Monthly Archives: June 2010

PHILIPPINE-BASED contact centers view as a potential threat the proposal of a US senator to impose restrictions and charges on companies that will outsource some operations to other countries. The US bill is meant to protect American jobs and discourage outsourcing, but some experts say outsourcing actually helps US businesses seeking to survive the crisis…

If stupidity got us into this mess, why can’t it get us out of it? The top story in this paper’s Monday edition was “Experts pitch BNPP to Aquino.” They didn’t actually pitch the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP) to Aquino. They pitched it to the media at an orientation seminar and tour of the…

CEBU, Philippines – The petitions for wage increase filed by the Trade Union Congress of the Philippines and the Cebu Labor Coalition remain in the shelf of the Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board until now.

Dear PAO, Do employees who have been working for almost 10 years have a right to make contributions to the Social Security System (SSS)? Louie

Japanese companies have raised the high local electricity prices, the lack of infrastructure and the need to improve the tax refund system between Japan and the Philippines as among the major constraints to the exchange of benefits under the Japan-Philippines Economic Partnership Agreement (Jpepa), the first free trade agreement for the country.

CONSUMER and sex education will be taught to students in elementary and high-school students beginning this school year, the Department of Education has announced.

CEBU, Philippines – The small and medium industries that don’t have their own generator sets are taking the brunt of the recent power outages brought about by the lack of supply for the Cebu-Negros-Panay Grid.

While there is no denying the fact that the quality of today’s local lifestyle and fashion magazines has improved a hundredfold both in visual appeal and content since the days of newsprint and smudgy ink, personally I have yet to find a magazine that speaks to me and talks about women my age. Sure, I…

MANILA, Philippines – Local parts makers yesterday expressed support for the newly signed Comprehensive Motor Vehicle Development Plan (MVDP) or Executive Order 877 saying the new law will be a big help in ensuring that the industry remains competitive.

Once again Tuesday last week, it was made painfully clear to me why we need to have reproductive health information and family planning options readily available from responsible channels to prevent tragedies. My wife was riding with a friend when her friend’s driver got a cell phone call that got him very troubled. My wife…

CAMP OLIVAS, Pampanga  , Philippines – Two construction workers were buried alive when heavy rains triggered a mudslide on a mountainside in Olongapo City Monday afternoon, authorities said.

MANILA, Philippines – The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) yesterday said the annual report of the secretary-general to the United Nations Security Council on Children and Armed Conflict regarding isolated incidents committed by the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) have been investigated and were found to be false.

MANILA, Philippines—As wage boards deliberate on a pay increase for Metro Manila workers, the research group Ibon on Tuesday called on the government to approximate the wage hike to the estimated family living wage, saying the value of the P382 minimum wage in the metropolis was now worth only P235.

About 11 million Filipino households remain without access to the banking system, Bangko Sentral Gov. Amando Tetangco Jr. said Monday.

THE Elections Commission has declared the first 34 congressmen who will represent 27 organizations that won under the Party-list system in the May 10 elections.

DESPITE calls from economists for the incoming administration to increase the country’s value-added tax (VAT) rate to 15 percent, the University of the Philippines Open University (UPOU) and Code: Reforms for Economic Development (CODE: RED) warned on Monday that this could cut consumption, increase poverty and endanger the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

PRESIDENT-APPARENT Sen. Benigno Aquino III is keeping his options open to the possibility of tapping nuclear energy to address a worsening power-supply shortage.

First-quarter GDP grew by 7.3% to the surprise of many analysts, including myself. That’s the good news. The bad news is that the first-quarter growth is not the type that you want to build on. It’s unsustainable, largely debt-driven, and non-inclusive.

A think tank backed by the state-owned University of the Philippines said proposals to again increase the sales tax or the value added tax (VAT) to 15 percent from the current 12 percent to resolve the back-to-back budget blowouts last year and this year of around P300 billion a year may further increase the number…

The government’s own statistics office confirmed what the Palace has been trying to dispute which was election spending as the main driver of the relatively high 7.3 percent growth in the first quarter.

AQUINO TOLD MANILA, Philippines—A labor group has urged apparent President-apparent Benigno Aquino III to persuade American lawmakers to pass a bill that seeks to revive the textile and apparel trade between the United States and the Philippines, and create thousands of new jobs in both countries.

Neither the many congressmen who went to the Smartmatic plant in Sta. Rosa, Cabuyao, for a testing of the precint count optical scan (PCOS) machines under controlled surroundings, nor the camp of former President Joseph Estrada were impressed or convinced that the automated election system, as programmed by Smartmatic, has yielded accurate results, and was…

Millions of Filipino children and youth are in one or more ways suffering the ill effects of poverty. Malnutrition, lack of access to good quality education and health care, parental neglect, exposure to domestic violence and drug abuse, sexual abuse and other forms of exploitation, are more common than most of us would like to…

CABUYAO, Laguna , Philippines  – There may have been no “hocus-PCOS” after all. A staunch ally of deposed President Joseph Estrada said Smartmatic had successfully demonstrated that it was “not possible” to tinker with the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines to manipulate the results of the country’s first automated elections.

MANILA, Philippines – Monetary authorities are expected to review the country’s latest inflation forecast during the meeting of the central bank’s Monetary Board on June 3 in light of the stronger-than-expected gross domestic product (GDP) growth in the first quarter of the year.