BusinessMirror July 11, 2021

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DEFENSE Secretary Delfin Lorenzana (third from left) and Batanes Governor Marilou Cayco (in PPE suit) lead military officials in paying honors to the flag at the ceremony opening the desalination plant on Mavulis Island, Itbayat, Batanes. NOLCOM

Govt, through the AFP, builds essential infra in Batanes Group of Islands for human habitation

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By Rene Acosta

The operation of a desalination plant followed the construction of a fishermen’s shelter complete with a fish-drying facility that was being powered by a 1.2-kilowatt solar photovoltaic system. A military detachment was also put in place.

HE Philippine government is fortifying its claim, ownership and human occupation of key islands and features over the country’s northern and “last frontier” through the implementation of several projects intended to spur development.

Harnessing the power of the sun

OFFICIALS holding glasses test whether the desalination plant really turns out potable water at the inauguration of the facility on Mavulis Island, Itbayat, Batanes. From left to right are the Armed Forces chief of staff General Cirilito Sobejana, Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana, Batanes Governor Marilou Cayco, Lt. Gen. Arnulfo Marcelo Burgos Jr. and Naval Forces Northern Luzon commander Commodore Caesar Bernard Valencia. NOLCOM

GOOGLE MAPS

The first ‘settlers’

On Mavulis Island in the Batanes Group of Islands, which lies at the end of the country’s northern waters, several construction projects have been completed, with the end goal of encouraging human habitation from the villagers of Batanes.

Beyond populating these territories, the bigger objective, however, is for the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) to keep and secure these, owing to their strategic military importance amid recorded Chinese military activities in adjoining and surrounding waters.

PESO EXCHANGE RATES n US 49.8700

“WE treat Mavulis Island and its waters as the northern fortification of our government’s seat of power and one of the primary and key sources of food and economy for our country and people,” Lt. Gen. Arnulfo Marcelo Burgos Jr., commander of the AFP-Northern Luzon Command (Nolcom), said.

“As such, despite the limitations, these waters are given utmost importance in such a way that assets and resources are equitably distributed to ensure that we have credible defense posture,” he added.

The Nolcom holds operational jurisdiction over the vast maritime waters in the northern portion of the country, including the 11 island chains in the Batanes Group of Islands.

Two months ago, a desalina-

tion plant capable of producing 500 gallons a day of potable water drawn from the sea was constructed and installed on Mavulis island, primarily to support the troops who have been stationed there along with the fishermen who occasionally seek shelter in between their fishing trips.

“We are developing the island, both for economic and security reasons, first, by constructing projects that would support its habitation,” said Burgos.

For years, the government, especially the provincial and local governments of Batanes and Itbayat, has been encouraging Ivatans, or the natives of Batanes, especially fishermen, to settle in the 4-square-kilometer jagged island because of the richness of its waters, but no one has

seriously taken the call.

There were some villagers who attempted to settle there, only to leave the area because it cannot support human habitation, leaving behind their livestock, some of which have gone feral.

Unwanted visitors

AS the island was deserted and no soldier was around, it instead supported the visits of Chinese, Vietnamese and Taiwanese poachers, who frequently came to rest and hunt the animals. On the water, Filipino fishermen simply could not compete with the much bigger boats of the intruders.

The military began to check this by slowly establishing its presence through the conduct of maritime patrols and deployment of soldiers.

THE Nolcom said the Department of Energy (DOE) has also scheduled an on-site survey of the island as part of the plan to energize it with the use of solar power.

The development of Mavulis is also benefitting the other islands, especially the town of Itbayat, where there is already a permanent presence of soldiers. The deployment of soldiers ran parallel with the stepped-up development activities in the municipality, also being undertaken with the help of the troops.

Last month, Burgos visited the naval detachment in the area to celebrate Father’s Day with the soldiers and he was welcomed by Itbayat Mayor Ronald Gutierrez, who encouraged regular visits by military officials.

Gutierrez said the presence of soldiers and the regular patrol of Nolcom’s assets in the waters off Itbayat have prevented the intrusion of foreign vessels, which were a regular fixture in the past.

On Pagasa Island, the DOE has also energized the island by switching on its 300-kilowatt power plant last month to supply power to the structures there, including the municipal government, houses and military facilities.

The installation of a power system followed the construction of the island’s beaching ramp and port, which, according to Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana, were part of the island’s development.

Lorenzana said the government plans to undertake a variety of projects on the island, including the construction and maintenance of an ice plant and a radio station.

n JAPAN 0.4544 n UK 68.7558 n HK 6.4201 n CHINA 7.6829 n SINGAPORE 36.8834 n AUSTRALIA 37.0484 n EU 59.0810 n SAUDI ARABIA 13.2969

Source: BSP (July 9, 2021)

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A2 Sunday, July 11, 2021

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Shipping chaos kills 1,800 cows, fueling calls for animal transport ban

By K Oanh Ha & Kevin Varley

I

Bloomberg News

N late December, some 1,800 bulls left Spain for Turkey aboard a ship called the Elbeik. The trip was supposed to take around 11 days, then the cattle were to be sold, mostly to halal slaughterhouses, where they’d be killed with minimal suffering, as required by religious law.

At least it would have been swift. For the next three months, as the pandemic began to wreak havoc on global shipping, the vessel failed to unload its cargo, and the animals began to starve, according to an investigation by the Spanish government. Nearly 10 percent of the bulls died, their corpses thrown overboard or left to fester in the pens among the living.

When the Elbeik returned to Spain, authorities ruled its remaining 1,600 animals were too sick to sell and had to be put down.

The Elbeik has become Exhibit A in the mounting case to ban the controversial, $18-billion crossborder trade in live animals. The pandemic has worsened conditions for the roughly 2 billion cows, sheep, goats, pigs and chickens that are exported each year, and epidemiologists have joined the calls for reform. Animals have been stuck in transit far longer than expected and safety inspections have been dramatically curtailed. With new sensitivity to risks that diseased

animals can pose to humans, a growing number of countries are limiting or phasing out the practice altogether.

“When it comes to animal welfare, transport by sea is a big black hole,” said Thomas Waitz, an organic farmer from Austria who is a European parliamentary representative on a committee charged with updating the rules for the crossborder shipping of animals. “Ship transports completely fall outside of any regulations or animal-welfare standards. Public health is at risk if animals are transported in conditions where germs and bacteria can flourish.”

The EU, which accounts for more than 75 percent of the world’s live animal exports, is “incapable of guaranteeing animal welfare,” according to a report commissioned by the committee, which is expected to recommend a new, tighter set of regulations for exporters by the end of the year. The UK has gone further, planning to ban the transport of live animals

A THREE-TRAILER road train loads live cattle for export by ship to Asia, at the western Australian port of Wyndham in the Kimberley region. JOHNCARNEMOLLA | DREAMSTIME.COM

for slaughter altogether, though it hasn’t set a date yet. New Zealand in April said it will phase out trade in live animals by 2023.

Some 39 million tons of meat were exported globally in 2019, most of it slaughtered, packaged and frozen or chilled beforehand— a process that’s more lucrative for meat producers and avoids the health and safety issues of transporting live animals.

The Halal factor

BUT as consumers in countries like China and Vietnam have grown wealthier, they’ve added more meat

and dairy to their diets, ramping up demand for breed stock and dairy animals. The robust market for Halal meat among devout Muslims also means demand has spiked in recent years. Prices for live cattle from Australia are at record highs.

Even in normal times, live animals are considered cargo, and a ship full of sheep is more or less treated the same as one full of wool sweaters as far as most port authorities and shipping industry regulators are concerned.

“We don’t look at the cargo or animal welfare,” said Maarten Vlag, secretary of the Paris maritime coalition that oversees ports from the UK to Russia. “We look if the ship is overloaded because that affects seaworthiness, but it makes no difference if it’s 10,000 containers or 10,000 animals.”

Meanwhile, thousands of livestock have been lost at sea. This spring, in addition to the cattle on the Elbeik, another 800 bulls on a ship to Turkey also had to be put down. Last year, nearly 6,000 cattle and more than 40 crew members died when their ship lost an engine and sank off the coast of Japan. In 2019, 14,000 sheep drowned in a shipping accident in a Romanian port, a livestock carrier caught fire while berthed in Greece, and another ran aground near Turkey.

The ordeal of the cattle on the Elbeik was so horrific that Spain’s agriculture ministry referred the case to prosecutors at the national court.

The ship’s owner, Ibrahim Maritime Ltd., couldn’t be reached after several phone attempts and didn’t respond to text messages through a representative in Lebanon.

In the EU, veterinary inspectors at the ports check vessels to make sure they’re fit for animal transport. They also approve the loading of animals onto the ships.

The report for the European Parliament’s transportation committee found that port inspectors and veterinarian authorities don’t share a communication platform.

Veterinary authorities don’t seem to use the database for vessel deficiencies and “therefore approve very substandard vessels to carry live animals,” it found.

Finding the vets

IF the animals get sick, there may not be anyone to tend to them.

Only Australia requires veterinarians on board if the voyage is expected to take longer than 10 days. The EU is considering a similar rule. Animal welfare advocates say there should be vets on all voyages. Even if the trip is supposed to be swift, delays happen—and the global pandemic has only made them worse.

Meanwhile, Australia has suspended its independent oversight of live animal shipping. In addition to the veterinary requirement, the government has since 2018 placed observers aboard on long journeys to ensure animals have adequate water, feed and ventilation. Out of concern for Covid risks and other logistical considerations, agricul-

ture secretary Andrew Metcalfe told legislators that observers probably won’t be back for at least another year.

“This is an inherently risky trade with no transparency,” said Shatha Hamade, legal counsel for Animals Australia, which has also had to suspend its own in-person animal welfare investigations this year. “Now regulators are back to a system where they’re checking up on the industry from computer screens and paperwork.”

Still, Australia is the only country that requires animal exporters to have in place a traceable supply chain that tracks livestock from the moment when they get on the ships all the way to the overseas slaughterhouses to ensure they are handled and, ultimately, killed humanely.

That level of standard raises costs substantially for Australian exporters, said John Klepec, executive chairman of Wellard Ltd. The Australian publicly listed company got out of the animal export business two years ago because it had become unprofitable and is now exclusively chartering its purposebuilt livestock carriers.

“It’s not a level playing field,” said Klepec. “We’re competing against ships from developing countries that don’t face the same standards. They can put as many animals on that can fit. We have to bear the brunt of the extra costs of regulation.”

During the pandemic, maritime inspections of livestock carriers have fallen more than 30 percent, according to a Bloomberg analysis of publicly available data.

Many countries haven’t allowed inspectors to board ships because of Covid concerns, said Vlag of the European maritime agency.

Even so, livestock carriers continue to face rates of detention far higher than vessels used for other industries. In Asian and European ports, some 9 percent of ships carrying animals in 2020 had deficiencies severe enough to delay their departure—more than double the rate for the next-biggest offenders.

Because there’s very little public information about the health of the animals on board, experts look to the conditions of the boat as a partial proxy, said Sue Foster, a veterinarian and spokeswoman for Vets Against Live Exports. “If the mechanics on board a ship aren’t working properly, it can interfere with food and water delivery or whether the ship is ventilated properly so the animals don’t get heat stressed.”

Most livestock vessels are old, converted to carry animals at the end of their run, said Vlag. That also puts the cargo at risk. “Fifty-year-old ships are hard to maintain, let alone find the spare parts that no one manufactures anymore.”

Of the 78 vessels approved by the EU for livestock transport, 53 have been detained three or more times for serious violations of the Paris MoU, according to a report released in June by the Animal Welfare Foundation.

The Elbeik, for example, is 54 years old and was previously found lacking. In an inspection in January 2020, it was cited for cracked beams, floors and windows as well as other safety violations. Six months later, inspectors found eight new deficiencies, including problems with the engine, steering and weathertightness.

Before the mass euthanasia on the Elbeik, the official veterinary report found that iron pipes in the pens of the ship were broken or had rusted areas with sharp elements that may have scratched or hurt the cattle. The pipes that supplied drinking water to the animals leaked.

The report also concluded that the animals on board had suffered.

It cited eye, skin and motor issues in the bulls, as well as weight loss leading in extreme cases to cachexia, a disorder that causes muscles wasting. “Some of these cachectic animals were in a state of stupor, unable to open their eyes or respond to stimuli,” the vet wrote.

As it is, more than half of the livestock vessels operating in the EU “pose a threat to animal welfare, health and safety,” according to a 2020 report on live animal transport. And although there are veterinarians that approve ships to load animals, they’re primarily concerned with the health of the livestock. They may not even have access to ship inspection records.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization has said live animal transport is “ideally suited for spreading disease.” Animals from different herds are confined in stressful environments, often with poor ventilation. Eventually, that’s bad for humans, too. While the origins of Covid-19 remain murky, it’s indisputable that animals have diseases that can transfer to people, and epidemiologists have been among the loudest critics of live animal export.

Best thing for animals

STILL, industry trade groups including the Australian Livestock Exporters’ Council said current regulations are adequate and the threat to public health isn’t any greater than conditions found on farms.

Australia exported more than 2.3 million livestock in 2019-20; after picking up the trade that New Zealand is set to ban, the nation’s industry will be worth an estimated $1.9 billion.

“No other country has the rigorous assurance system that we have in place for animal welfare,” said Mark Harvey-Sutton, chief executive officer of the Australian Livestock Exporters’ Council, an advocacy group for exporters. “Our desire is that more governments meet the Australian standards.

That’s the best thing for the animals being transported.”

Australia also requires exporters to record daily mortality rates and notify agriculture authorities if animals die at a rate higher than 0.5 percent per voyage, or at least three animals. In 2020, Australia exported more than 1 million live cattle by sea and ships reported a total mortality rate of 0.11 percent, or about 1,224 animals, according to government data.

