation, you can import your Twitter profile—or start from scratch—and then follow people or “clubs” on a broad range of topics. The app encourages people to use their real names, though this does not appear to be enforced. You’ll also need an iPhone—Clubhouse doesn’t yet work on Android phones and is not on the web.

WHO MADE CLUBHOUSE?

C

BY BARBARA O�TUTAY & MICHAEL LIEDTKE The Associated Press

LUBHOUSE, an invitation-only audio chat app launched less than a year ago, has caught the attention of tech industry bigshots like Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg—not to mention the Chinese government, which has already blocked it in the country.

WHAT IS CLUBHOUSE?

THE iPhone-only app, once you’re in, lets you start or listen into conversations on a whole host of topics, from tech to pro sports, parenting, Black literature and so on. There are no posts, photos or videos—only people’s profile pictures and their voices.

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Conversations can be intimate, like a phone call, or might include thousands of people listening to a talk by boldface names, like a conference or stage interview. Think part podcast, part conference call, part social media. It’s free to use and there are no ads, at least not at this point.

HOW DO I GET IN?

CURRENTLY, the only way to get an invitation is to score one from someone already on Clubhouse.

It’s still in “beta,” version, like Gmail was in its early days, when it was a badge of nerd worthiness to get an account. If you don’t know anyone who can invite you yet, you may not have to wait much longer.

When Clubhouse first came out, new members only got two invitations. That number has now grown to five, signaling that the app feels ready to broaden its audience. You can also download the app and get on a

IT was created by Silicon Valley entrepreneur Paul Davison, best known for a location-driven social networking app Highlight that Pinterest bought in 2016, and a former Google engineer, Rohan Seth.

Although it obviously wasn’t planned, they probably couldn’t have picked a better time to start welcoming a select few into Clubhouse. The app made its debut last March, just as people were being ordered to stay at home to battle the pandemic and found themselves eager to talk to other people besides their family or roommates.

WHY IS IT GETTING MORE ATTENTION NOW?

THE primary reason is probably that Musk and Zuckerberg recently made surprise appearances on Clubhouse. When two technology icons worth a combined $280 billion choose to use the same app to get their message out within a few days of each other, people tend to sit up and take notice.

In his Januart 31 appearance, Musk began by discussing his mission to get to Mars through its rocket ship company Space X and sharing his views on cryptocurrency, artificial intelligence and the ongoing pandemic.

But then he rocked the Clubhouse by summoning Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev to the virtual stage for an interview about the app’s role in transforming GameStop’s stock from a dud into a Wall Street sensation that at least briefly devastated sophisticated

investors who had bet the shares would continue to decline. That interview illustrated two points that are important to remember about Clubhouse. Although the app itself says it doesn’t record the discussions occurring within its rooms, that doesn’t mean other participants aren’t. And the posted recordings of discussions like that also prove there are ways for getting around Clubhouse’s 5,000-person limit in its rooms.

Zuckerberg’s February 4 appearance on Clubhouse didn’t delve into anything quite as hot as the GameStop frenzy, but his presence still added to the curiosity about the app. In true Facebook fashion, the company is also reportedly working on a copycat, known internally as Fireside.

SO IS IT ALL TECH INDUSTRY PEOPLE?

WHILE the early users of Clubhouse were largely venture capitalists and startup folks, as the app’s user base has expanded so has the diversity of its members. Users can now explore subjects such as “Ask A Coach: Life, Love & The Pursuit of Joy, Money/ Health,” “Bitcoin Basics for Baby Boomers,” “Drag Race Clubhaus,” “Investing While Black” and “PlantBased Basics for Beginners with Dietitian Jasmine.”

WHAT HAPPENED IN CHINA?

THOUSANDS of Chinese users have flocked to the app in recent months, lured by the unfettered discussions it allowed with people abroad—particularly about democracy, Taiwan and other sensitive topics.

That was especially striking given that President Xi Jinping’s government is increasingly hostile to independent voices. Clubhouse allowed many mainland users their first direct communication with people in Hong Kong and Taiwan and with exiles from the Uighur minority in the northwestern region of Xinjiang.

