Monthly Archives: March 2011

MANILA, Philippines –  The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) would withdraw its controversial regulation requiring private taxpayers to file the equivalent of a statement of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALN) mandatory for government officials.

LINGAYEN, Pangasinan, Philippines – Despite the nuclear crisis in the tsunami-ravaged northeastern Japan, a Pangasinan official said the provincial board is not rescinding a resolution to have a nuclear power plant built along its coastline.

Labor and Employment Secretary Rosalinda Dimapilis-Baldoz has approved and signed the rules of procedure of the single entry approach (SEnA), an administrative mechanism aimed at providing a speedy, impartial, inexpensive, and accessible settlement procedure to all labor issues or conflicts, thereby preventing them from turning into full-blown disputes.

Despite the UN General Assembly declaring that access to safe water is a human right, thousands die each day because of water-related diseases, and many countries are not expected to meet the UN Millennium Development Goals on water. The ILO is working with governments, employers’ and workers’ organizations to identify priorities for investment infrastructure in…

Manila, Philippines (16 March 2011) – The House of Representatives Committee on Ecology approved House Bill Nos. 479 and 896. The approval came after the bill authors agreed to an amendment addressing installed asbestos-containing materials in houses and buildings. A Technical Working Group (TWG) tasked to consolidate the bills would craft the amendment.

TOKYO – Japan’s central bank continued to flood money markets with cash on Wednesday, bringing its total emergency funding to nearly $700 billion as it tries to soothe fears about the economic impact of the catastrophic earthquake, tsunami and unfolding nuclear crisis.

THE Bangko Sentral said Monday it will review its economic assumptions for the year, including remittance and inflation forecasts, taking into consideration the recent earthquake and tsunami and Japan as well as the political tension in the Arab nations.

PARIS (Xinhua) – The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) economies are likely to maintain growth momentum in the first quarter of 2011, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) said Monday.

BAGUIO CITY, Philippines – The implementation of the national government’s conditional cash transfer under the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program or 4Ps to help alleviate the living conditions of the country’s poorest of the poor is being set back by the fact that some beneficiaries do not belong to marginalized families.

MANILA, Philippines – Taiwan has lifted the restrictions it imposed on visa applications and work permits for Filipino workers.

Following is a primer on the health consequences of exposure to radiation: RADIATION RISK Three things, say experts, determine whether a blast of radiation will be harmless, debilitating or lethal: the intensity of exposure, its duration and access to treatment.

AN advocate for the revival of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP) said on Monday that he was not abandoning his cause despite issuing a self-imposed moratorium on it, amid a nuclear power plant’s explosions in disaster-hit Japan and the opposition of some members of the House of Representatives.

The leading proponent of introducing nuclear energy to the country reversed his stand yesterday in the wake of a potential nuclear disaster in quake-hit Japan.

LEGISLATORS support the warning issued by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources against the officials of some 183 local government units (LGUs) who have failed to comply with the implementation of Republic Act (RA) 9003, or the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act.

CEBU, Philippines – A number of policemen in the region were accused of economic abuse by their wives or live-in partners for their alleged failure to provide financial support.

MANILA, Philippines – Banks and other credit card issuers warned congressmen yesterday that a cap on interest rates could force them to close their credit card business.

MANILA, Philippines – Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago branded as unconstitutional and discriminatory a bill seeking to ban women from working for at least 11 consecutive hours during the night.

EXCLUSIVE: A major initiative currently sponsored by United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, the U.N. Global Compact, is being challenged by the world body’s own watchdog agency as financially opaque, unwilling to police its membership and only questionably effective at accomplishing its mission of winning private-sector adherence to the U.N.’s anti-corruption, anti-poverty and environmental goals.

Many of us watched anxiously as Fukushima Daiichi facility’s nuclear emergency unraveled over the weekend. The situation has added to the intense stress and heartbreak Japan has been experiencing since Friday’s 8.9-magnitude earthquake and the subsequent tsunami.

The nuclear energy option will continue to be considered by the government, officials said over the weekend, with lessons from a disaster in Japan to be incorporated into any policy decision. An explosion on Saturday at a unit of the quake-hit Fukushima nuclear power plant north of Tokyo has raised meltdown fears and highlighted the…

MANILA, Philippines – A Catholic priest, who is among the country’s top legal minds, has compared the Inquisition to the Ayala Alabang ordinance requiring people to secure prescriptions before they are allowed to buy condoms and other contraceptives in the village.

HIGH power costs continue to deter potential investments in semiconductor and electronics, according to industry executives.

THE government has released funds to enable qualified public school students to study in private educational institutions.

REPORTED meltdowns of the nuclear reactors of Japanese power plants in the wake of an 8.9-magnitude earthquake late last week prompted a lawmaker over the weekend to seek the conversion of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP) into a natural gas-fired energy generator.

ATTENTION incoming college freshmen: If you want to be sure of landing a job after college, take a course on information technology (IT), hotel and restaurant management or accountancy. This was the advice of Jay-Jay Viray, managing director of an online recruitment portal company.

STATE-RUN Philippine National Railway (PNR) has secured multibillion-peso funding from the national government to revive its defunct line from Manila to Bicol.

Business groups yesterday demanded the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) to speed up the implementing guidelines for the open access scheme on electricity that will allow major power users to choose where to get their supply, saying that the start of the scheme is long overdue.

MANILA, Philippines – London-based Barclays Capital sees the peso strengthening only at 41.50 to $1 instead of 40 to $1 this year due to the continued increase in global oil prices.

MANILA, Philippines – US-based Citigroup has ruled out the possibility that inflation in the Philippines would hit double-digit levels — like what happened in 2008 — due to the steady rise in global oil prices.