Mortality statistics are only the most extreme evidence of animal suffering, said Foster of Vets Against Live Exports. “Animals are huffing and puffing for days because of heat stress, they haven’t eaten or they’re covered in sores.

That’s suffering and animal cruelty, but they’re not dead,” she said.

“It’s difficult to know when boats are going, where they’re going to and what’s on board. It’s an industry that’s shrouded in secrecy and a lack of transparency.”

Waitz, the European parliament member, agrees. He recently was in Cartagena, Spain, where he observed cattle being beaten and kicked as they were being loaded onto a ship. On visits to other European ports, Waitz has been barred from the vessels entirely.

“They’re probably afraid of what we might see,” he said.

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

TheWorld

Do-it-all central banks risk rates flexibility in new expanded roles

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entral bankers are engaged in the most sweeping rethink of their role in decades, spurred by the success of tight collaboration with governments in countering the pandemic crisis and a new political reality of increased demands on monetary policy-makers.

The Federal Reserve, European Central Bank and emerging market counterparts like Bank Indonesia are among those that enabled fiscal authorities to ramp up emergency spending without driving borrowing costs up, through large-scale bond purchases.

As the crisis recedes, many policy-makers favor keeping their expanded role in shaping economies and even broadening it further—to incorporate social goals such as climate change and curbing inequality. The new pact has been enabled by sustained low inflation in recent years, any change to which could again shift policy-makers’ views.

As governments expand social safety nets, the growing public debt loads will make it challenging for central banks to shrink their balance sheets or attempt to return interest rates to pre-crisis levels.

The new approach in one sense takes central banks back to their original mission more than a century ago, which focused more on the economy than on consumer prices.

“We are very far removed from the political economy of the 1980s and 1990s that prized delegating power to central bankers to quash inflation,” said Sarah Binder, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. “In the wake of the financial crisis and pandemic, and political demands for more activist central banks, they have returned to their roots—fighting crises and helping to restore economic growth.”

Benefits from more active central banks could include higher sustained employment over time, along with greater progress on nurturing green finance. But some caution that a greater political role could make it harder for monetary policy-makers to tighten their stance in the face of escalating inflation or asset-bubble risks.

For now, central bankers seem happy about their partnership with big-spending governments and broadened objectives. Deutsche Bank AG analysts note a jump in mentions of “inequality” in speeches by central bankers, a shift from their previous focus on inflation.

“Recent years have seen central banks increasingly enter the debate on numerous other topics including fiscal policy, social justice, race, gender issues, climate change and inequality,” Deutsche Bank analysts wrote earlier this week. “It does show how central bank power and influence has changed and also how they seem to be giving governments cover to spend on these issues.”

Expansive ECB

In the euro zone, the ECB on Thursday joined the Fed and BOJ in tweaking its policy to provide for an overshooting of its inflation target for a time. It also incorporated climate change into its policy framework, days before the BOJ is set to unveil a climate-focused lending initiative.

ECB President Christine Lagarde has lauded the symbiotic relationship between monetary and fiscal policy during the crisis, as the 19 governments in the currency bloc spent record sums on protecting companies and workers from the pandemic fallout. Fed Chair Jerome Powell also was a reliable advocate for US lawmakers who wanted to ramp up fiscal aid during the pandemic. Borrowing costs were held down even as the government deployed an unprecedented scale of emergency spending, thanks to the Fed’s mammoth asset purchases.

The Fed’s 2020 emergency credit programs reached far beyond the bank and market support of the 2008 crisis and were extended to municipalities, large corporations, and even Main Street businesses.

‘Tenuous’ endgame

Taimur Baig, the Singapore-based chief economist at DBS Bank Ltd. who previously worked at the International Monetary Fund, said there is scope for central banks to do more on a continuing basis. There’s logic in looking at climate change, given that it does have a financial stability element, he said.

But Baig worries about what happens when it comes time to wind back the pandemic-era monetary largesse.

“The exit or endgame looks rather tenuous,” said Baig, who also previously served at the Monetary Authority of Singapore. As central banks move “deeper into the fiscal sphere,” there’s the risk that they become “paralyzed if they fear market and political repercussions from selling bonds,” he said.

Not all central banks have embraced new roles. Those in Mexico and Brazil didn’t mount the type of extraordinary asset purchases during the pandemic seen elsewhere, for example. And some have already raised interest rates to address inflation risks.

Political pressure

But political interests are coming to bear in some locations nonetheless.

Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador ruled out a second term for central bank Governor Alejandro Diaz de Leon, saying he wanted an economist “with a social dimension—one who is in favor of a moral economy.”

After the Bank of Korea made preparations to raise interest rates amid plans by South Korea’s government to keep fiscal stimulus rolling, Finance Minister Hong Nam-ki held an unusual meeting with Governor Lee Ju-yeol. The July 2 breakfast meeting produced an agreement that fiscal and monetary policies should complement each other, according to a joint statement.

Monetary authorities know they exist by political consensus. If the consensus is shifting, they have to be part of the dialogue or risk losing their jobs. “There is always this challenge of striking the right balance between cooperation, coordination and lack of independence,” Bank of Thailand Governor Sethaput Suthiwartnarueput said in a June 24 interview.

‘Extraordinary junction’

In Indonesia, President Joko Widodo said in an April interview that he supports legislation that would expand the central bank’s mandate to include job creation and sustainable economic growth.

The central bank already has demonstrated a role in longer-term growth even though it’s not part of its official mandate, Bank of Indonesia Governor Perry Warjiyo said in a briefing last month.

For all the leaning in to progressive agendas, Paul Tucker, a former deputy governor of the Bank of England, points out that it was high inflation that destroyed center-left governments politically in the past, and led to central bank independence in the first place.

It’s “been strange not to hear more about the priority of keeping longer term inflation expectations anchored whatever happens in the shorterrun, since that is the point of being independent from day-to-day politics,” said Tucker, now a senior fellow at Harvard University. Monetary-fiscal cooperation can’t come at the cost of “losing credibility for price stability and financial stability,” he said.

“We are certainly at an extraordinary junction” in central banking, Tucker concluded. Bloomberg News

BusinessMirror

Sunday, July 11, 2021

A3

Singapore trader alarmed some banks long before his arrest

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he trader charged with orchestrating what police describe as one of Singapore’s biggest suspected investment frauds began setting off alarm bells at banks more than a year before his arrest in February, according to people familiar with the matter.

Ng Yu Zhi’s unusually large cash transfers from his trading company to his personal account prompted Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp. to file suspicious transaction reports to police as far back as 2019, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing private information.

The bank shut the personal account in August 2020. Ng’s corporate account at United Overseas Bank Ltd. was closed more than a year before the 34-year-old was arrested, one of the people said.

The previously unreported timeline raises fresh questions about how Ng could have maintained an alleged S$1.46 billion ($1.08 billion) fraud for so long.

Even as OCBC and UOB cut ties with the trader, other banks including DBS Group Holdings Ltd. and CIMB Group Holdings Bhd. still had relationships with him at the time he was charged, people familiar with the matter said. Ng continued accepting money from wealthy Singaporeans until his arrest, enticing them with purported investment gains that averaged 15 percent a quarter.

Prosecutors and court-appointed judicial managers of Ng’s companies allege that he was in fact fabricating trades and misappropriating client money to finance a S$2-million-a-month spending h abit t h at i nc luded pr iv ate jet travel, a personal butler and nightclub outings. A ll told, Ng funneled about S$475 million from his companies—Env y Asset Management and Env y Global Trading—into his personal accounts, according to an interim report from the judicial

managers led by Bob Yap of K PMG LLP, who have proposed liquidation for the firms.

Ng’s case has riveted Singapore’s moneyed elite and thrust a spotlight on the challenges of developing effective early warning systems for fraud even in the most advanced financial centers. Assets under management in Singapore swelled by 17 percent last year to a record $3.5 trillion.

“For international financial centers, the difficulty in detecting financial scams may be exacerbated due to the sheer volume and complexity of transactions,” said Nizam Ismail, founder of Singapore-based Etikom Consultancy, which advises firms on compliance.

Ng, who has been out on bail, has yet to enter a plea and his lawyer didn’t respond to an e-mail seeking comment. “It is inappropriate to comment on ongoing police investigations,” a spokesperson for Singapore’s police department said.

Spokespeople at CIMB and OC B C dec l i ned to com ment on N g ’s a c c o u n t s . L o r e t t a Y u e n , OC BC ’s g roup head of lega l a nd regulator y compliance, said t ra n sac t ion s t h at a re fou nd to be su spic iou s or u nu su a l a re re por ted to t he aut hor it ies.

A DBS spokesperson said the bank maintains “robust systems” and controls to identif y and report suspicious transactions. “We cooperate fully w ith law enforcement efforts, and this includes account freezing and property seizures,” the spokesperson said. “As a matter of policy, we do not comment on cases under investigation.”

Corporate accounts

DBS filed suspicious transaction reports to Singapore police on Ng’s corporate accounts and was in the process of closing them before he was arrested, a person familiar with the matter said. Ng allegedly misappropriated at least S$201 million from Envy Global Trading’s account at DBS, according to charge sheets seen by Bloomberg.

HSBC Holdings Plc, where Ng had a personal account, also filed STRs between 2019 and 2020, a person familiar said. The police later froze Ng’s personal account at HSBC, people familiar with the matter said, without specifying when that happened.

An HSBC spokesman declined to comment on Ng’s accounts but said the bank has measures in place to spot suspicious transactions. A UOB representative declined to comment.

A spokesman for Malayan Banking Bhd., which is listed in the judicial managers’ report among banks that dealt with Ng’s companies, also declined to comment. The report showed no money in the Maybank account, suggesting it had been closed, although the timing wasn’t clear.

The judicial managers have described the pattern of transactions in Ng’s accounts as “highly unusual.”

Between July 2020 and February 2021, there were about 150 transfers a month, on average, from Envy corporate accounts to Ng’s personal ones, according to an interim report by the judicial managers in May. Globa l banks are required by most major financial centers, including Singapore, to alert authorities to suspect activity v ia suspicious transaction reports. These so-called STRs can help expose possible fraud, but they’re not always easy to analyze quick ly given the high volume of reports, according to Oonagh van den Berg, managing director of Virtual R isk Solutions in Hong Kong, a consultancy firm that offers adv isor y and training ser v ices on compliance.

Investor alert In Singapore alone, about 33,571 STRs were filed on average each year from 2016 and 2019, according

to data from the Commercial A ffairs Department, the white-collar unit of the Singapore Police Force.

“Generally banks are risk averse, and would err on the side of caution” when it comes to filing a STR, said Chenthil Kumarasingam, a partner at law firm Withers KhattarWong. “This is understandable given the rigorous regulatory oversight in Singapore.”

Ng had appeared on authorities’ radar for a different reason as early as March 2020. That’s when the Monetary Authority of Singapore put Envy Asset Management on its “Investor Alert List,” which highlights companies that have been wrongly perceived as being licensed by the regulator.

The alert did little to deter some investors, however, in part because Ng distributed a letter from a top Singapore law firm, Allen & Gledhill LLP, expressing its opinion that Envy Asset didn’t need to be licensed by MAS because it wasn’t providing a fund management service as defined by the regulator, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Ng was also honoring withdrawal requests, giving clients little reason to suspect wrongdoing, another person said. As for banks, they aren’t required to stop dealing with entities on the investor alert list.

MAS said in a response to questions from Bloomberg this month that it received “additional information” on Ng’s companies between May and September 2020 and subsequently sent its findings to the police. Allen & Gledhill said in an e-mailed reply that the firm’s advice was addressed only to Envy Asset and Envy Global, and not to be relied upon by anyone else. “We did not advise on Envy’s credit standing or the suitability of its products for investors,” the firm said. “We are not able to comment further due to client confidentiality.”

Ng’s companies had six bank accounts holding about $7.9 million as of April 30, according to the judicial managers’ report. About 86 percent of that was in four accounts at DBS, with the remainder at CIMB. At least S$282.2 million of cash that investors gave to Ng’s companies remains unaccounted for, the prosecutors have said in affidavits. Bloomberg News

ECB strikes classic compromise to set terms of inflation debate

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he European Central Bank’s biggest strategic rethink since the creation of the euro sets the terms of engagement for a half decade of post-pandemic monetary debates—even if it stops short of signaling much about future policy.

The outcome that President Christine Lagarde unveiled on Thursday raises the inflation target and specifically acknowledges that it might need a temporary overshoot. That’s a win for doves on the Governing Council.

But it was also careful to portray that leeway as a special situation—albeit one that the euro zone has been in for years—when interest rates are so low that “especially forceful” monetary stimulus is needed to revive price pressures. That’s a win for the hawks, such as at Germany’s Bundesbank, who don’t want extraordinary measures to be used in normal times.

Granting both sides of the ECB’s policy spectrum devices to argue their case on the economic outlook underscores how the institution’s rethink is ultimately a technocratic version of the classic European compromise that has long characterized the region’s politics.

It means the strategy review became an exercise in ambiguity and discretion rather than the more rigid framework it might have produced. In return, Lagarde secured unanimous agreement, and a foundation of consensus for the next phase of policy that may clean the slate after years of bad-tempered decision-making under

her predecessor, Mario Draghi.

“With Lagarde’s ECB, it’s always a compromise, there’s something for everyone,” said Marco Valli, head of macro research at UniCredit Bank.

“We have always seen that the ECB in the end does the right thing. It just takes them longer to get there than other central banks.”

That argument is highlighted by the fact that the review ended almost a year after the Federal Reserve concluded its own reappraisal. That exercise resulted in a commitment to target average inflation of 2 percent—a step too far for its euro-zone peers.

The ECB opted for “symmetry” around its goal instead, meaning “negative and positive revisions of inflation from the target are equally undesirable.”

“This is such a subtle difference, and you have to know Lagarde a little bit to know maybe they needed to have this giveaway to the Bundesbank and the hawks,” said Agnes Belaisch, chief European strategist at Barings.