The app was removed from Apple Inc.’s China store by at least December 16, according to Benjamin Ismail, an activist with the group Apple Censorship which tracks censorship in the Apple Store. Users still could download it if they had access to an Apple app store abroad.

But on Monday, Chinese users lost access to Clubhouse, much the way thousands of other web sites and social media apps have been blocked by the Chinese Communist Party using the world’s most extensive system of Internet filters. ■

Cathy Yap-Yang talks about living and working in challenging times

PLDT-SMART’S Cathy Yap-Yang at work in her Makati office

THIS column’s name—“Primetime”—brings to mind a person like Cathy Yap-Yang, First Vice President and Group Communications Officer of the PLDT-Smart Group. Why? In the TV or radio industry, “primetime” is that block of time when the audience is expected to be the biggest.

In terms of her career, I see Yap-Yang just approaching prime time.

In December 2019, while still an anchor for ANC, Yap-Yang was named Best TV News Anchor 2019 at the Asian Academy Awards in Singapore. In January 2020, she won Best TV News Presenter at the Asian TV Awards in Manila.

These weren’t Yap-Yang’s first international awards but her first two at ANC, representing a Filipino news organization.

It was for Yap-Yang, the pinnacle of her broadcasting career, to be recognized as a Filipino broadcaster for a Filipino network.

We all know what happened after January 2020 but Yap-Yang continued to go to work everyday at ANC even during the pandemic until ABS-CBN was shut down in May. It is this dedication and determination that she now brings with her to the PLDT-Smart Group as the

head of its communications team.

It hasn’t been easy.

“I celebrated my birthday recently and sina Sarah [staff member], a few of them came here to surprise me with a cake. ’Yung talagang nag-abala pa sila,” said Yap-Yang. It was the first time she was meeting some of her team members since joining PLDT-Smart in August 2020.

One of the first things Yap-Yang did when she took office was to make sure that everyone on her team was set in terms of connectivity. There were others, for instance, who would say they had to go to the sari-sari store to buy prepaid load and for her that was an indication that what they were getting was not enough in our current circumstances where everything is being done online.

“Some of them needed laptops. Some of them needed to get their laptops from the office and some were scared to go there. These were some of their concerns. Our people group really helped us with these concerns,” said Yap-Yang.

In her new post, she heads the communications group of a 90-year-old company (PLDT) and a 30-year-old company (Smart), and she knew there would be challenges.

“It was beneficial that I came from the outside so I could look at their dynamics. They’re a great bunch.

I realized that as long as they’re working together, it doesn’t matter if they’re PLDT or they’re Smart.”

This philosophy extended to the team’s external relations efforts. The key takeaway is that PLDT and Smart belong to one group.

Connectivity is also a big issue.

Transparency, to Yap-Yang, is very important.

Announcing any network repairs or maintenance that could result in slowdowns and/or shutdowns.

Another thing that Yap-Yang keeps in mind is

that as a PLDT-Smart employee, she is a “customer ambassador.”

“I learned that members of my team have been addressing connectivity concerns from relatives and friends. I am not saying this is a solution but it’s a good start. We are reminded that it is our duty to serve others,” she said.

At home, Yap-Yang is a wife to her dermatologist husband and a mother to two girls, one 25 and the other 15. For 15 years, Yap-Yang worked abroad (four in Japan and 11 in Hong Kong). For all those years, she was a commuter mom who took a Friday flight to Manila and came back on Sunday.

“This gave me an opportunity to see my children grow up even if my husband was a very good ‘natay.’”

Although she is a very private and reserved person, we asked Yap-Yang what other interests she had. “I have a WSET’s Level 2 Award in Wines so, yes, I can make a mean cocktail.”

This level, according to www.wsetglobal.com, is “intended for beginners wishing to learn about a wide range of wines or those seeking to build on the introductory knowledge gained with the WSET Level 1 Award in Wines.”

