ROTARY CLUB OF MANILA JOURNALISM AWARDS
2006 National Newspaper of the Year 2011 National Newspaper of the Year 2013 Business Newspaper of the Year 2017 Business Newspaper of the Year 2019 Business Newspaper of the Year 2021 Pro Patria Award PHILIPPINE STATISTICS AUTHORITY 2018 Data Champion
BusinessMirror Tuesday, June 25, 2024 Vol. 19 No. 252
Q
w
EJAP JOURNALISM AWARDS
BUSINESS NEWS SOURCE OF THE YEAR 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 DEPARTMENT OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
2018 BANTOG MEDIA AWARDS
P. nationwide | sections pages |
NEDA HINTS AT TWEAKS
ON RICE TARIFF TOOLS
PAMPANGA POGO PROBE Senator Sherwin Gatchalian, leading the Senate Committee on Ways and Means, conducted an extensive inspection at the raided Pogo (Philippine offshore gaming operator) hub in Porac, Pampanga, on Monday, June 24, 2024. The inspection covered 46 buildings, including six entry and exit gates, along with a KTV bar, bar restaurant, dormitories, and various facilities that together employ nearly 2,000 individuals. Accompanying Senator Gatchalian were PAOCC (Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission) Undersecretary Gilbert Cruz, officials from CIDG/PNP, and personnel from the Special Action Force. Story in A3 Nation. ROY DOMINGO By Cai U. Ordinario
@caiordinario
T
HE National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) said the administration is willing to adjust rice tariffs if global and local economic conditions drastically change. On Monday, Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan told BusinessMirror that the 15-percent tariff was already the optimal rate to provide protection for local farmers and reduce rice prices to benefit Filipino consumers. However, Balisacan, later on told reporters that tariffs are policy
tools that can be adjusted when they become “quite dull” and fail to effect the desired outcome or attain a specific goal. “If [the] situation changes, the government must have that flexibility to re-examine its tools. If the tools have become already quite dull See “NEDA,” A
INVESTING IN HUMAN CAPITAL MUST START NOW FOR PHL–WB INVESTING in human capital within a generation starting today will make the Philippines a rich country before it gets old, according to the World Bank. At the launch of the Philippine Human Capital Review report, World Bank Country Director for Brunei, Malaysia, Philippines and Thailand Ndiame Diop said the benefits of investing in human capital are immense for the country. Diop said the Philippines has a unique advantage over its neighbors, who are expected to age be-
fore they become rich countries. This will allow it to improve its Human Capital Index score which is currently lagging behind its neighbors at 0.52. “So if investment in human capital happens now, the people that will be coming out of the education system and joining economic activities will be equipped to really propel the Philippines to even higher growth, which means that the Philippines will be able to grow at a high rate,” Diop said in a press briefing on Monday. See “Investing,” A
Rice inventory to settle at 3.6MMT, says DA By Ada Pelonia
T
HE Department of Agriculture (DA) expects the country’s yearend rice inventory to settle at 3.64 million metric tons (MMT) despite the “moderate” damage caused by El Niño on palay production. According to Assistant Secretary for Operations U-Nichols Manalo, the projected volume is equivalent to about 93 days of national rice consumption, surpassing the 1.9 MMT recorded in December 2023.
Manalo said the weather phenomenon damaged 191,233 MT of rice at the end of the dry cropping season. This was 2 percent of the department’s 9.2 MMT expected damage due to El Niño. The DA said that if its year-end projection is realized, the national inventory at the end of the year will be the “highest” in at least a quarter of a century, topping the 3.42 MMT recorded in 2010 as per the Philippine Statistics Authority’s (PSA) data. See “Rice,” A
‘Tourist arrivals to post annual double-digit growth’
T
ARAW NG MAYNILA The City of Manila commemorates its 453rd anniversary with a civicmilitary parade at Onyx Street, San Andres Bukid, Manila, on June 24, 2024. The event, featuring cultural performances by local residents, pays tribute to the city’s founding on this day in 1571 by Spanish conquistador Miguel López de Legazpi. NONIE REYES
OURIST arrivals in the Philippines are projected to post double-digit growth annually until 2028, according to the latest outlook by BMI, a Fitch Solutions Company. BMI Country Risk & Industry Research said this level of growth rate will boost the country’s tourist arrivals to 8.3 million in 2025 and 9.4 million in 2028. This year, tourist arrivals are expected to grow 32.6 percent to 6.6 million from the 5 million arrivals recorded in 2023. This, BMI said, is already 81 percent of the 8.2 million tourist arrivals in 2019. “We have a positive outlook for the Philippines’ tourist arrivals in 2024 and over the remainder of
our medium-term forecast period to 2028. We expect arrivals growth to be driven by key source markets in Asia-Pacific, North America and Europe,” BMI said. BMI said the country’s tourism sector’s post pandemic recovery remains under way. The Covid-19 pandemic caused tourist arrivals in the country to contract by 82.9 percent year on year in 2020. The BMI outlook said the lockdown and the shuttering of borders led to tourist arrivals dropping to 1.4 million. However, while the outlook for the tourism sector remains positive, BMI said there are risks on the horizon that could derail the recovery.
“While we have a positive outlook for the Philippines’s arrivals, there are short-term risks stemming from high living costs in many markets globally and tighter credit conditions which will weigh on consumer spending, particularly on non-essential categories such as travel,” BMI said. Citing data from the Department of Tourism, BMI said the data showed there were 1.6 million tourist arrivals in the first quarter of 2024, a 21.3-percent y-o-y growth from the 1.3 million tourist arrivals in the same period last year. The data, BMI said, showed South Korea was the Philippines’s largest source market over the first three months of 2024 with 458,619
arrivals, making up 26 percent of tourist arrivals. This was followed by the US and Mainland China at second and third place, respectively, with 264,690 at 16.9 percent of tourist arrivals and 109,568 at 7 percent of total arrivals arrivals over the first quarter of 2024. The top five source markets, BMI said, were completed by fifthplaced Japan with 105,347 arrivals in the January to March period this year; while Australia ranked fifth with 70,601 arrivals. Earlier, Filipinos spent nearly a trillion pesos on shopping as well as entertainment and recreation services while on vacation here and See “Tourists,” A
PESO EXCHANGE RATES Q US 58.8350 Q JAPAN 0.3684 Q UK 74.3910 Q HK 7.5372 Q CHINA 8.1030 Q SINGAPORE 43.4271 Q AUSTRALIA 39.0488 Q EU 62.9064 Q KOREA 0.0424 Q SAUDI ARABIA 15.6847 Source: BSP (June 24, 2024)