Consensus builder The task Lagarde faced was daunting, with the ECB never really having comprehensively taken stock of its approach to managing an economy, which had clearly evolved considerably since the fledgling currency region was created in 1999.

With the institution forced to take the lead in repeated crisis battles, philosophical disagreements had festered

on the Governing Council, culminating in a decision where Draghi pushed through stimulus against the wishes of governors representing much of the euro zone’s core.

Only Lagarde’s new presidency in 2019 allowed a hiatus to take hold, buying time for a review she inaugurated that grants a combination of concessions to policy-makers and citizens alike.

The new 2-percent inflation target is higher than the “close to, but below 2 percent” that it used to be, giving doves an allowance for more price growth than before. There’s also the acknowledgment that a “transitory period” above the goal can be tolerated.

“In theory this makes a continuation of the current ultra-accommodative monetary policy even more likely and pushes the prospect of any policy rate rises further into the future,” Simon Wells, an economist at HSBC Holdings Plc, said in a report. Still, “all in all, we don’t see today’s announcement as significantly changing the near-term policy outlook.”

“After years of undershooting the target and predicting an acceleration of inflation that never materialized, the Governing Council will wait until it sees evidence of higher inflation before starting to withdraw stimulus rather than purely relying on the staff economist’s medium-term forecasts,” said Bloomberg’s economists David Powell and Maeva Cousin.

Impor t a nt ly for t he l i kes of Bundesbank officials though, the

possibility of an inflation overshoot is framed within the context of “when the economy is operating close to the lower bound on nominal interest rates.” Or in other words, when interest rates are so low that further cuts would be ineffective—as now.

The ECB’s acknowledgment of the need to include owner-occupied housing costs in assessing consumer prices also helps the hawks, at least as long as ultralow interest rates are pushing up home prices. JPMorgan economists reckon such costs would currently add as much as 0.3 percentage points to core inflation.

“What I think is really important is the extent to which they are open to embrace the flexibility that they deployed in the crisis and make this a more permanent feature of their tools,” said UniCredit’s Valli.

For citizens, meanwhile, the ECB’s review places the institution at the vanguard of climate-change policy making for financial markets. That’s a regional response to concerns that mirrors the emphasis of the European Union’s new recovery fund and seeks to quell angst that has been displayed in demonstrations on the streets of its Frankfurt home—and on its roof.

Policy-makers approved the compromise unanimously, but if anyone is left dissatisfied, there’s even reason for comfort there: the ECB won’t wait so long for its next strategy review, with officials announcing that the next one should begin in 2025.

Bloomberg News

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Sunday, July 11, 2021

TheWorld BusinessMirror

China’s Didi Global crackdown is all about controlling big data

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hortly after Beijing’s shock cyber-security probe into Didi Global Inc., Chinese social-media users furiously passed around a 2015 story on the Uber-like app that showed what might be spooking President Xi Jinping.

Screenshots circulated of a breezy state media report on a Didi study that revealed how bureaucrats used the company’s services on two sweltering July days in Beijing. Using playful charts, it showed that traffic at the Ministry of Public Security was among the busiest, while China’s anti-corruption agency was relatively quiet.

At the time, it looked like an innocuous peek at the potential of Big Data to make the government more efficient. Yet six years later it clearly shows the risk that an outside party—and perhaps foreign spies—could glean valuable intelligence from Didi about some of the country’s most important officials.

Didi’s listing in the US last week came just as Xi is looking for ways to control the vast reams of data held by China’s tech giants, in part to ensure the Communist Party spreads the wealth beyond a small circle of billionaires. That scrutiny awoke regulators in Beijing to the threat posed by private companies, prompting them to ban Didi from signing up new users days after it conducted the secondbiggest American initial public offering for a Chinese company.

More broad ly, the crackdow n shows how big data is quickly turning into the next major battleground in a clash of superpowers, with implications that potentially could reshape the global economy for decades to come. With the US lobbying other nations to prevent China from obtaining technology like advanced computer chips and Xi undertaking a national project to develop them, stringent data security controls risk further disrupting supply chains, balkanizing financial markets and forcing countries to pick sides.

While neither the US nor China say they want economic decoupling, failure to come to terms on what data can safely be shared could suddenly turn any “smart device” into a security risk. Still, the costs of failing to reach some sort of deal are high: China risks losing access to deep capital markets abroad that can finance its push for technological superiority, while US companies could find themselves cut off from investing in one of the world’s top growth engines.

“We are in a moment where security concerns have taken precedence, due in part to changing geopolitical dynamics, as well as the ‘unknowns’ surrounding data-driven technologies,” said Tom Nunlist, a policy analyst at Beijing-based Trivium China, which advises businesses. “The trade-off, broadly speaking, is that the focus on protection will slow down economic

and technological development. The question is how the US and China will navigate—and negotiate—the trade-off.”

Perhaps more than any other major country, China has sought to harness the potential of data to transform its economy. Some projections show China will hold a third of the world’s data by 2025, potentially giving it a big competitive advantage in areas like artificial intelligence that need lots of information to fine-tune algorithms and improve services.

For Xi, harnessing that data is key to maintaining political control. Not only can he use it to feed a vast surveillance state to snuff out dissent, but he’s also looking to create a market for data to unleash its value throughout the broader economy. That includes pouring $1.4 trillion into digital infrastructure like server centers, preparing laws regulating data use and seeking to strong-arm tech giants into sharing their enormous databases.

His challenge is doing all that without stifling the innovation that created more wealth over the past decade than any other sector.

“There’s been a lot of lip service in China about the power of data to drive growth into the future,” said Carly Ramsey, a Shanghai-based director with international consulting firm Control Risks. “But the question is how do you walk that fine line between control and development of using data. I don’t know if China has figured that out.”

The Communist Party is just now expressing alarm at how all that data could be used by its adversaries. The expansion of cyber-security probes beyond Didi to two other companies that recently listed in the US—Full Truck Alliance Co., a similar service for trucks, and Kanzhun Ltd., which owns an online recruitment platform— showed broader concerns about data falling into the wrong hands.

Even to experts, it’s not exactly clear why China views US listings as a data security threat, particularly given US intelligence agencies already have the ability to spy on communications around the globe.

In orders from Beijing this week, the State Council and Cyberspace Administration of China didn’t specify what information might be exposed through f loats on overseas bourses.

The main trigger appears to be US legislation passed last year that would allow the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board to review audits of large Chinese firms from Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. to Baidu Inc. that trade on American exchanges. Beijing

officials have been vocal about the potential national security threat from allowing US regulators to pore over internal company documents and accounts—and they don’t appear worried about the long-term financial consequences of shunning America.

“While China hawks in Washington are seeking to deny China access to US listings, Beijing is confident that there is more than enough money around the globe chasing returns to meet all their funding requirements while playing by China’s rules,” said Graham Allison, a professor at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, who wrote “Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides’s Trap?”

One major Chinese concern is that the US disclosure rules could result in a data leak that provides more detailed information on the world’s secondbiggest economy than official releases.

“Such data could directly or indirectly reflect the population distribution, business hot spots, population flow, freight flow, and business operation,” Li Keshun, deputy head of a big data lab in the coastal province of Jiangsu, was quoted as saying in an article published this week by the Communist Party’s top disciplinary body.

The warning was similar to one published in a Chinese academic journal in January: “With the free f low of data, one country could do an accurate profiling of the social situation of another country as well as targeted intelligence collection and analysis, thus threatening the latter’s national security.”

The US, for its part, is also concerned about how China could weaponize big data. President Donald Trump last year banned ByteDance Ltd.’s TikTok and Tencent Holdings Ltd.’s WeChat over similar fears, with Secretary of State Michael Pompeo saying “we don’t want American data in the hands of the Chinese Communist Party.”

W hile the Biden administration revoked the Chinese app bans last month, in part because they were c h a l lenged i n cou r t, t he W h ite House has ordered a review due later this year into what data would be considered too sensitive for China to access. That includes everything from personal health information to genetic information to “ harm from access to large data repositories”—not unlike those held by China’s big tech firms.

The US campaign to deny China key technology, including through export bans like the one that strangled Huawei Technologies Co.’s smartphone business, gives even more incentive for Beijing to ensure it has a way to stop IPOs from the likes of Didi if necessary. Moreover, discouraging overseas listings will help Xi keep China’s biggest companies aligned with the party’s goals, as also seen through Beijing’s move last year to scuttle Ant Group Co.’s $35-billion dual listing in Shanghai and Hong Kong at the 11th hour.

“Keeping local technology champions closer to home in domestic capital markets increases the party-state’s

leverage over them and strengthens incentives for firms to align themselves with the party’s interests,” said William C. Kirby, a professor of China Studies at Harvard University.

Regulators in Beijing are now planning rule changes that would allow them to block a Chinese company from listing abroad even if the unit selling shares is incorporated outside China, a well-trodden avenue for the country’s technology giants, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg News. LinkDoc Technology Ltd. became the first known company to halt plans for a US initial public offering after China’s crackdown, people familiar with the matter said on Thursday.

In an op-ed for the party-backed Global Times, Zhejiang University’s Fang Xingdong—a former Internet entrepreneur who is a key opinion leader in China—said the US listings represented a “ huge hidden danger for national network security” because major shareholders “had their interests lying abroad.”

“The full activation of China’s cyber-security review mechanisms indicate that Chinese Internet companies will officially bid farewell to the stage of barbaric growth,” he wrote on Thursday.

Alibaba, Ant, Tencent and Bytedance together employ almost half a million employees. The world’s largest food delivery empire Meituan has 569 million users covering 2,800 cities, connected by an army of one million delivery people. WeChat has a billion-plus users, and Didi has 377 million users and 13 million drivers in China.

“China is undergoing a broad sweeping review, reigning in anti-competitive market practices, maintaining financial system stability and ensuring national data security, which could impact every industry sector,” said Joel A. Gallo, chief financial officer at health-care company ETAO International Group and adjunct faculty at New York University.

Some investors see China’s moves as counterproductive. Thomas Hayes, chairman at Great Hill Capital in New York, said Beijing was hurting itself by restricting their best companies from raising capital abroad.

But the Chinese government sees it the other way around. Rather than hurting the economy, tighter oversight will prevent tech companies from growing too big and ultimately posing systemic risks to both the domestic and global economy, according to Chen Xi, a senior external advisor to the China Academy of Information and Communication Technology, a research group under the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

Moreover, he said, the US and China will eventually find it’s in their interest to cooperate in reining in companies that seek to amass—and profit from—more and more data.

“China, the US and other economies will benefit from these giants, but also continue to be in confrontation with them,” Chen said. “They could not deal with the problem alone. This is an important area for cooperation.” Bloomberg News

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Solar power now dirt-cheap and about to get even more powerful

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he solar industry has spent decades slashing the cost of generating electricity direct from the sun. Now it’s focusing on making panels even more powerful.

With savings in equipment manufacturing hitting a plateau, and more recently pressured by rising prices of raw materials, producers are stepping up work on advances in technology—building better components and employing increasingly sophisticated designs to generate more electricity from the same-sized solar farms.

“The first 20 years in the 21st century saw huge reductions in module prices, but the speed of the reduction started to level off noticeably in the past two years,” said Xiaojing Sun, global solar research leader at Wood Mackenzie Ltd. “Fortunately, new technologies will create further cost-of-electricity reductions.”

A push for more powerful solar equipment underscores how further cost reductions remain essential to advance the shift away from fossil fuels. W hile grid-sized solar farms are now ty pically cheaper than even the most advanced coal or gas-fired plants, additional savings w ill be required to pair clean energ y sources w ith the expensive storage technolog y that’s needed for around-the-clock carbon-free power.

Bigger factories, the use of automation and more efficient production methods have delivered economies of scale, lower labor costs and less material waste for the solar sector. The average cost of a solar panel dropped by 90 percent from 2010 to 2020.

Boosting power generation per panel means developers can deliver the same amount of electricity from a smaller-sized operation. That’s potentially crucial as costs of land, construction, engineering and other equipment haven’t fallen in the same way as panel prices.

It can even make sense to pay a p r e m iu m f o r mo r e a d v a n c e d technolog y. “ We’re seeing people w illing to pay a higher price for a higher wattage module that lets them produce more power and make more money off their land,” said Jenny Chase, lead solar researcher at BloombergNEF. Higher-powered systems are already arriv ing. Through much of the past decade, most solar panels produced a ma ximum of about 400 watts of electricity. In early 2020, companies began selling 500 -watt panels, and in June, China-based Risen Energy Co. introduced a 700watt model.

Here are some of the ways that solar companies are super-charging panels:

Perovskite

W hile m a ny c u r re nt d e ve lo p ments involve tweaks to existing technologies, perovskite promises a genuine breakthrough. Thinner and more transparent than polysi l icon, t he mater ia l t hat ’s traditionally used, perovskite could eventua l ly be layered on top of existing solar panels to boost efficiency, or be integrated w ith glass to make building windows that also generate power. “ We will be able to take solar power to the next level,” said K im Dohy ung, principal researcher on a perovskite project team at Korea Electric Power Corp., one of several

companies experimenting with the m ater i a l. “ U lt i m ately, t h is new technolog y w ill enable us to make a huge contr ibution in lowering greenhouse gas emissions.”

Adoption of perovskite has previously been challenged by costs and technical issues that prevented commercial-scale production. There are now signs that is changing. Wuxi UtmoLight Technology Co. in May announced plans to start a pilot line

by October with mass production beginning in 2023.

Bi-facial panels

Solar panels ty pically get their power from the side that faces the sun, but can also make use of the small amount of light that ref lects back off the ground. Bi-facial panels started to gain in popularity in 2019, w ith producers seeking to capture the extra increments of electricity by replacing opaque bac k i n g m ate r i a l w it h s p e c i a list glass. They were also temporarily boosted by a since-closed loophole in US law that exempted them from tariffs on Chinese products.