Professionally, Yap-Yang intends to help sustain the partnerships that PLDT-Smart has built over the years through programs like School in a Bag and Digital Learning Program.

“We will be there where we are needed, and continue to improve our service to the public.”

www.businessmirror.com.ph

BusinessMirror

Editor: Gerard S. Ramos

• Saturday, February 13, 2021 A11

/

AGING DESKTOP SOURCE OF ATTORNEY’S ACCIDENTAL CAT FILTER RICHMOND, Texas—Texas attorney Rod Ponton’s appearance as a fluffy kitten during an online court hearing provided a moment of levity to a pandemicand Zoom-fatigued world.

But that specific, adorable filter may be tough to find for anyone looking to replicate the viral moment.

Ponton told The Associated Press that he was using his assistant’s 10-year-old desktop Dell computer when he logged in for a routine civil forfeiture hearing Tuesday in Presidio County, Texas, where he serves as prosecutor.

Ponton says his appearance looked normal on the webcam as he waited to be let into the Zoom hearing in Judge Roy Ferguson’s court. But when the hearing began, to his shock and dismay, he was a cat.

“I think everybody in the world’s seen the video now and heard me trying as I struggled to try to uncat myself,” he said.

Ponton said he’s still trying to untangle the

mystery, but he believes the computer’s software and the assistant’s young child are the likeliest culprits.

Texas-based Dell Technologies says the aging desktop was likely in need of a software update.

“Ponton was likely running an outdated driver which may have held him in cat filter limbo a little too long,” said Glen Robson, chief technology officer at Dell’s client solutions group. “While those of us techies were probably cringing watching that video, I’m sure cat lovers everywhere were celebrating.”

Video filters and virtual backgrounds have exploded in popularity as much of the world’s activities moved online during the pandemic. One commonly used program is Snap Camera, which lets users download all kinds of filters, including one that makes a person appear like a potato (as one woman famously did early in the pandemic). Separately, Zoom offers filters of its own through its app, though none as realistic as Ponton’s attorney-cat. AP

Pictures and video speak more than words

I

N 2021, pictures, video, and audio will speak more than words—this was one of the predictions shared by Amazon.com Vice President and Chief Technology Officer, Dr. Werner Vogels in his article “8 Predictions on How Technology Will Impact Our Lives in the Coming Year.”

Twenty-twenty was a year unlike any other as businesses large and small, governments new and old all had to completely change what they do and how they operate. But rather than slow us down, the pandemic year accelerated our shift to a digital world and whether it was Blackboard, Zoom, Netflix, or any number of other tools, we all relied on technology to help prepare meals, teach our children, collaborate with coworkers, and even entertain ourselves after yet another day at home.

At a briefing held by Amazon Web Services (AWS) earlier in the week, it was discussed how 2021 will be a launchpad for all kinds of change as access to compute and storage of the cloud are spreading out of dense data centers and reaching into rural communities, remote wilderness, and even near earth orbit.

In the past year, as we all quarantined, we increasingly communicated via audio, video and images. As a result, the amount of text we consume on our screens is being reduced as we make much more use of multimedia to communicate.

Even on Twitter, 80 percent of messages contain some kind of image or video, or are just an image or video. Some of this has been enabled by the rapid reduction in the cost and ability to store data in the cloud. In 2021 and beyond, the use of audio, video and images will continue to replace written text in everything from social platforms to business operations, and cloud technologies will play a significant role in meeting that demand.

As a writer and content creator, it was the prediction about pictures and video that struck me the most. I remember having a chat with a PR friend before the pandemic struck and we reminisced the “old” times, when you were either from print/

traditional media or online/blogging. Back then we only had to write stories and have it posted/published.

Then came the “Instagrammers.” Even though a lot of them just attended events and took photos, we also had to learn how to take better photos for our own Instagram and Facebook accounts.

These days, it’s the “YouTubers” “vloggers” and even “TikTokers” that are getting the attention of brands—and everyone is making videos. Now beside the blogpost, and the Instagram/Facebook photo sharing, brands also request us to do YouTube videos.

