THE PHILIPPINES’ 2012 growth forecast could be raised by the Asian Development Bank (ADB), with its country chief noting improved investor sentiment, recent ratings developments and fiscal gains.

SEOUL – Companies in Asia’s leading economies have “strikingly” few women in senior jobs, missing out on a vital pool of talent to fuel the region’s growth, consultancy firm McKinsey & Company said Sunday. In a survey covering 744 firms of 10 major stock markets in the Asia-Pacific, McKinsey said women on average account for…

The Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) said combined net income grew by 24 percent to P134.66 billion in the first three months of 2012 from P108.60 billion in the same period last year due to better performances showed by financials, industrial, property and holding firms sectors.

Labor groups expressed alarm at the growing anti-labor position of many of the country’s national leaders. The labor sector is the most abused sector in the Philippine economic equation, bowing to the influences of money sources or investors, the object of government’s wooing and cajoling, offering them everything, from tax holidays to guarantees against labor…

Congressmen representing marginalized sectors have merged into a formidable bloc at the House of Representatives. Now, the 56-member bloc appears bent on taking measures to gain one of the 24 Senate seats.

DAVAO CITY, Philippines – Suspected New People’s Army (NPA) rebels torched six trucks Saturday night in Quezon, Bukidnon, the military said. Officials of the Army’s 4th Infantry Division said several armed men on board five vans flagged down the trucks at around 10 p.m. Saturday in Barangay Puntian, Quezon town.

2 July 2012 – With three important targets on poverty, slums and water having been met, a new United Nations report stresses the need for a true global partnership to achieve the remaining Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by the 2015 deadline.

Three Philippine universities have been listed as among the world’s best in teaching English, according to London-based research and ratings firm Quacquarelli Symonds (QS). QS’ World University Rankings by Subject included Ateneo de Manila University, University of the Philippines, and De La Salle University on the Top 50 in its English list.

MANILA, Philippines – The government is looking to develop the country’s rubber industry to take advantage of an expected increase in the production of tires of its major market, a trade official said.

According to one study I had just recently come across, about 21 percent of the remittance of a migrant worker is already “lost” even before the intended recipient could receive the transmitted amount. This puts a different side on one of my favorite mantras, i.e., the need for Filipinos migrant workers to put their remittances…

MANILA, Philippines – The Export–Import Bank of Korea sees an influx of Korean companies relocating their operations from China to emerging market economies led by the Philippines due to rising costs.

For the first time ever since I could remember, the Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) sent their monthly electric billing to their consumer households with a leaflet to explain where and why they charge higher rates. The leaflet is enclosed in the Meralco bill envelope for the month of June that I got recently.

MANILA, Philippines – A 35-year old electrician died yesterday afternoon after he accidentally touched a live wire while trying to install a power line in Quiapo, Manila.

MANILA, Philippines – The government has allowed the deployment of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) to 188 countries that complied with Republic Act 10022 or the amended Migrant Workers Act.

MANILA, Philippines – The rising incidence of child labor in the country was not only due to poor enforcement of labor laws but also caused by the failure to enact the Reproductive Health (RH) bill, Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman said yesterday.

MANILA, Philippines – From modern-day hero to heel: that’s effectively how a legislator describes reckless seafarers who access commercial sex abroad and pass on the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) to their family back home.

They weren’t surprised by the bad news. In fact, the employees of Ford Motor Co. Philippines’ assembly plant in Sta. Rosa, Laguna saw it coming.

MANILA, Philippines – A water station employee was killed after a concrete slab fell on him from the fourth floor of a condominium building in Sampaloc, Manila Friday.

MANILA, Philippines – The New York-based Human Rights Watch yesterday said that the absence of successful prosecution of human rights violations highlights the broader problems on extra-judicial killings facing the Aquino administration.

MANILA, Philippines – The Philippines is one of the three Asian countries where amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS) are mainly produced, a United Nations report said. “Nowadays, ATS manufacture is concentrated mainly in China, Myanmar and the Philippines,” a report prepared by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) said.

Do you like office meetings? If you’re normal, you don’t really look forward to those. But leaders know that they need to hold meetings, and they know how to make these meetings productive encounters with their people. There are, however, some “bosses” who behave more like jerks than leaders holding endless meetings that waste people’s…

The rise in the number of children at work could be traced to the absence of a Reproductive Health (RH) law in the Philippines, a senior member of the House of Representatives said on Friday.

CHURCH, HR GROUPS POUND ON NOY’S FAILURE TO PROTECT RIGHTS The second year of the Aquino administration was highlighted yesterday by a contrast between achievement or the lack of it and spins on more promises of what President Aquino intends to achieve in his four remaining years in office with both human rights groups and…

DOLE enforces new pay system today It may be considered the end of an era on Metro Manila roads, one that is partly blamed for the undisciplined behavior of drivers in the public transport sector.

MANILA – More units of donated blood has been contaminated with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) during the first five months of this year, the Department of Health (DOH) reported.

DISTURBING and worrisome is how the government should look at the findings of the survey financed by the International Labor Organization (ILO) showing that there are 5.59 million child laborers in the Philippines, with most of them working in hazardous conditions.

You and I are living in a culture of performance. Comparing ourselves with the next person has become a norm. Advertising has convinced us that we should always look better, feel better and make others eat our dust.

“I need money for school expenses. Good thing there are call centers,” said Maria Christina Bactol, 22, an industrial engineering student from the University of the Philippines Diliman.

Microinsurance can play a key role in alleviating poverty and has expanded dramatically over recent years. But as a recent ILO study explains, it takes more than a good idea to sell a product.

MANILA, Philippines – The Department of Trade and Industry has issued an administrative order removing the expiration of gift certificates, checks and cards. Trade Undersecretary Zenaida Maglaya said that the order was issued last June 25 and would become effective upon its publication in early July.