The trend caught solar glass suppliers off-guard and brief ly caused prices for the material to soar. Late last year, China loosened regulations around glass manufacturing capacity, and that should prepare the ground for more widespread adoption of the t wo-sided solar technology.

Doped polysilicon

Another change that can deliver an increase in power is shifting from positively charged silicon material for solar panels to negatively charged, or n-type, products.

N-type material is made by doping polysilicon with a small amount of an element with an extra electron like phosphorous. It’s more expensive, but can be as much as 3.5 percent more powerful than the material that currently dominates. The products a re e x pected to beg in taking market share in 2024 and be the dominant material by 2028, according to PV-Tech.

In the solar supply chain, ultrarefined polysilicon is shaped into rectangular ingots, which are in turn sliced into ultra-thin squares known as wafers. Those wafers are wired into cells and pieced together to form solar panels.

Bigger wafers, better cells

For most of t he 2010s, t he st a nd a rd sol a r wa fer wa s a 156 -m i ll i meter (6.14 i nc hes) squ a re of polysi l icon, about t he si ze of t he f ront of a C D c a se. Now, compan ies a re m a k i ng t he squ a res bigger to boost ef f ic ienc y a nd reduce m a nu fac t u r i ng cost s. P roducers a re pu sh i ng 182- a nd 210 -m i l l imeter wa fers, a nd t he l a rger si zes w i l l g row f rom about 19 percent of t he m a rket sh a re t h is yea r to more than ha lf by 2023, according to Wood Mac ken zie’s Su n.

T he f a c t or ie s t h at w i re w a fe r s i nt o c e l l s — w h i c h c o nv e r t e lec t rons e xc ited by photons of l ig ht i nto e lec t r ic it y— a re add i ng new c apac it y for desig ns l i ke heteroju nc t ion or t u n ne l‐ ox ide pa ssiv ated cont ac t ce l l s. W h i le more e x pensive to m a ke, t hose st r uc t u res a l low t he e lec t rons to keep bou nc i ng a rou nd for longer, i nc rea si ng t he a mou nt of power t he y generate. Bloomberg News

China’s electric-vehicle battery maker now richer than Jack Ma

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Zeng Yuqun Bloomberg photo

eng Yuqun, the founder of the world’s biggest electricvehicle battery maker, has overtaken Jack Ma in the wealth rankings, a symbolic moment in the rise of China’s green billionaires.

Zeng’s net worth has jumped to $49.5 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, as shares of Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Ltd. surged this year. That exceeds Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. cofounder Ma’s wealth of $48.1 billion and makes Zeng one of the five richest people in Asia for the first time.

It’s the latest sign of how a new generation of tycoons in China is amassing vast fortunes in the cleanenergy boom. Investors have pushed up stocks such as CATL, a key supplier to Tesla Inc., as the country leads the

market for electric-vehicle sales and pursues an ambitious policy of reaching carbon neutrality in 2060.

“The billionaire ranking used to be dominated by real-estate tycoons and later tech entrepreneurs, and now we are seeing more from the new energy sector,” said Hao Gao, director of Tsinghua University’s NIFR Global Family Business Research Center. “As the industry leader for electric-vehicle batteries, CATL will benefit most from the carbon emission goal.”

A spokesman for CATL declined to comment on Zeng’s net worth.

Zeng, 53, who hails from a hillside village in Fujian province in southeast China, built CATL into a battery juggernaut in less than a decade, creating the largest global producer of rechargeable cells for plug-in vehicles.

Global electric-vehicle batter y sales more than doubled in the first five months of this year from a year earlier, with CATL accounting for 31.2 percent of the market, the largest share, according to an SNE Research report. New-energy vehicle retail sales in China rose 9.8 percent in 2020 to 1.11 million units, according to the China Passenger Car Association.

BloombergNEF expects the company’s global sales growth to continue, benefiting from economies of scale, a cost-competitive upstream supply chain and an established client base.

CATL’s stock has surged more than 20-fold since the company went public in Shenzhen in 2018. It’s up 59 percent this year alone as demand for EVs increases, countries work to reduce carbon emissions and costs tumble.

CATL trades at more than 100 times estimated earnings, compared with about 13 times for competitor Panasonic Corp.

In addition to Tesla, CATL counts BMW AG and Volkswagen AG among its customers. In an interview last year, Zeng said he and Tesla Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk text about technology, Covid-19 and Musk’s main interest: cheaper batteries and cars.

Zeng, who earned a doctorate in condensed matter physics from the Chinese Academy of Science in Beijing, isn’t the only billionaire who’s benefiting from the surge in CATL’s stock. Huang Shilin, a vice chairman of the company, is worth more than $21 billion, while Li Ping, who’s also a vice chairman, has an $8.5-billion fortune. Bloomberg News

Science

BusinessMirror

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

Pinoy HS kids win 3 bronze medals in programming tilt

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hey faced prog ramming challenges ranging from dungeons game to DNA. Thus, bagging three bronze medals at the world ’s most prestigious and most difficult competitive programming event in the world was no mean feat for these Filipino high-school students.

Vincent de la Cruz, Raphael Dylan Dalida and Frederick Ivan Tan each brought home a bronze medal from the recent 33rd International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI), besting hundreds of contestants from over 80 countries.

The IOI is one of the world’s biggest science olympiads. The two-day competition—hosted this year by Singapore from June 19 to 25—was held online due to the pandemic.

It featured a gauntlet of programming challenges that tested the competitors’ coding skills and creativity, with problems involving everything from a dungeons game to mutating DNA. De la Cruz, a 12th-grader at the Valenzuela City School of Mathematics and Science, scored the highest from the Philippine contingent at 92nd place out of 351 competitors.

Meanwhile, Dalida came in at 119th place and Tan finished in 136th place. The two are 10th- and 11th-grade pupils, respectively, at the Philippine Science High SchoolMain Campus.

The fourth member of the Philippine team, Saint Jude Catholic School's 12th-grader Steven Reyes, finished at a respectable 216th place.

The Philippine team leader, Vernon Gutierrez, was ecstatic over the victory.

“A huge shout-out to our students!

The Philippine Team bagged the most medals in a year, despite the difficulties presented by the pandemic,” he enthused.

“This wouldn't be possible without the help of the volunteers in our organization, NOI.PH [National Olympiad in Informatics-Philippines], and the continuous support of DOST-SEI,” Gutierrez added “The IOI is a proving ground for... the brightest [young] minds who are in the best position to solve the world's problems. Apart from coding skills, contestants also need to think on their feet and find solutions to anything that's thrown at them," said NOI.PH President Marte Solita.

NOI.PH organized the Philippine contingent in partnership with the Department of Science and Technology-Science Education Institute (DOST-SEI).

Gutierrez and Solita expressed hope that the Philippines continues its winning streak and are looking forward to bringing more participants as well as trainers and volunteers to the prestigious competition.

S&T Media Services

‘People-centered approaches needed to address drug abuse’

By Rizal Raoul Reyes

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he drug problem has proven to be a tough nut to crack in both local and global environments due to many factors, requiring its stakeholders to implement “holistic, people-centered and public health approaches” to address substance abuse.

This assessment was made at the recent National Substance Use Science Policy and Information Forum with the theme, “Substance Use in the Philippines: Governance, Research and Practice.”

The online event was organized by the National Academy of Science and Technology Philippines, the country’s highest science and technology advisory body to the government, in partnership with the Asian Center for Drug Policy, and the University of the Philippines Manila.

The factors cited at the forum that hinder in solving the problem were: expansion and increased sophistication of the global and regional drug market; changes in drug market operations, such as mobility, new technology, new substances, expansion of network, use of online facilities and legitimate establishments.

Likewise cited among the factors are the rising number of persons getting into drugs, especially among the youth; and the increased volume of people in jail that lead to prison overcrowding, which, in turn, infringe on the right to life and health.

People-oriented approaches

Dr. Francisco A. Magno, project director of the SDG City Laboratory at De La Salle University Manila, said in his summary of research and policy recommendations that “insufficient multilateral collaboration among the stakeholders is one of the obstacles that needs to be hurdled to present a united stand against substance abuse.”

Magno said there is a need to st reng t hen a nd inst it ut iona l i ze people-oriented and public health approaches to substance use to counter these challenges.

There must be an integration of holistic approaches and policies in the framework for responding to substance abuse, he said.

On the ground level, Magno said communities must push the implementation of rehabilitation of programs and facilities.

Magno pointed out that the government must establish programs that address economic and social realities connected to substance abuse.

This means the victims of substance abuse must be given access to economic activities to disincentivize participation in the drug trade and substance abuse.

Magno pointed out that it is also important to allocate resources in health services, health financing and social health-insurance coverage for rehabilitation educational programs to help persons suffering from substance abuse.

There must also be continuous care for persons who use drugs and educational programs that can help them in their substance dependency concerns and recovery.

These measures must also be complemented by the social integration of persons who use drugs (PWUDs), giving them economic opportunities and livelihood.

Online health services

Magno likewise urged the government to expand its online health services, such as counselling and assessment related to substance use in order to ensure that the treatment is in the right direction.

He said there must be monitoring of those who completed the treatment programs.

Magno said the repair and improvement programs of treatment and rehabilitation centers and community-based drug rehabilitation facilities must be given top priority to immediately treat substance users.

“Capacity-building must be increased for officials and staff [of these facilities] as part of their training to deliver better service,” he said.

He said the “people-centered approach” in the program will ensure that policies reflect the people’s rights and needs. This will include assessment of system compatibility to the needs of PWUDs and their families.

Treating substance dependents must be grouped according to gender and age groups’ individual treatment programs, and focused on the client’s growth as a human being that enables their transition to society. “ The adoption of ‘compassion pragmatism’ [means] the human dignity of the PWUDs is its core foundation,” Magno said.

The policies, according to Magno, must foster restrictive and transformative justice to substance use.

He said clear policy mechanisms for building drug resilient individuals, families and communities must be implemented, while he pointed out it is also vital that the rights of a PWUD under treatment be clarified and articulated.

Sunday

Sunday, July 11, 2021

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S&T’s rags-to-riches story

From ‘suka and toyo’ to space tech and technopreneurship ‘W

e were chided as S&T, 'suka and toyo' [vinegar and soy sauce],” was how the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) was referred to during its earlier years, according to Science Secretary Fortunato T. de la Peña.

The pun was shared by the Science chief during a light conversation in a special online chat called “Coffee Chat with Sec Boy” commemorating the 63rd anniversary celebration of the DOST on June 15.

"Sec Boy," as de la Peña is being fondly called by DOST employees and and his close associates, elaborated that history would tell that the DOST is no longer just for suka or toyo. The Science Department has soared high with its many accomplishments.

He relayed how the two decades of DOST were devoted on the Human Resource Development program.

In 1958, when Congress established the National Science Development Board (NSDB) pioneered by Dr. Frank Co Tui, was marked with the start of collaborative research that was done in Sta. Barbara with the Department of National Defense on cloud seeding.

That year, the country started its geothermal energy research by the Commission on Volcanology, the predecessor of the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs).

It was also during that time that other attached agencies were added to DOST, such as the Forest Product Research Institute that was originally part of the Department of the Environment and Natural Resources, and the Metals Industry Research and Development Center and the Philippine Textile Research Institute, which were part of the Department of Trade and Industry.

“In the 1980s... I joined the DOST, and saw the transition from the NSDB [that] became the National Science and Technology Authority, which has already administrative supervision over several institutes,” said de la Peña, who has been serving the agency for 40 years already.

That decade, two more sectoral research councils on industry and energy, and health were created.

Prior to that, the Philippine Council for Agricultural Research was established in 1978.

“That was the time that we started contract research and adopted the ‘demand-pull’ strategy for R&D,” de la Peña explained. It was a research strategy where R&D institutes develop technologies based on what the sector it serves needed.

DOST officials, led by Secretary Fortunato T. de la Peña (second from right), are in a "Coffee Chat" style news conference as the Department of Science and Technology celebrates its 63rd anniversary. They discussed the early years of DOST from its first foray into collaborative research on cloud seeding to the country’s leap in the latest Global Innovation Index and space satellite technology. Also, in photo (from left) are DOST Undersecretaries Dr. Renato U. Solidum Jr., Engr. Sancho A. Mabborang, Dr. Rowena Cristina L. Guevara and DOST-Science and Technology Information Institute Director Richard P. Burgos. In front of them are the various products produced by DOST agencies and SMEs under SETUP. Henry A. de Leon/S&T Media Service

“This was the time when products that are not really high-tech but were useful to the people,” he said. “ I remember, t hey were sor t of chiding us by saying that S&T is suka and toyo because we were promoting [and processing] at that time [what the] people needed.”

Fast-forward to the present, DOST is behind most of the big-ticket R&D activities in the country.

Science for Change and space programs

According to Undersecretary Dr. Rowena Cristina L. Guevara, for Research and Development, “from 2011 to 2016, [the] R&D funding [of] DOST increased from P1 billion to P7 billion.”

She disclosed that since the implementation of the Science for Change Program, the country has established 35 Niche Centers in the Regions for R&D, which enables higher education institutions to develop their own R&D initiatives to spur developments in the regions through the technologies developed under the program.

Because of this thrust, the country’s ranking in the Global Innovation Index improved in 2020 to 50th among the 131 economies from rank 100th in 2014.

“We are considered as efficient innovators,” declared Guevara. “Kasi ang input natin ay hindi gaano kalakihan pero grabe naman ang output natin [Because our input was not very big, but our output was huge].”

The country also committed in space science R&D that enabled Filipino scientists and engineers to develop and deploy into space the Philippines’s first microsatellites Diwata-1 in 2016 and Diwata-2 in 2018.

With the success of the first two microsatel lites, DOST once again sent i nto outer s pace t he f i rst

na nosatel l ites c a l led Maya-1 in June 2018 and Maya-2 in Februar y.

These encouraging achievements led to the eventual birth of the Philippine Space Agency, the government agency mandated to promote and develop the country’s space technologies, capabilities, and applications.