So not only are we writers-turned-photographers, we also have to learn video editing to adapt to the changing times.

It’s no wonder that smartphone companies are now highlighting their phones video capabilities more than just their camera megapixels.

Xiaomi for example, just launched its Mi 11 Flagship device globally, and one of its key selling points is its “studio-grade camera.”

The ultimate pocket-sized movie studio, the Mi 11 was designed to help any novice photo and video enthusiast become a film director with its improved triple rear camera setup.

It has a 108MP wide-angle main camera, 13MP 123-degree ultra-wide angle camera and 5MP telemacro camera, and redefines photography after dark with Night Mode capabilities on all three cameras, and Ultra Night Video.

Building on Xiaomi’s existing technology, six one-click AI cinema features make artsy shooting a breeze, from Parallel World (think Inception)— which duplicates and inverts your scene to give the appearance of a mirrored world—to Freeze Frame Video, which freezes and clones video frames to create the illusion that parts of your video are frozen in time. There’s also Magic Zoom mode, that creates an illusion of the camera simultaneously zooming in and out of the scene, a trick originally popularized in movie thrillers.

The Mi 11 likewise offers studio-level shooting control with its HDR10+ recording and new Pro TimeLapse mode, capable of adjusting shutter speed, ISO, aperture and EV to handle even the most challenging lighting situations.

Studio-level control also extends to editing with advanced AI features, including AI Erase 2.0 which allows users to remove unwanted objects or lines from images with one simple click.

Watching your videos on the Mi 11 will also be a better experience. It has a 6.81” AMOLED DotDisplay, with its WQHD+ ultra-high resolution, and 10-bit color technology, allowing for breathtaking clarity and smooth color transitions. Xiaomi’s Super

Resolution technology upgrades low resolution videos up to WQHD+ quality without increasing data consumption. On top of that, 10-bit color technology achieves smoother color transitions while 120Hz AdaptiveSync automatically adjusts the content’s frame rate for optimal viewing. Not to mention the extra-fast 480Hz touch sampling rate for extreme gaming experience.

The Mi 11 is powered by the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 processor and comes in two storage variants—8GB+128GB and 8GB+256GB. The device not only supports 2K/120fps/HDR gaming, but also sports an octa-core design, and ultra-large core Arm Cortex-X1 which ramps up performance dramatically.

As for the battery it has a 4,600mAh battery with 55W wired charging and 50W wireless charging support.

The Mi 11 will be out later this month and I’ll have more details as soon as we get our review unit and let you know if it is indeed the smartphone for aspiring video creators.

Now for the rest of the AWS predictions.

■ Cloud will be everywhere: The days of cloud capabilities being centralized in data centers are fast fading. Today, cloud-based applications can help boost the performance of ships at sea, aircraft traversing the sky, and in our cars and homes.

■ The Internet of machine learning: We generate more data in one hour than was created in the entirety of 2000—and more data will be created in the next three years than was created over the past 30.

■ Technology will transform our physical worlds as much as our digital worlds: In 2020, we were introduced to social distancing. With the help of advanced data analytics, we’ll start to figure out how to design our cities with the advantages of social distancing without the sense of being apart.

■ Remote learning earns its place in education: Technology, and access to it, has played a huge role in children’s education during this pandemic. Remote classrooms give school systems the flexibility to respond to unforeseen events—whether pandemics, natural disasters, or man-made calamities—to continue student education.

■ Small businesses will race to the cloud, and Southeast Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa will lead the way: In a massive shift, small businesses will begin to make use of advanced cloud technology to reach their customers.

■ Quantum computing starts to bloom As companies and institutions begin to experiment with quantum for the first time—and as that expertise starts to move beyond the academic world—we’ll see business plans and the early seeds of products and services that center around a quantum future. ■

STRONGER AND FASTER PREPAID WI-FI VIA BOOSTERS

DIGITAL connectivity is a must in today’s new normal, which is why it’s important to have a “reliable and consistent” network. Through the latest Globe At Home (GAH) Prepaid WiFi LTEAdvanced modem, customers are assured of a strong, stable and fast Internet connection that’s friendly on the wallet.

GAH Prepaid WiFi LTE-Advanced modem with its “Doble-Bilis Boosters” now offers Internet connection that’s two times faster than any other Globe prepaid modem.

The modem is plug-and-play making it easier to use, and comes with free 10GB data that can be shared with the family. Up to six devices can access the Internet using the newest modem from GAH Prepaid WiFi. “These advantages and benefits are really made to help families cope with the demands of working from home for dads and moms; and the requirements of their children while attending online classes,” said Darius Delgado, Globe VP for Broadband Business.

The GAH Prepaid WiFi LTE-Advanced is equipped with carrier aggregation technology making it a seamless experience for families to use the Internet. All they need to do is plug in and load up their Doble-Bilis Boosters-equipped modems and enjoy working while at home, watching their favorite series and learning history with just a click away.

It works best with data promos exclusive to GAH Prepaid WiFi, from as low as P99 for HomeSURF99 with 10GB valid for five days, or the HomeWATCH199 promo that gives customers a total of 34GB for seven days. The promos can only work with the SIM inserted in the modem.

The GAH Prepaid WiFi LTE-Advanced modems with Doble-Bilis Boosters are available at the Globe Online Shop and other channels nationwide for only P1,999.

XIAOMI Mi 11

A12 Saturday, February 13, 2021

BusinessMirror

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

CJ HOPES BIG TIME AT SMB Q

Roque says MPBL needs JAO for amateur sports

Panlilio

Doha Fiba qualifiers canceled, SBP to bid again to host games

P

RESIDENTIAL spokesman Atty. Harry Roque said in his press briefing on Friday that the Maharlika Pilipinas Basketball League (MPBL) should wait for the release of a joint administrative order (JAO) for amateur sports for the league to resume its stalled 2019-2020 Lakan season.

Roque, also the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Disease (IATF) spokesperson, also said that the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority should also agree with the implementation of the league’s health protocols during the semifinals and championship games under a bubble set up.

“I just told them that the DOH should release first a JAO for amateur sports and the SBMA or the local government unit should agree to implement the health protocols,” Roque told BusinessMirror on Friday.

Roque said that the requirement would be easy for the MPBL. “There’s already a JAO for professional sports and there’s nothing different,” he said. “It’s the same bubble.”

MPBL legal chief Atty. Brando Viernesto said they would wait for the IATF’s directive to the DOH to secure a JAO for amateur sports because they are not the only amateur sports league that are hoping to return to action.

“We are not alone in requesting for exemption—there’s also the volleyball amateur league,” said Viernesto, referring to the Philippine Super Liga which is eyeing a beach volleyball tournament later this month also in Subic.

“Hopefully by March we will resume the games,” Viernesto said.

The MPBL needs to complete the suddendeath semifinal Game Five between the Northern division’s San Juan Knights and Makati City Skyscrappers and the Southern division’s Davao Occidental Tigers and Basilan Steels and the best-of-three finals to wrap up the season. Josef Ramos

Sports

By Josef Ramos

C

CJ PEREZ kisses his daughter as he holds his 2019 Rookie of the Year trophy.

Serena williams is in top form. AP

J PEREZ is oozing with excitement as he braces himself to be working the ball with six-time Most Valuable Player June Mar Fajardo.

He is also looking forward to getting to know his new teammates at San Miguel Beer and hear straight from Head Coach Leo Austria about his role on the team.

But Perez still has to wait some time.

Team training is still prohibited and besides, he has yet to hear from Austria or any of his teammates since he was traded from Terrafirma some two weeks ago.

“It’s going to be exciting to play alongside June Mar,” Perez told BusinessMirror in perhaps his first interview since the trade.

“But I still need to know what my role in my team is. I am willing to play any roles under Coach Leo.” Perez couldn’t be reached while the Philippine Basketball Association’s trade committee scrutinize the trade that sent him from the Dyip to the Beermen in exchange for Russel Escoto, Gelo Alolino and Matt GanuelasRosser and San Miguel Beer’s first round (No. 8) pick in next month’s Rookie Draft and first round

pick in next year’s draft.