The agency is now headed by Director General Dr. Joel Marciano Jr., the former director of the Advanced Science and Technology Institute (ASTI) of the DOST. Undersecretary Renato U. Solidum Jr. cleverly put the developments in the country's space science research. "[ASTI] has ventured into environmental surveillance. Does it not show how good the Filipinos are? Before, fairies can only be found in the forest, now fairies can now be found in space [referring to the Diwata-1 and 2 satellites; diwata is fairy or goddess in English]. And a sparrow [referring to maya bird] that fly low from the ground now hovers over space as the Maya satellite," Solidum said partly in Filipino.

He also shared the many developments over the years as the DOST, through its institutes, the Phivolcs and the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical, and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa), has efficiently forecasted and monitored various natural disasters through the use of knowledge products and weather and geohazards forecasting technologies.

“Today, Phivolcs can remotely monitor volcanoes. We have near real-time volcano monitoring stations, where we can monitor all the volcanoes, in our facility in Quezon City,” revealed by the country’s premier "fault finder."

Solidum also shared that the country now has 109 earthquake monitoring stations from just 10

in the 1980s.

Besides this, 29 sea-level monitoring stations for tsunami monitoring were established.

In earlier years, Pagasa used rain gauges to gather rain from buckets.

“But now we have 17 doppler radars that can forecast typhoons from a distance of 200 kilometers, and 13 flood-forecasting and warning centers with additional five more being constructed.

For his part, DOST Undersecretary for Regional Operations Sancho A. Mabborang highlighted the success of DOST’s Small Enterprise Technology Upgrading Program, a nationwide program that empowers micro, small and medium enterprises to be more productive and competitive.

Mabborang reported that since 2002, when the program was launched, they have already assisted 90,000 small to medium enterprises (SMEs) and generated additional 290,000 jobs mostly in the countryside.

Besides this, he bannered the Food Innovation Centers, which are mostly found inside the campuses of state universities and colleges in the regions, that conduct collaborative R&D activities and other support services that enable development in the food sector.

As a result, the centers were able to create new products and technologies that helped spur new developments for SMEs and enliven economic activity in the regions.

As the DOST marked its more than si x decades of ser v ing the people through science, technology and innovation, the thousands of men and women of science continue to pledge their full support and dedication to improving the lives of every Filipino in the future beyond the new normal.

Joy M. Lazcano, DOST-STII

Virtual library boosts open access to aquaculture, fisheries publications

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eading publications on aquaculture and fisheries technologies may not be a problem even during the pandemic. If people have access to the Internet, they can still find their next read on the subject matter as one digital library made thousands of publications on the topic for readers all over the world.

The Southeast Asian Fisheries Development Center Aquaculture Department (Seafdec/AQD), an international research center located in Tigbauan town in Iloilo province, has given the public unrestricted access to over 1,800 publications, including full-text digitized books, extension manuals, conference proceedings, annual reports, and other materials authored by the organization’s scientists and researchers, Seafdec/ AQD said in a news release.

Stephen A layon, head of the Librar y and Databank ing Ser v ices Section that painstakingly digitized and indexed the publications, said this is part of the institution’s initiative to make quality scientific information readily available.

“ We believe that infor mation generated from publicly-funded researches should go back to the public, and the public’s right to this information must be upheld,” Alayon said in an interview.

The publications are available online through the Seafdec/AQD Institutional Repository (SAIR), which can be accessed at https://repository. seafdec.org.ph.

Before this initiative, users must send a request to access a title in the library’s collection, but with SAIR’s open-access model, they can immediately download a PDF copy of the digitized publication they wish to read. Actually, a user may already be unknowingly accessing the PDF files through search engine results.

Open access is an international movement to make publications and other data free of financial, legal, or technical barriers to public access.

Since SAIR’s establishment in 2011 until May 2021, hosted documents have already been downloaded 4.2 million times by users from all over the world.

Knowledge haven during the pandemic The need for openly accessible digital publications was highlighted by the shift to online learning and alternative working arrangements brought about by the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020.

“Searches performed on the site in 2020 jumped over 147 percent to 224,524 compared to 91,057 i n 2019, w h i le u n ique v i s itor s jumped 903 percent to 773,777 f rom just 77,147,” said Dr. Edgar A mar, Seafdec/AQD Training and Infor mation Div ision head.

He added that students and members of the academe make up a large part of SAIR’s user base, along with researchers, fish farmers and employees from both government and private sectors. “ We m ade e ven more of ou r aquaculture manuals readily available during this pandemic to help fisheries schools, and to empower our fish farmers with the sciencebased procedures detailed by our scientists and researchers in these

books,” remarked Dan Baliao, chief of Seafdec/AQD. Baliao said that because faceto-face training sessions and farm visits were very limited, making the publications available over the Internet was “the least that Seafdec/ AQD could do.”

Seafdec/AQD and its member countries pour substantial effort, time, and funds to produce these manuals and books that are painstakingly written by our scientists and researchers.

"It only makes sense that we maximize their use by making sure they reach as many extension workers and farmers possIble,” said Rex Delsar Dianala, officer-in-charge of Seafdec/AQD’s Development Communication section.

“What we really want to happen is for as many people as possible to benefit from our research here at Seafdec/AQD. If the whole world has unimpeded access to our researchbased books and manuals, we will have done most of our part,” Dianala further underscored.

Faith A6 Sunday, July 11, 2021

Sunday

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

Prelate to public: ‘Have a jab. When Covid hits you, you’ll call all the saints’

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Catholic archbishop and Covid-19 survivor added his voice to help address the vaccine hesitancy among Filipinos.

Archbishop Gilbert Garcera of Lipa tested positive for Covid-19 last March. Speaking during a recent Mass, the archbishop revealed that he had a long and difficult battle with the disease.

“Take it from me, when covid hits you, you will call all the saints in heaven,” Garcera said in his homily.

Archbishop Gilbert Garcera of Lipa. CBCP FILE PHOTO

After battling Covid-19, he said that survivors may have to settle hefty hospital bills.

The archbishop encouraged hesitant people to avail themselves of the vaccines that are available “ before it’s too late.”

“Don’t wait to get sick [with Covid-19]. You’ll regret it,” Garcera warned.

The archbishop also pointed out that vaccines are “blessings” during this time of the pandemic.

“The Covid-19 vaccination rollout is also a blessing to us and we know that vaccination centers are widespread,” he added.

Ga rcera a n nou nced on Ma rc h 21 t h at he wa s i nfec ted w it h Co v i d -19, m a k i n g h i m t h e t e nt h Fi l ipi no pre l ate to cont rac t t he d isea se. He h a s si nce recovered a f ter he wa s hospit a l i zed.

In March and April three more prelates—Archbishop Jose Palma and Bishop Emeritus Antonio Rañola of Cebu, and Archbishop Florentino Lavarias of San Fernando—had been

infected with Covid-19 but they all have recovered.

Vaccine hesitancy among Filipinos remains a serious challenge in the national inoculation program, although the government has had difficulties securing vaccine supplies.

In May, local pollster Social Weather Stations found that only a third of 1,200 Filipinos it surveyed were willing to be vaccinated, while a third were hesitant over concerns about side effects or the efficacy of vaccines.

As of June 27, the country has administered more than 10 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines, with 7.5 million people receiving their first shot. CBCP News

What kind of surgery The role of Holy Communion in the Catholic Church did Pope Francis have? T

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ONDON—Pope Francis has had surgery to remove part of his left colon in what the Vatican has described as a planned procedure.

Doctors say the bowel problems that the 84-year-old pope was experiencing are very common in older people, although only about 10 percent to 20 percent of people with similar problems require surgery.

The Vatican said Pope Francis ate breakfast, read the newspapers and took a walk on Tuesday as he continued recovering from intestinal surgery.

A statement from the Vatican spokesman, Matteo Bruni, said tests performed following the pontiff’s Sunday surgery to remove half of his colon yielded “good” and normal result.

“His Holiness Pope Francis rested well during the night,” Bruni said.

“This morning he had breakfast, read some newspapers and got up to walk.

The post-operative recovering is regular. Routine control tests are good.”

Here’s a look about the operation and what the pope’s doctors will be watching out for.

What kind of surgery did the pope have?

According to the Vatican, Pope Francis had the left part of his bowel removed in a three-hour operation last Sunday at a Rome hospital. Officials said it was required because the pope’s bowel had narrowed.

Dr. Manish Chand, an associate professor of surgery at University College London who specializes in colorectal surgery, said the pope had likely been experiencing painful symptoms long before the bowel procedure. He was not involved in the pope’s care.

Although minor symptoms can be treated with antibiotics, Chand said in some older people, the pain becomes so severe that removing part of the colon is the only way to fix it.

“That leads to scarring of the colon, which results in a narrowing part of the colon,” Chand said, explaining that prevents normal bowel movements. “There aren’t any drugs we can use to remedy the situation, so the only way to rid patients of the pain is by removing that narrowed portion of the bowel and join the two healthy ends of the bowel together.”

What are the risks of complications?

Although the pope’s surgery was planned, it was not minor.

“This is a major operation, so as with any big operation, you want to make sure a patient’s heart and lungs are recovering and progressing the way they should after something like this,” said Dr. Walter Longo, chief of colon and rectal surgery at

Yale University School of Medicine.

Longo said the primary concern is ensuring that the two parts of the bowel that surgeons have stitched together remain attached.

“The biggest risk is that this fails, and the patient experiences more pain, a fever, and there’s evidence of infection,” Longo said. “If that happens, then another operation would be needed to hook [the colon] back together.”

He said that is extremely rare and that only two to three out of 100 surgeries would result in a repeat surgery.

Chand said if there are no complications, he would expect the pope to experience an almost immediate improvement in his quality of life and be back to eating regularly within days.

What are doctors watching out for now?

The Vatican said Francis is expected to spend a week in Rome’s Gemilli Polyclinic recuperating.

Given the pope’s previous respiratory issues—he is missing part of his right lung after having it removed following a severe bout of pneumonia in his youth— Chand said doctors would need to monitor his breathing carefully.

“In the case of having previous problems with the lung, there is always a concern after the major abdominal surgery of the risk of getting a chest infection,” Chand said.

He said the pain might make it difficult for the pope to breathe deeply, preventing the lungs from expanding fully and getting rid of any f luid that could cause problems.

On Monday, Vatican officials said the pope was breathing on his own.

How long will it take for the pope to recover?

Chand said even if the pope began to feel better soon, it would take weeks for someone to recover from losing half their colon and that he would likely feel very fatigued.

Longo said it would likely take the pope about four to six weeks of recovery before he might be able to resume his normal duties.

“This is a big operation for a man in his 80s, even though I understand he was in fine condition before,” Longo said. “There’s no question he will require a lot of physical therapy and recovery time.”

Longo recommended that the pope increase his fiber intake in the future and predicted he would be back to normal w ithin several months.

Shortly before his surgery, the pope announced last Sunday that he would visit Slovakia and Hungary for a few days in mid-September. AP

he biannual US Catholic bishops’ meeting received more than its usual attention last June due to one particular item on its agenda: a proposed document on the Sacrament of the Eucharist, a ritual also known as Holy Communion.

Because this as yet unwritten document is expected to include guidance on when and whether Holy Communion may be refused to a Catholic who presents her or himself in a manifest state of serious sin, this church matter received notice in the pages of national newspapers.

It also prompted a “Statement of Principles” from 60 Democratic Catholics in the US House of Representatives urging bishops “to not move forward and deny this most holy of all sacraments.”

As a scholar of Catholic sacramental theology, let me offer some thoughts on the central role of Holy Communion in the Catholic Church, and the pain it can cause some members to be denied reception of it.

One of the seven sacraments of the Catholic Church, the Eucharist is a ritual in which, according to Catholic theology, bread and wine blessed by a priest really become the body, blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ.

Such is its central role in Catholicism, it has been called the “fount and apex of the whole Christian life.”

Catholics are obliged to receive Communion at least once a year, but in practice many do so far more frequently during Mass, or Catholic public worship.

Why might Catholics be concerned with lacking access to this one practice when there are presumably many other opportunities for spiritual growth both within and without the

Pope Francis gives first Communion to children during a Mass at the Church of the Sacred Heart in Rakovski, Bulgaria, May 6, 2019. PAUL HARING/CNS via CBCP News Catholic Church?

The answer lies not only in a sense of injustice about being denied access or forcing a change of habit. It is found in the history, practice and theology of Holy Communion itself.

Eucharist in early Christianity In the formative years of Christianity around 2,000 years ago, the practice of ritual meals was already common in both Jewish and Greco-Roman culture.

Early Christian Eucharistic practice took seriously the ritual power of a meal to transport participants beyond the physical world by connecting them to both past events and spiritual realities.

Jesus shared many mea ls t h roughout His t i me on Ea r t h, culminating in His “ last supper,” during which, according to biblical passages, He instructed followers to share bread and wine, saying, “This is My body that is for you. Do this

in remembrance of Me.” Early followers of Jesus worshiped in sy nagogues and continued to take part in Jew ish rituals.

Thus, the Eucharist f lowed from the same stream as the Passover Seder in which Jew ish tradition says each person is to regard him or herself as hav ing been personally freed from slaver y in Eg y pt.

Yet, Christian ritual meals were unique because they were centered on Jesus, a crucified victim of the Roman Empire, whom, Christians believe, “passed over” death to be resurrected by God.

Body of Christ The whole structure of the Mass, which normally culminates in reception of Communion, is about thrusting participants into the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, so that they may see the death-and-resurrection shape of life in the world.

Catholic theology distinguishes

three ways of speaking of the body of Christ, all rooted in the Bible: There is the historical Jesus who walked on Earth, the body of Christ that is present in the bread and w ine of the Eucharist, and finally the assembly of people who, as St. Paul the apostle put it, “are the body of Christ and indiv idually members of it.”

The early Christian celebration of, and reflection on, the Eucharist did not imagine a sharp divide between the presence of Christ in the Eucharist and in the people who celebrate it.

But an 11th-century controversy over the nature of Christ’s presence in the Eucharist, which became closely associated with the historical Jesus, initiated what one scholar called a “deadly break” between the presence of Christ in the Eucharist and the presence of Christ in people.

Twentieth-century Catholic theology recovered that deep connection between Christ’s presence in the Eucharist and in the community.

Being set apart In its most basic terms, Catholics receive the really-present Christ in Communion so that they may be Christ in the world.

Catholics believe that when one consumes the Eucharist, one is incorporated into Christ and becomes bonded to others who are also part of the body of Christ on Earth.

It is not simply a matter of individual belief, but of Church unity and the mission of being Christ in the world.

To set oneself outside of the practice of Communion—or to be set outside by another—is to be apart from the very practice that incorporates one into the body of Christ. Timothy Gabri-

elli University of Dayton/The Conversation

Dalai Lama marks 86th birthday

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HARAMSHALA, India— T he Tibet a n spi r it u a l leader the Dalai Lama celebrated turning 86 a few days ago, thanking his supporters and expressing his appreciation for India, where he has lived since he fled his homeland in 1959.

“I want to express my deep appreciation of all my friends who have really shown me love, respect and trust,” the Dalai Lama said in a video message.

He reiterated his mission to serving humanity and urged supporters to be compassionate.

“Since I became a refugee and now settled in India, I have taken full advantage of India’s freedom and religious harmony,” he said.

He added that he had great respect for India’s secular values, such as “ honesty, karuna

[compassion], and ahimsa [nonviolence].”

The Dalai Lama made the hillside town of Dharamshala his headquarters after a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959. China doesn’t recognize the Tibetan government-in-exile and accuses the Dalai Lama of seeking to separate Tibet from China.

The Dalai Lama denies being a separatist and says he merely advocates for substantial autonomy and protection of Tibet’s native Buddhist culture.

On Tuesday, a small celebration attended by mostly government officials was held at the Central Tibetan Administration.

On a projected screen, the Dalai Lama’s video message was played and followed by a cultural performance by the Tibetan Institute of

Exile Tibetan government officials watch a message from their spiritual leader the Dalai Lama on a screen during a ceremony to mark the 86th birthday of the Tibetan leader in Dharmsala, India, on July 6. AP/Ashwini Bhatia Performing Arts.

Usually, the spiritual leader’s birthday is a fairly elaborate affair in the town, open to members of the public who would flock to the Tsuglakhang Temple, where performances were held. Sometimes, the leader would also make an appearance.

This year, due to the coronavirus pandemic, the celebrations were muted and behind closed doors. But a

banner marking his birthday hung in the town square and Tibetan monks distributed sweets and juice to passers-by outside the closed temple.

“Many people really show they love me. And many people actually love my smile,” the Dalai Lama said with a smile at the start of the video. “In spite of my old age, my face is quite handsome,” he said with a laugh. AP

Biodiversity Sunday BusinessMirror

Asean Champions of Biodiversity Media Category 2014

Sunday, July 11, 2021

Editor: Lyn Resurreccion

A7

Minalungao National Park

Nueva Ecija’s best-kept secret

The participants at the ACB webinar, led by Executive Director Theresa Mundita Lim. ACB photo

Why accounting natural capital is important to economies

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hat would be the value of a nation’s economy if the contributions of nature are properly measured?

A holistic appreciation and accounting of the values of ecosystems and their services are integral in effectively managing wealth and resources for the sustainable growth of economies to benefit the people, a recent webinar organized by the Asean Centre for Biodiversity (ACB) told participants, its news release said.

The ACB held the third part of the webinar series on the economics of biodiversity, focusing on natural capital accounting and existing standards that include indicators on the economic values of the flow of ecosystem services and goods.

The webinar series is being supported by the European Union, German Development Bank, and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit through the Biodiversity Conservation and Management of Protected Areas in Asean Project, Small Grants Programme, and the Institutional Strengthening of Biodiversity Sector in the Asean II Project, respectively.

“Natural capital accounting is a necessary step toward the creation of inclusive wealth accounts,” ACB Executive Director Theresa Mundita Lim said in her opening remarks.

“It enables us to understand and appreciate the place of nature’s services in our economies, including the services that are usually overlooked, most especially life support assets that include water supply, fish stocks, carbon sequestration and other ecosystem services,” she added.

Also gracing the webinar were Dr. Nor Imtihan Binti Haji Abdul Razak, permanent secretary for planning, land use and environment of Brunei Darussalam’s Ministry of Development and chairman of the Asean Senior Officials on the Environment, and Dr. David Tantow, counsellor for development cooperation of the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany in Jakarta.

Nor said that the government of Brunei Darussalam is paying close attention to widening the coverage of its mangroves and peat swamp forests as it develops its national biodiversity strategies and plans.

“Maintaining this biodiversity…increases new economic opportunities ranging from timber, pharmaceuticals, as well as ecotourism,” she said, noting that every decision made for development requires consideration for nature and biological resources.

The webinar gave participants a brief overview of the UN System of Environmental-Economic Accounting—Ecosystem Accounting (SEEA-EA).

SEEA-EA constitutes an integrated and comprehensive statistical framework for organizing data about habitats and landscapes, measuring the ecosystem services, tracking changes in ecosystem assets, and linking this information to economic and other human activity. This was adopted by the UN Statistical Commission in March 2021.

Several countries are compiling data and piloting SEEA-EA, according to the 2020 global assessment for environmental economic accounting.

Alessandra Alfieri, chief of the Environmental-Economic Accounts Section of the United Nations’ Department of Economic and Social Affairs, noted the six Asean member-states already engaged in SEEA-EA, such as Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.

In the Philippines, among the current initiatives are updating of environmental accounts and statistics, as well as compiling of environment and natural resources accounts in pilot regions.

These data help the country measure sustainability in tourism, ocean economy, greenhouse-gas emissions, climate change, disaster expenditure and material flow, supporting environment indicators under the Sustainable Development Agenda for 2030, said Assistant National Statistician Vivian Ilarina of the Philippine Statistics Authority.

Dr. Gem B. Castillo, president of the Resource and Environmental Economics Foundation of the Philippines and national consultant of the Wealth Accounting and Valuation of Ecosystem Services, noted that there was a significant achievement in bringing together data and identifying data gaps and deficiencies in the information system of the Philippines.

Like in the Philippines, SEEA-EA efforts in Indonesia started in 1990 and is still being implemented.

It started with a compilation of an integrated system of environmental-economic accounting, “Sistem Terintegrasi Neraca dan Ekonomi Lingkungan” (Sisnerling), followed by sectoral applications, the latest of which is on sustainable tourism.

In her presentation, Etjih Tasriah, senior statistician of Badan Pusat Statistik of Indonesia, shared that Sisnerling sought to describe the impacts of economic development on the availability of natural resources and the roles of natural resources in economic activities.

The government has been conducting in-depth studies on SEEA-EA in 17 provinces of Indonesia every year since 2016.

Experts from the Philippines and Indonesia cited the need for strong commitment from officials and concerted efforts from several sectors to manage and monitor the natural accounting processes and make sure these are integrated in decision-making.

With the post-2020 global biodiversity framework expected to be finalised at the 15th Conference of Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity this year, the adoption and implementation of natural capital accounting systems are even more crucial.

By Jonathan L. Mayuga

T

he 2,018-hectare Minalungao National Park, a place of unique beauty that mesmerize visitors with its unique landscape, sits in the province of Nueva Ecija.

Dec lared as a protected area through Republic Act 51000 on June 17, 1967, it is accessible by land in Luzon, and is ideal for a quick getaway from the stressful city life.

Minalungao’s name was derived from a conjunction of the words mina and lungao, or mine of gold in caves. While there may not be mines of gold in the cave in Minalungao, it remains as Nueva Ecija’s best-kept secret.

An initial component of the National Integrated Protected Areas System Act, Minalungao is mostly grassland of around 1,396 hectares, while some 403 hectares are forested areas.

Around 116 kilometers north of Metro Manila, the municipality of General Tinio, particularly Barangays Pias and Rio Chico, has territorial jurisdiction over Minalungao, and partly shared by Makabaclay in Gapan City, Nueva Ecija.

River of life The Minalungao National Park is dissected by the Sumacbao River in almost equal halves.

The Sumacbao River flowing between the towering rocks of Minalungao National Park has an approximate width of 10 feet.

Smaller water bodies, such as the Samon, Wakwak, Mantahilan, Ngabngab and Balintingon creeks feed the river with fresh water.

Sumacbao River is the main source of water in the area and is used for bathing and washing, and other domestic use. It also provides water for small farms of sustenance farmers.

The river is also used for transportation through small bancas and bamboo or wooden raft.

More importantly, the river provides an abundant supply of freshwater fish like biya, eel and shrimp.

Popular tourist spot Donaver M. Guevarra, chief of the Public Affairs Office of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) Central Luzon, said the Minalungao National Park is a well-known tourist spot in Nueva Ecija and Central Luzon.

“Some visitors came from as far as Region I and from Metro Manila,” Guevarra told the BusinessMirror in an interview via Zoom on July 7.

The unique features of the Minalungao National Park—the river and its natural rock formation—make it an awesome place to visit.

“Just like in Palawan, the river

The unique huge forest-covered karst forms wall-like protection to the crystal clear Sumacbao River at the foothills of the Sierra Madre Mountain Range in General Tinio, Nueva Ecija.

DON GUEVARRA/DENR-REGION 3 PUBLIC AFFAIRS OFFICE

and its abundance, the natural rock formations make it very popular,” he said.

Tourism attractions The Sumacbao River boasts of crystalclear, blue-green water, making it suitable for various activities like rafting, river cruise, bathing and swimming, especially during the dry season.

The enchanting limestone rock formations on both sides of the river serves as a wall of up to 16 meters high.

The national park also offers wildlife adventures, such as bird watching and monkey viewing, while on a serene river cruise on a bamboo raft.

One could enjoy nature’s singingflying creations, while being amazed by some Philippine macaque helping themselves with nature’s abundance of a buffet of vegetation on top of the rocky hills.

Another attraction is the Minalungao Cave tour, a 5-minute trek to the opening of the cave to explore the unique ecosystem.

Meanwhile, the sparsely dense forest cover is ideal for picnic, the excitement brought by the hanging bridge and relaxation with nature, while enjoying the soft sound of flowing water and chirping of birds that thrive in the park.

The towering man-made cross has become a pilgrimage site, with the challenge of hurdling 1,000 steps to reach the cross.

The national park houses the Protected Area Management Board (PAMB) office, an information center and a guest house, and other amenities like a shower area, souvenir shops and hotels.

Closed due to Covid Jimmy Aberin, Community Environment and Natural Resource Officer of Cabanatuan and concurrent Protected Area Superintendent of the Minalungao National Park, told the BusinessMirror that the Minalungao National Park remains closed to the public due to Covid.

A lthough the PAMB of the national park has already appealed to the Inter-agency Task Force on Covid-19 to allow gradual opening of the park to the public, local officials are not risking the resurgence of the pandemic with the reopening of the parks and other tourism areas.

He said at the same Zoom meeting that hundreds of families, whose livelihoods depend largely on ecotourism, are affected by the travel restriction due to the pandemic.

Biological diversity According to the protected area su it abi l it y assessment in 1994, human activities, such as kaingin (slash-and-burn farming) and charcoal making, unabated and illegal logging within and the adjacent area of the national park pose serious threat to the biological diversity in the area.

With the native and fruit-bearing trees in the park, numerous species of birds have been recorded in the area. There are bats, rats, snakes and various species of lizards, from small ones to the larger monitor lizard, or bayawak.

The brahminy kite, grass owl, Philippine hanging parakeet, rufous hornbill, Eurasian tree sparrow, large-billed crow, barred rail, red jungle fowl, zebra dove, crested myna, brown shrike, white-collared kingfisher, pechora pipit, brown cuckoo dove are just some of the commonly seen birds in the area.

There were also report of sightings of Philippine deer, wild pig, and civet cat in the area.

Lawin Program Through the Lawin Forest and Biodiversity Protection System, the DENR is able to effectively monitor suspicious activities and quickly respond to prevent environmental degradation.

Raissa Lico, chief of the Protected Area and Biodiversity Conservation Office of DENR-Central Luzon, said as a protected area Minalungao National Park has a very unique ecosystem.

In Central Luzon, there are a total of 24 protected areas, the areas that are set aside for conservation to protect the rich biodiversity that thrives therein.

“Other protected areas are mostly forest while Minalungao is the only one that features a river, the Sumacbao River,” Lico said.

To protect the Minalungao National Park, the DENR implements the Lawin Program. Through the Lawin monitoring system that makes use of a mobile application, Lico said forest protectors immediately learn if there’s an illegal activity so we immediately report to authorities.

Reforestation Aberin said the DENR continues to reforest the protected area and encourages people to stop their destructive activities like slash-and-burn farming and charcoal mining, which used to be rampant in the area.

He said the residents in the area were tapped by the DENR as National Greening Program partners.

“Right now, about 500 hectares have been reforested in Minalungao,” he said.

According to Aberin, only about 20 percent of the Minalungao National Park are covered with forest, asserting the need to intensify reforestation to protect and conserve the river and the surrounding environs.

Sustenance farming The Minalungao National Park is also inhabited by humans, making farming as a way of life in the area. With only sustenance farming allowed, ecotourism was introduced and started to gain traction. L ivelihood sources, such as tour guiding; renting out kiosks, swimming equipment, such as kayak and life vests; boating; putting up a sari-sari store and a souvenir shop were made available to the residents.

Some of the people are extracting nontimber forest products like bamboo, and are engaging in trading, processing and manufacturing.

Some of the household members work as drivers, construction workers, tourism staff and local government employees on a contractual basis.