He told BusinessMirror his sim card accidentally broke and had to secure a replacement.

But the 2019 Rookie of the Year said he expects himself and his new teammates to be virtualy wearing bullseye signs on their backs.

“That’s expected, we will be the target of all teams,” he said. “But I am really sure we’re going to prepare for it seriously.”

The Beermen failed to extend their domination of the all-Filipino conference in last season’s Philippine Cup at the Clark bubble where Perez was No. 1 in scoring with a 24.3-point average in 11 games he complimented with 6.8 rebounds and 4.2 assists norms.

Perez admitted he was surprised about the trade. “I was surprised but that is what it is,” he said.

The 27-year-old prolific player said that he aims to help San Miguel Beer regain not only the Philippine Cup which Barangay Ginebra San Miguel won, but to a more ambitious grand slam.

“As long as we’re going to be healthy all the time, I think everything is achievable,” he said.

“I will follow their lead and for sure we’re going to work hard for that grand slam.”

San Miguel Beer looked poised at sweeping all three conferences in 2017 and 2019 seasons, but couldn’t achieve the feat its 1989 team under Coach Norman Black achieved.

Perez was with the national pool inside the Inspire Sports Academy bubble in Calamba, Laguna. The team, however, had to break camp after the International Basketball Federation Asia Cup Qualifiers set from February 18 to 22 in Doha, Qatar, was canceled.

“There are things beyond our control,” said the 6-foot-3 Perez, who momentarily left the Laguna bubble to renew his passport. “It’s okay, I got a fresh 10 years with my new passport.”

The break allowed Perez to go home to his native Rizal, Nueva Ecija, and reunite with his family.

ATAR begged off from hosting the International Basketball Federation (Fiba) Asia Cup qualifiers, giving the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas (SBP) fresh hopes of bringing the games back to the Clark bubble.

“Yes,” was SBP President Al Panlilio’s reply when asked by BusinessMirror if the federation would again bid for the qualifiers that it was supposed to host but was also canceled because of travel restrictions.

The SBP, in a statement sent to BusinessMirror on Friday, said it already got a letter from the Fiba, through a letter signed by its Executive Director-Asia Hagop Khajirian, informed on Friday all participating nations in Groups A, B, and E that the Ministry of Public Health in Qatar has ordered to cancel all events because of the increasing cases of Covid-19 in the country.

Doha was supposed to host the games from February 17 to 22.

The SBP was supposed to host the Group B games with South Korea and Indonesia also this month, but travel bans were imposed. The federation was also confident that the Qatar qualifiers would push through and ordered the national pool to undergo training at the Inspire Sports Academy bubble in Calamba.

“We are looking at hosting the games maybe next month, still in Clark,” Panlilio said.

“But the SBP is saddened by the development especially because we know the kind of work that our Gilas Pilipinas men’s pool has done in Calamba,” he said. “The players and coaching staff have all sacrificed so much in this process as they’ve been apart from their families to represent the Philippines against South Korea and Indonesia.”

Panlilio added: “We are hoping that the rise of Covid-19 cases in their country ceases soon.

Although we are saddened by the situation, we also understand the predicament faced by the Qatar Basketball Federation as they had no choice but to follow the mandate of their government.”

“That’s a very sad development because I am personally excited. This is a rare opportunity to represent your country. But it’s for our safety,” Phoenix Super LPG slot man Justin Chua, one of the 20 players inside the bubble, said.

Josef Ramos

FEU hangs tough in Kasparov chessfest

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Serena advances; fans to be banned for 5 days

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ELBOURNE, Australia—If Serena Williams somehow manages to conjure up another on-the-run, back-to-thenet, no-look, over-the-shoulder shot in her next Australian Open match, a local coronavirus flareup means there won’t be any spectators to react with the appreciative applause and yells that greeted this one.