Public Awareness campaign A cc o rding t o G u e v a r r a , t h e DENR-Central Luzon led by DENR Regional Executive Director Paquito T. Moreno Jr. continuously conducts public-awareness campaigns in various parts of the region.

“We go to schools and even down to the communities to highlight the importance of protecting and conserving our protected areas and our rich biodiversity, and why it is important not to harm our wildlife,” he said partly in Filipino.

Endangered sea turtles thriving, hatchlings released in Culasi, Antique

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reen sea turtle hatchlings crawled their way back home to the vast ocean in the province of Antique.

A total of 84 green sea turtle hatchlings were released by the Community Environment and Natural Resources Office (Cenro) Culasi at Brgy. San Francisco Norte, Tibiao, Antique, in late June, said a news release from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources Region 6.

The green sea turtle (Chelonia mydas) is considered an endangered species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and is on its Red List.

The species is carnivorous from hatchling until juvenile stage, and shift to a herbivorous diet as their serrated jaws adapts for most vegetarian diet of sea grasses and algae.

Ninety-nine green sea turtle eggs were found by a fisherman the night

The photos show eggs of the endangered green sea turtle that were found by a fisherman at Brgy. San Francisco Norte, Tibiao, Antique; and released green sea turtle hatchlings crawl to the sea of Tibiao. Cenro Culasi photo before its release and immediately reported to their local government unit. Thirteen of the eggs remained unhatched while two were found dead during the release.

The province of Antique has a strong implementation of the Turtle Conservation Program, with the local folks actively support the protection and conservation of the marine animals.

T he m a r i ne re pt i les m ig rate

thousands of miles over their lifetime to feed, breed and lay eggs. They have an internal global positioning system using the Earth’s magnetic field, pinpointing specific coastlines based on their magnetic signature.

Female turtles were able to return to the exact place where they were born to lay their eggs.

“These endangered sea creatures thrive in warmer temperatures of the

waters in Antique to lay their eggs.

More sightings of sea turtle hatch also indicate a healthy ocean ecosystem.

We are thankful to the fishermen, our partners and guardians of the environment, in saving our marine wildlife species,” said DENR Regional Executive Director Livino B. Duran.

Enhanced biodiversity conservation is among the top priority of Environment Secretary Roy A. Cimatu.

Sports BusinessMirror

By Ben Nuckols The Associated Press

L

A8 | S

unday, July 11, 2021 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao

SPELLING BEE CHAMP, BASKETBALL PRODIGY

AKE BUENA VISTA, Florida—Zaila Avantgarde understood the significance of what she was doing as she stood on the Scripps National Spelling Bee stage, peppering pronouncer Jacques Bailly with questions about Greek and Latin roots.

Zaila knew she would be the first African American winner of the bee. She knew Black kids around the country were watching Thursday night’s ESPN2 telecast, waiting to be inspired and hoping to follow in the footsteps of someone who looked like them.

She even thought of MacNolia Cox, who in 1936 became the first Black finalist at the bee and wasn’t allowed to stay in the same hotel as the rest of the spellers.

But she never let the moment become too big for her, and when she heard what turned out to be her winning word—“Murraya,” a genus of tropical Asiatic and Australian trees—she beamed with confidence. It was over.

Declared the champion, Zaila jumped and twirled with joy, only flinching in surprise when confetti was shot onto the stage.

“I was pretty relaxed on the subject of Murraya and pretty much any other word I got,” Zaila said.

The only previous Black champion was also the only international winner: Jody-Anne Maxwell of Jamaica in 1998. The bee, however, has still been a showcase for spellers of color over the past two decades, with kids of South Asian descent dominating the competition. Zaila’s win breaks a streak of at least one Indian-American champion every year since 2008.

Zaila has other priorities, which perhaps explains how she came to dominate this year’s bee. The 14-year-old from Harvey, Louisiana, is a basketball prodigy who owns three Guinness world records for dribbling multiple balls simultaneously and hopes to one day play in the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) or even coach in the NBA. She described spelling as a side hobby, even

though she routinely practiced for seven hours a day.

“I kind of thought I would never be into spelling again, but I’m also happy that I’m going to make a clean break from it,” Zaila said. “I can go out, like my Guinness world records, just leave it right there, and walk off.”

Many of top Scripps spellers start competing as young as kindergarten. Zaila only started a few years ago, after her father, Jawara Spacetime, watched the bee on TV and realized his daughter’s affinity for doing complicated math in her head could translate well to spelling.

She progressed quickly enough to make it to nationals in 2019 but bowed out in the preliminary rounds.

That’s when she started to take it more seriously and began working with a private coach, Cole Shafer-Ray, a 20-year-old Yale student and the 2015 Scripps runner-up.

“Usually to be as good as Zaila, you have to be well-connected in the spelling community. You have to have been doing it for many years,” Shafer-Ray said. “It was like a mystery, like, ‘Is this person even real?’”

Shafer-Ray quickly realized his pupil had extraordinary gifts.

“She really just had a much different approach than any speller I’ve ever seen. She basically knew the definition of every word that we did, like pretty much verbatim,” he said. “She knew, not just the word but the story behind the word, why every letter had to be that letter and couldn’t be anything else.”

Sometimes she knew more than she let on. Part of her strategy, she said, was to ask about roots that weren’t part of the word she was given, just to eliminate them from consideration.

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Dutch 3x3 Olympic basketball team eyes Tokyo gold

MSTERDAM—Dimeo van der Horst’s time was running out with the Dutch national basketball team, so he gave 3-on-3 a shot.

Swish.

The Netherlands 3x3 men’s team is headed to the Tokyo Olympics after knocking off the United States and France to qualify—unlikely propositions in 5-on-5—with van der Horst sinking a long-range effort to clinch victory over the French.

The fast-paced, half-court 3x3 is an Olympic sport for the first time and presents traditionally overlooked hoops countries—Japan, Poland and the Netherlands among them—with opportunities for medals.

“For me, it’s one of the most beautiful things you can do as an athlete,” the 30-year-old van der Horst said. “But also for the country—to show that we’re here, we can play basketball.”

Fiba has grown the sport for more than a decade, getting it into the 2010 Youth Olympics and holding its first world championship two years later.

Now, it’s an Olympic sport.

Many of the players also compete in Fiba’s professional circuit. Tournaments are held in historic European squares, near beaches, even in shopping malls as a DJ cranks music throughout the games.

Countries with less-established and less-lucrative 5-on-5 leagues tend to gravitate toward it.

“It’s a great chance for the smaller basketball countries to show themselves,” said Jesper

Jobse, one of the Netherlands’ first official 3x3 players who now advises the national team, manages a pro squad, and runs a 3x3 foundation.

The Netherlands had never qualified for the Olympics in basketball before. The sport ranks way behind soccer, cycling and volleyball in the Netherlands.

“Even baseball is bigger here,” Jobse said.

The Netherlands finished near the bottom of the 2014 world championships— now called

the World Cup. But the Dutch federation hired a coach, budgeted for 3x3 and reached the World Cup final twice with a team captained by Jobse.

At a recent practice session

got to compete in person, in a small portion of a cavernous arena at the ESPN Wide World of Sports complex in Florida that also hosted the NBA playoff bubble last year. The in-person crowd was limited to spellers’ immediate family, Scripps staff, selected media—and first lady Jill Biden, who spoke to the spellers and stayed to watch.

Sometimes it was so quiet in the arena that the only sound was the unamplified voice of ESPN host Kevin Negandhi as he spoke into a TV microphone.

The format of the bee, too, underwent an overhaul after the 2019 competition ended in an eight-way tie. Scripps’ word list was no match for the top spellers that year, but this year, five of the 11 finalists were eliminated in the first onstage round. Then came the new wrinkle of this year’s bee: multiple-choice vocabulary questions. All six remaining spellers got those right.

Zaila won efficiently enough— the bee was over in less than two hours—that another

ZAILA AVANT-GARDE is a basketball prodigy who owns three Guinness world records for dribbling multiple balls simultaneously and hopes to one day play in the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) or even coach in the NBA. AP

Only one word gave her trouble: “nepeta,” a genus of mints, and she jumped even higher when she got that one right than she did when she took the trophy.

“I’ve always struggled with that word. I’ve heard it a lot of times. I don’t know, there’s just some words, for a speller, I just get them and I can’t get them right,” she said. “I even knew it was a genus of plants. I know what you are and I can’t get you.”

Zaila—her dad gave her the last name Avant-garde in tribute to jazz musician John Coltrane— is a singular champion of a most

in an Amsterdam indoor tennis facility converted to a basketball court, players were reminded constantly to defend against the two-point shot—in 5-on-5, that would be a 3-pointer. The scoring is ones and twos—

unusual bee, the first in more than 25 months. Last year’s bee was canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic, and this one was thoroughly modified to minimize risk to kids and their families.

Most of the bee was held virtually, and only the 11 finalists

like in playground 3-on-3.

Because of the immense value of the 2-pointer, defenders usually don’t leave their opponent to help a teammate during drives to the basket—that could leave someone open at the two-point line.

JULIAN JARING (right) protects the ball from Dimeo van der Horst (second right) as Aron Roije defends Deividas Kumelis (left) during a Netherlands 3x3 basketball team practice in Amsterdam. AP

innovation, a lightning-round tiebreaker, wasn’t necessary.

She will take home more than $50,000 in cash and prizes.

The runner-up was Chaitra Thummala, a 12-year-old from Frisco, Texas, and another student of Shafer-Ray. She has two years of eligibility remaining and instantly becomes one of next year’s favorites. Bhavana Madini, a 13-year-old from Plainview, New York, finished third and also could be back.

“Zaila deserved it. She’s always been better than me,” Chaitra said.

“I could review a lot more words. I could get a stronger work ethic.

“We have a rule,” Netherlands Coach Brian Benjamin said, “you can never be too tired to take the 2-point shot away. For guys to get that, it takes sometimes nine months to a year for them to understand that you can never give up—you can never die on a play.”

The 12-second shot clock spurs the frenetic pace. Games are only 10 minutes long or first to 21.

Coaches are not allowed on the floor—players make decisions like when to substitute. Teams consist of four players.

Versatility is vital. The Dutch players who competed in the qualifying tournament—van der Horst, Arvin Slagter, Jessey Voorn and Julian Jaring—are all under 6-foot-6.

The 6-foot-5 Van der Horst was a point guard in the Dutch Basketball League, where Slagter was the MVP in 2014, before 3x3.

“I went from outside and passing the ball to the big guys to setting screens and receiving the ball,” van der Horst said. “In 3-on3, the most important [aspect] is that you can do multiple things.”

Van der Horst, Slagter and Voorn were selected along with Canadian-born Ross Bekkering to compete in Tokyo.

Serbia is the favorite on the men’s side, and China is the women’s defending world champion but the United States is sending a women’s team boasting four WNBA players,

Osaka: Djokovic, Michelle Obama, reached out

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EW YORK—Naomi Osaka says former first lady Michelle Obama and sports stars Novak Djokovic, Michael Phelps and Stephen Curry were among those who reached out to offer support after she withdrew from the French Open to take a mental health break.

In an essay in Time magazine’s Olympic preview issue, on sale Friday, Osaka—a four-time Grand Slam champion and former No. 1-ranked player—wrote that she hopes “we can enact measures to protect athletes, especially the fragile ones,” and suggests they be allowed to sometimes skip media obligations without punishment.

“There can be moments for any of us where we are dealing with issues behind the scenes,” the 23-year-old Osaka said. “Each of us as humans is going through something on some level.”

She said before the French Open began that she would not speak to the media during that tournament, saying those interactions were sometimes uncomfortable and would create doubts for her on the court. After her first-round victory in Paris, Osaka was fined $15,000 for skipping her mandatory news conference and threatened by the four Grand Slam tournaments with the possibility of disqualification or suspension if she continued to avoid the media.

Osaka then pulled out of that tournament, saying she deals with anxiety before news conferences and has experienced bouts of depression in recent years.

“Believe it or not, I am naturally introverted and do not court the spotlight,” she wrote for Time. “I always try to push myself to speak up for what I believe to be right, but that often comes at a cost of great anxiety.”

She hasn’t played since Paris, also sitting out Wimbledon, which ends Sunday.

She will return to competition at the Tokyo Olympics, which open July 23, and where she will represent her native Japan.

“It has become apparent to me that literally everyone either suffers from issues related to their mental health or knows someone who does,” Osaka wrote in her essay, adding later: “I do hope that people can relate and understand it’s OK to not be OK, and it’s OK to talk about it.”

On the topic of news conferences, Osaka said she thinks the “format itself is out of date and in great need of a refresh.”

She also proposed giving tennis players “a small number of ‘sick days’ per year, where you are excused from your press commitments without having to disclose your personal reasons. I believe this would bring sport in line with the rest of society.” AP

including Kelsey Plum.

Serbia’s top weapon is Dusan Bulut, who has led the world player points rankings for years.

Bulut has been at the center of Fiba’s battle to grow 3x3 in the United States, where rapper Ice Cube has his Big3 league. He was set to play in the Big3 in 2019 but withdrew, saying Fiba had threatened his Olympic eligibility.

The 35-year-old Bulut appears headed to the Big3 after the Olympics—he was selected third in the league’s draft in June.

Fiba, which emphasizes the “x” for branding, has teamed up with the Kevin Garnett-owned Hoop it Up in the United States.

Fiba Secretary-General Andreas Zagklis eyes more growth.

“We expect these opportunities to rise significantly as the sports industry leaders watch a spectacular 3x3 event in Tokyo and some of our best athletes become national and international stars after winning Olympic medals,” Zagklis said.

First up for the Netherlands on July 24? Serbia.

“They are the team to beat,” van der Horst said, “but we’re working hard so we might change that.” AP

BusinessMirror

Digital games that teach civics through play

July 11, 2021

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BusinessMirror JULY 11, 2021 | soundstrip.businessmirror@gmail.com

YOUR MUSI

ODE TO BETTER TIMES MYRNE on his ‘Wanderinwg’ EP

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By Stephanie Joy Ching

HEN Singaporean DJ MYRNE first played around with what would become his “Wandering” EP in 2019, he never thought he would be reworking two of those songs into something different just a year later.

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: T. Anthony C. Cabangon

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Group Creative Director : Eduardo A. Davad Graphic Designers Contributing Writers

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: Bernard P. Testa Nonie Reyes

Y2Z & SOUNDSTRIP are published and distributed free every Sunday by the Philippine Business Daily Mirror Publishing Inc. as a project of the

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According to the 26 year old artist, the original “Wandering” tracks were first brought to life in between long eight-to-nine hour bus drives during his 2019 tour.

“You could sleep off the first few hours but after that you’re left alone with your thoughts and your music,” he recounted, “In that period I really wanted to make a collection of songs that would soundtrack my life and also to write music about the nature of spontaneity in music,” As an avid hiker and ‘wanderer’, the original reincarnations of “Sleeping on My Own Again” and “Superstructure” were free feeling and outdoorsy, with a smooth dance hook that invoked MYRNE’s reinvigorated love of nature and hiking when he isn’t creating music.

‘I have found a fond love for nature during this time. We were hiking everywhere on days we didn’t have shows,” he said.

However, with the lockdown still in place in his home country, MYRNE finds himself unable to wander as much as he wanted to. Moreover, he finds himself uninspired to make music, as he had “nothing to write about.”

“It’s really hard to stay inspired, like exercise can only go so far.

I’ve been bothered by that but like Henry David Thoreau once said; ‘how foolish it is of me to sit down and write when I have not stood up to live’,” Despite this, he shares that he is still grateful that he and his loved ones are alive and well, though he admits to longing for the atmosphere of big social events like parties.

“I’ve been missing house music a lot, and the energy of live shows, so I wanted to bring those two tracks to life in that context,” he admitted.

This led to him reworking the two songs to soundtrack a different part of his life. To express his longing for better times, he reworks the songs into a

MYRNE

tighter, somewhat claustrophobic groove that invokes the feeling of a massive house party. The outdoorsy feel is replaced with a pulsating beat and a tighter sound to fully invoke the feeling of a cramped yet fun space.

“I’ve always felt that albums are a snapshot in time for an artist, or a measure of modernity.

Every EP or album I’ve ever released will sound dated in some sense in a year or two, so I wanted to rework the songs to see what it would be like in a live environment,” he shared. “Music is always viewed in context, so my musical philosophy is that music in general is the soundtrack of a person’s life.”

MYRNE’s Wandering is now available in major streaming platforms.

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soundstrip.businessmirror@gmail.com | JULY 11, 2021

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BUSINESS

BALONG MALALIM

The deep well of Mike Hanopol’s musical genius

MIKE Hanopol (Photo from his Facebook page)

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By Yugel Losorata

ardly the moment felt like I was with a rock icon as we said a prayer-before-meal at his house.

Truth be told, it reminded me of the opening candle prayer scene from “Schindler’s List” as the intonation of his voice sounded so much like that one heard on the Spielberg classic.

That part of my visit at the place of Mike Hanopol a few years back made quite an impression on me because, to be blunt about it, I was wondering why I was hearing a prayer led by a rabbi rather than sharing a rock n roll anecdote with someone who gave the word hippie a good alternative name. As a music journalist I usually don’t expect to be interviewing a rock god who raises both his hands up in the air and delivers a chant.

I couldn’t help but likewise recall that scene I witnessed at then Hard Rock Café in Makati further back when the audience started glancing at each other because jeproks Mike was kind of preaching while doing some spiel during a Juan Dela Cruz Band show.

In hindsight, Mr. Hanopol on both occasions was not trying to ruin a night or in my case, my day.

He was just being the way he has always been: reinvented. When it

appeared that he had a lot more to offer outside of his pioneering Pinoy rock trio, he went solo and adopted the term, jeproks with the monster hit “Laki Sa Layaw.” When writing rock songs wouldn’t suffice his versatility, he penned a number of novelty tracks meant to be sung by a boy band called Hagibis. Absurdly enough, the public didn’t truly notice it was just Mike singing on their songs including their signature track “Katawan.”

Several years later, he informed me that he was riding on a train when he thought of the melody to “Lagot Ka” popularized by another hunk group called Masculados.

Quite unexpectedly, for someone who had made a big name for himself here, he opted to go to the US and, as the title to one of his solo songs implied, resorted to “Buhay Amerika.” He spent most of the 80s there and, as he told me, he chauffeured for international

celebrities for a stretch, including for Julio Iglesias. He returned back home in the early 90s.

Reinvention never stopped from there. He became a practicing rabbi after converting to Messianic Judaism. You bet that after we had our meal that day, he shared with me the extent of his spiritual conversion. I can’t forget hearing him say, “Swerte ang mga Hudyo.” You’d believe him when he said it because of his conviction and intense delivery.

Sadly the prolific songwriter and schooled guitarist just got back in the news after he contracted Covid-19.

The good news is, he’s recovering or should we say he beat it — at age 75 at that. Not all rock stars from his era die young and someone like him could get past even a pandemic. A concert in support of him is being set come July 24 in Florida, headlined

by Paul Sapiera of Rockstar fame.

The benefit concert is simply billed as “Tulungan Natin,” after one of Hanopol’s own songs.

Not everybody realizes the magnitude of Mike’s contribution to Pinoy Rock. Yes, Pepe was the flamboyant face of their band; but he was the virtuoso whose singing voice had more weight and definitely more talented as a tunesmith and lyricist.

Just a quick look at the list of hits he wrote would settle the argument: “Balong Malalim,” “No Touch,” “Titser’s Enemi No. 1,” and “Kahit Anong Mangyari.” The fact that he was the band’s official bass player put him among the few noted Pinoy rockers who sang lead while playing the traditionally four-string guitar.

Yet, while he could have bragged about it, I don’t recall ever hearing him sound like he did. He even noted, “Iba si Pepe.” He also doesn’t mince

his words, which reflects his blunt honesty. He told me, “Nung panahon namin noon sa Juan Dela Cruz, kahit marijuana lang ang bayad sa amin tutugtog kami.”

We surely would wish that’s an exaggeration. But it was the nature of the times. Rockers then weren't trying to be cute or business-like. Talents like Mike Hanopol were just enjoying themselves without a care and at the same time inadvertently laying down the foundations of Philippine rock as we know it today.

At some point in our conversation, he recalled with a laugh that day he commuted to a record label office to submit a song while virtually having no money in his pocket. He mentioned the name of now Senate President Tito Sotto as the executive who cared to listen to what he composed.

It was kind of Mike to welcome me to his home located in Antipolo for an exclusive interview after I expressed that it would be great to speak to him at a leisure pace. I just read he was in a different place when he contracted the coronavirus.

While overshadowed by his signature solo hit, "Umiikot-ikot" is a track of him that I really like because it shows his trademark emphatic musical hook and simply said inspirational words in arguably finer mix than his older songs.

The bridge part says it all: “Kung ang lahat ng bagay ay kusang lumilipas/Gamitin mo ang iyong galing at husay/Pagkat hindi magtatagal ika’y lilipas din.”

It is subject to debate if the word jeproks for which Mike will always be identified with, had already lost its charm. But we may all agree that it has gone to a new level of relevance, like the word bagets. Both have earned quite a status unlike outdated expressions like dead na dead or kadiri to death. Same goes with Mike Hanopol who will never be some forgotten rock star. Besides, how are we supposed to forget someone who at one point in his life was the epitome of a Filipino hippie and many years later became the first Filipino rabbi? Talking about reinvention.

Digital games that teach civics through play

By Kat Schrier

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Plague Inc.: The Cure

Marist College

here is a lot of discussion in the United States about how to help people come together to solve the complex problems facing the nation and the world.

As a scholar of games, I see opportunities for that popular medium to contribute to this effort.

Games and the gaming community, especially online, are not always models of civility or civic life. Harassment and toxicity, not to mention the spread of disinformation and conspiracy theories, are problems in some games, and in how some people play them.

But in addition to the cruelty in some games, there is compassion, too, just as in other kinds of communities, whether school classrooms, town hall meetings or Facebook groups. For instance, a 2020 study by the Anti-Defamation League, an anti-hate organization, surveyed people who play online multiplayer games and found that 81 percent of players experienced harassment, but 95 percent of those surveyed also had positive experiences, like finding friends and mentors and feeling like part of a community.

In fact, many people of all ages may be participating in civic life without even realizing it—through play. Gamers engage in debates and political discussions, take on others’ perspectives, and even protest issues about both physical and virtual worlds.

As I explain in my book We the Gamers:

In Plague Inc.: The Cure, players can engage in a worldwide battle against a fast-spreading virus. Ndemic Creations Som How Games Teach Ethics and Civics, games can help players practice important skills related to civics and public life, like communication, empathy and compassion, critical thinking and problem-solving. Here are some examples.

Minecraft Minecraft players can find and break apart bricks that yield materials they can use to craft items like tools, buildings and food.

There are different modes of play, like survival mode, where players need to maintain their health by finding resources, or creative mode, where players can modify the game to develop new items or activities within the game. For instance, players in Minecraft may need to think about where to build or which materials to use to create a home or building, just like planners and builders in a real-world community.

In addition, players have used the game to engage in civic-related stories. Last year, thousands of YouTube and Twitch viewers watched Minecraft livestreamers on one particular shared virtual world. While

they played Minecraft, they performed a dramatic narrative related to a fictional election for the president of a world they created, called L’Manberg. In this election, four imaginary political parties competed.

The finale in January 2021 brought in over 650,000 viewers across YouTube and Twitch and dealt with such issues as voter fraud.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons In Animal Crossing: New Horizons, players create their own island, visit others’ islands and collect bugs, fish and other digital critters.

Players can design and clothe their own digital avatars, give items to other players and purchase upgrades for their homes.

They need to express their identity in the game; my daughter’s in-game house has an aquatic-themed living room, while mine looks like a library. Giving gifts that fit the desires of other players requires learning their interests and perspectives.

Learning to express themselves and understand the needs of neighbors helps players feel part of the wider conversation about how society improves the world.

Some games even help players more directly solve civic problems. In the Plague, Inc. series, gamers play as a virus, bacteria or other germ and try to spread it as much as possible. They can evolve the pathogen to spread through insects or to cause symptoms like coughing.

But a recent version, Plague Inc.: The Cure, puts players in the role of fighting the outbreak, much as the world has been working to curb the Covid-19 pandemic. Players try to develop a vaccine or make policies around masking or social distancing and observe the economic and social fallout.

Playing games like these helps people understand complex systems and how the intersection of dynamic factors can play out in a society.

Learning skills for group problemsolving, understanding world crises, observing elected officials—those all sound like civic engagement, social action and activism, even when they’re happening in a digital game.

Games may even be useful ways to explore potential changes in social, political and economic systems. Letting millions of people experiment in a digital world could provide insights identifying productive—and destructive—policies that might be adopted in the physical world. For instance, through the game EterRNA, players are already helping to design new mRNA vaccines that can defend against variants of the coronavirus that causes Covid-19. Games may reveal flaws, opportunities and even solutions to troubling problems.

Digital games provide opportunities to learn, grow, explore and change—not just individually, but in terms of humanity and society as well. The Conversation

Millennials, Boomers more cautious about future tech

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illennials and Boomers in Southeast Asia (SEA) have more reservations with regards to future technologies such as biometrics, smart appliances, robotic devices and deepfakes as compared to those from the Gen Z and Gen X age groups, according to a new research.

Kaspersky’s “Making Sense of Our Place in the Digital Reputation Economy” surveyed 831 social-media users in SEA about their level of fear against the current technological trends. The study, conducted in November 2020, revealed that more than half (62 percent) are afraid of deepfakes. The figure is highest among Baby Boomers (74 percent) and lowest among Gen X (58 percent).

Deepfakes is the use of artificial intel-

ligence to create images, audio, or voice recordings in someone’s likeness, often for political purposes and personal gains. The tool is also being used in major attempts at blackmail and fraud.

SEA respondents are less guarded about biometrics or the use of fingerprint, eye scanner, and facial recognition (32 percent), smart devices (27 percent), and robotic tools like a robot cleaner (15 percent).

The study found out that the vigilance stems from bad personal experiences online.

More than 3-in-10 respondents said they were victims of account takeover, wherein someone got access to their accounts without their permission. More than a quarter (29 percent) also have some secret information seen by someone they would not want to see.

4 BusinessMirror

Aftermaths of these incidents include receiving spam and adverts (43 percent), stress (29 percent), causing embarrassment or offense (17 percent), reputational damage (15 percent), and monetary loss (14 percent).

“Our survey proves that unfortunate incidents can happen online and such have real-life repercussions,” said Chris Connell, managing director for Asia Pacific at Kaspersky. “Technologies are meant to evolve for the greater good, however, there are always learning curves where some amount of fear with action will be vital.”

Training is crucial to help your teams become cyber-aware. Plan a program of learning, with a mix of online learning, classroom (virtual or real-world) and regular advice by e-mail. You could test whether

July 11, 2021

people can spot a phishing attack by setting up a fake phishing e-mail.

The free 30-minute adaptive learning course by Kaspersky and Area9 Lyceum helps with lessons about choosing strong passwords, as well as the importance of endpoint protection and regular software updates.

In the Philippines, Kaspersky is offering free e-gift vouchers (choice of Grab, GCash, or PayMaya) for every purchase of Kaspersky Total Security (valid for 1 year for 1 device) or Kaspersky Internet Security (valid for 1 or 2 years for 1, 3, or 5 devices). The promo runs until July 31, 2021. Participating Kaspersky products are available from official partner stores in Metro Manila, official partner e-stores, and via Shopee and Lazada.