That’s because while Williams was using that bit of magic Friday to help pull off a comeback victory over an opponent who’s 20 years younger, the head of the Victoria state government was announcing a five-day lockdown in response to a Covid-19 outbreak at a hotel.

Competition at the year’s first Grand Slam tournament will be allowed to continue, but no one can attend as of Saturday.

After the pandemic led to the cancellation of Wimbledon, zero fans at the US Open and just 1,000 a day at the French Open in 2020, the government let Tennis Australia admit up to 30,000 daily, 50 percent of normal capacity.

But not anymore.

“It’s going to be a rough few days for, I think, everyone. But we’ll hopefully get through it,” Williams said after beating 19-year-old Anastasia Potapova, 7-6 (5), 6-2, despite 25 unforced errors in the first set alone. “It’s not ideal. It’s been really fun to have the crowd back, especially here. It’s been really cool. But you know what? At the end of the day, we have to do what’s best. Hopefully it will be all right.”

A year ago, Williams dropped just three games against Potapova in the first round. But

then the American was surprised in the third round, her earliest exit in Australia in 14 years.

This time at that stage, Williams—who has won seven of her 23 Grand Slam singles titles in Australia—fell behind in the opening set, which Potapova served for at 5-3. But the 2016 Wimbledon junior champion double-faulted five times in that game, including twice on set point.

Williams then trailed 5-3 in the tiebreaker.

But she took the next four points, the last on a 21-stroke exchange that ended with Potapova putting a forehand into the net.

“I don’t have much experience on those stages. For me, it was an absolutely mental thing. I was over-thinking. I was over-playing.

Over-hitting,” said Potapova, who was visited by a trainer in the second set for what she described as pain between her ribs that made it hard to breathe.

“Respect to Serena. She came back. She just didn’t let it go,” the 101st-ranked Potapova said.

“She kept fighting for each point, for each ball.”

Never more so than shortly after Potapova edged ahead again by breaking to begin the second set.

Williams broke right back with the help of a remarkable get on a lob. After somehow putting her racket on the ball and sending it in the right direction, the 39-year-old paused and smiled, assuming the point was over—and then laughed upon realizing she won the point, because Potapova responded by missing an overhead into the net.

“I mean, that was a great point. Jesus. Very beautiful,” Potapova said with a smile in a video

interview with The Associated Press. “That’s what she does. That’s what makes her be great.”

Up next for Williams is No. 7 seed Aryna Sabalenka, who matched her best Grand Slam showing by reaching the fourth round with a 6-3, 6-1 win over Ann Li. “It’s always, I think, a big challenge to play against these kind of players. But I’m going to do everything I can to get this win,” Sabalenka said. “We’re all here for the wins.”

She’s been accumulating them at quite a pace going back to the end of last season: Sabalenka has won 18 of her past 19 matches.

“She hits very hard. She has a big, big power game,” Williams said about the 22-year-old from Belarus. “She’s a big girl—strong like myself.”

Other women who won included three-time Grand Slam title winner Naomi Osaka, two-time major champion Garbiñe Muguruza, 2019 French Open finalist Marketa Vondrousova and Hsieh Su-wei. In men’s play, 2020 US Open runner-up Alexander Zverev won in straight sets, while No. 18-seeded Grigor Dimitrov advanced when Pablo Carreno retired after losing the first seven games.

A packed night session was scheduled to include eight-time Australian Open champion Novak Djokovic against No. 27 seed Taylor Fritz of the US, reigning US Open champion Dominic Thiem against Nick Kyrgios of Australia, and No. 11 Denis Shapovalov against No. 20 Felix Auger-Aliassime in an all-Canadian matchup, along with contests featuring two-time major champ Simona Halep and reigning French Open champion Iga Swiatek. AP

N underdog Far Eastern University (FEU) bucked all odds and eked out a top 10 finish in the super strong Kasparov Chess Foundation University Cup that was recently staged online.

Darry Bernardo, a member of the national para chess team that finished fifth in the FIDE Olympiad for People with Disability last year, led the Tamaraws’ bid by scoring eighth out of a possible nine points on Board 4 that was highlighted by his shock win over International Master Harshit Raja of the University of Missouri A. FEU team A—also composed of Jeth Romy Morado, Rhenzi Kyle Sevillano, John Merill Jacutina and alternate Kristian Glen Abuton—actually finished tied for seventh with Greece’s National Technical University of Athens A, the United States’ St. Louis University A and Russia’s Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology A with 6.5 points apiece.

But the reigning University Athletic Association of the Philippines champion ended up 10th after the tiebreak.

It was a strong performance nonetheless for a team that competed without a titled player and ranged against a field headed by US powerhouse University of Texas at Rio Grande A, which blew away the opposition with a nine-game title sweep.

UTRGA was led by two Grandmasters Vladimir Fedoseev and Sanan Sjugirov, who combined for 15 points in the tournament that lured 571 players, including 17 GMs, 11 IMs, 16 FIDE Masters, one Woman GM and four Woman FM from 125 teams from 24 countries.

“We are so fortunate that despite of the pandemic, the FEU Sports programs continue especially in chess. We owe our success to FEU management,” said national women’s and FEU Coach GM Jayson Gonzales, who thanked FEU Chairman Aurelio Montinola III and Athletic Director Mark Molina for their support.

Gonzales said his team would see action in the FIDE World University Online Chess Championship slated March 13 to 27.

University of Missouri A placed second with 7.5 points, Texas Tech University A third with 7.0 and University of Texas Dallas A, a team coached by Filipino GM Julio Catalino Sadorra, fourth with 7.0 points.

Indonesia’s Gunadarma University was fifth while England’s University of Cambridge was sixth each with 7.0 points.

FEU Diliman B ended up 18th, FEU Diliman A 28th, FEU Manila C 39th, FEU Diliman C 54th, FEU Diliman D 73rd and FEU Manila D 77th.

Stealing some of the thunder from big guns were UAAP MVP Shania Mae Mendoza and young April Joy Claros and Lemmuel Adena.

Mendoza, a many-time World Chess Olympiad veteran, finished with 7.5 points out of nine and the 13-year-old Claros, the best Filipino finisher who made the quarterfinals of the World Youth and Cadet Championship last year, finished undefeated with seven wins and two draws.

Adena, a 13-year-old eighth-grader, upset GM Hovhannes Gabuzyan of UTRGB.

MORI RESIGNS BUT GENDER ISSUES REMAIN

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OKYO—Yoshiro Mori resigned Friday as the president of the Tokyo Olympic organizing committee following sexist comments implying women talk too much.

“As of today I will resign from the president’s position,” he said to open an executive board and council meeting. The board was expected to pick his successor later on Friday. Mori was appointed in 2014, just months after Tokyo won the bid to host the Olympics.

“My inappropriate comments have caused a lot of chaos,”he said. He repeated several times he had regret over the remarks, but also said he had “no intention of neglecting women.”

Mori’s departure comes after more than a week of non-stop criticism about his remarks earlier this month. He initially apologized but refused to step away, which was followed by relentless pressure from television pundits, sponsors, and an online petition that drew 150,000 signatures.

But it’s not clear that his resignation will clear the air and return the focus to exactly how

Tokyo can hold the Olympics in just over five months in the midst of a pandemic.

The Olympics are to open on July 23, with 11,000 athletes and 4,400 more in the Paralympic a month later. About 80 percent in recent polls in Japan say they want the Olympics canceled or postponed with clear support about 15 percent.

Early reports said the 83-year-old Mori had picked 84-year-old Saburo Kawabuchi, the former president of the governing body of Japanese soccer and a former player himself. He played for Japan in the 1964 Olympics.

Kawabuchi is even older than Mori and will raise the issue of why a woman was not appointed. This is the center of the entire debate that Mori triggered over gender inequality in Japan and the absence of women in boardrooms, politics, and sports governance. Women are also largely absence in leadership roles at the organizing committee. AP

YOSHIRO MORI: My inappropriate comments have caused a lot of chaos. AP