THE PHILIPPINE Economic Zone Authority (PEZA) will keep its target for 2010 despite slow growth in the past three quarters as most investments come in September to December, an official said.

LOCALLY MADE vehicles have lost ground to imports eight months into the pilot year of a duty-free scheme, industry data compiled by BusinessWorld showed.

SENIOR CITIZENS will now be able to get a 5% discount on more food and basic items after the Agriculture and Trade departments tagged additional commodities other than those mentioned under Republic Act 9994 or the Expanded Senior Citizens Act of 2010.

Popular culture has given us the more lasting portrayals of the “typical” bully—usually a boy, big and burly, from whom other kids generally stay away for fear of being harmed, taunted, or forced into submission into doing things against their will.

HEALTH Undersecretary Alexander Padilla said Sunday he will assume the position of chief operations officer of Philippine Health Corp. next month to sign up more members.

THE Commission on Elections said Sunday it will suspend the proclamation of winning candidates in today’s village or barangay council elections who are found to have violated the three-term limit set by law and file cases against them.

Last Sept. 29, Meralco announced the strong likelihood of its exceeding the company’s core net income target of P11 billion for 2010. Set on top of its reported P7-billion income for 2009, this is already well beyond a whopping 60-percent profit growth that’s sure to signal a lot more happier days for the power firm.

Twelve thousand five hundred twenty-six (12,526) child laborers were benefited from Angel Tree Project (ATP) of the Department of Labor and Employment (DoLE) that granted their wishes for food, clothing, schooling and other forms of assistance, said DoLE Secretary Rosalinda Baldoz.

CALIFORNIA, United States—Nimfa and Margaret are both special education teachers who obtained “J1” visas to teach in two different school districts in the United States.

MANILA, Philippines—With identical scores of 99.7 percent, four young Filipino numbers aces were among 65 students worldwide who topped the 2010 Australian Mathematics Competition (AMC), which drew about 400,000 contestants from at least 40 countries when it was held in August.

MANILA, Philippines— For inspiring popular interest in science and math through her weekly column “Eureka!” in the Inquirer Learning section, Queena N. Lee-Chua is the first winner, jointly with Malaysia’s Mahaletchumy Arujanan, of the Regional Prize for Public Understanding of Science in the East and Southeast Asia and the Pacific from the Third World Academy…

For sure the country’s basic education system is beset with many problems and past administrations have tried to solve them. Past regimes, have vowed but failed to resolve the perennial shortage of teachers and classrooms.

Filipino engineers and other professionals struggle to obtain international accreditation to meet requirements for jobs abroad because our basic education is only 10 years, two years shy of the international standard. Now, there is a strong move to increase basic education by two more years to make our high school graduates employable and our professionals,…

DESPITE the most respected experts’ agreement that it is urgent and necessary to reform the country’s basic education system with something like the Department of Education’s Enhanced K+12 program, it will surely face rough sailing. Mainly the difficulties arise from lack of funds and the opposition mounted by populists, leftists, anti-administration politicians and educators claiming…

SEATTLE – Women across nearly every income level gave significantly more to charity than men, nearly twice as much in some cases, according to a study by the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University.

The Philippines is ill-prepared to embark on the ideal 12-year basic education curriculum, at least for now, lawmakers eyeing the money problem say. The Enhanced K+12 program will add two years of senior high school to the current system and will be implemented beginning school year 2016 to 2017.

Tabuk City, Kalinga – Two pocket miners have died due to alleged gas poisoning and suffocation after they were trapped inside a small-scale mine tunnel in section Umbog, Bagtayan, Pasil town over the past several days.

MANILA, Philippines—Let me make it quite clear: I am pro-life, pro-poor, pro-women. And therefore, like most Filipinos (average of 82 percent according to a Pulse Asia Survey, but ranging from 76 percent to 91 percent across all geographic areas and socio-economic classes), I am in favor of the government providing family planning information and services…

“Honor and Excellence’’ was the heart of Prof. Winnie Monsod’s last lecture for the recently-concluded semester at the University of the Philippines-Diliman School of Economics. For her students, her words and fervent advices always bring a good note to end the term.

MANILA, Philippines—Solita C. Monsod, University of the Philippines School of Economics professor emerita, endorses the Aquino administration’s Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) program, which goes by the brand-name Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program. I, a UP kickout, reject it.

LAST October 3, we discussed the need for the Aquino III administration to do “best practices called the 4-Cs” within its first 200 days. Recall the record of President Aquino III’s first 100 days which materialized well below what was anticipated, considering the nationwide optimism at his inaugural on 30 June and further boosted after…

CITING the small number of big corporations participating in biodiversity conservation, nevertheless, it was pointed out that the presence of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) is needed to be actively and positively involved in biodiversity promotion.

Monsignor Juanito Figura said if a law or state policy is against Christian teachings, the Catholics are not bound by conscience to obey. Is he advocating anarchy against his elected government? A government that is responsible to all people, not only Catholics. A Bishop said “civil disobedience remained an option if the Aquino administration pushed…

Manila (22 October) — Labor and Employment Secretary Rosalinda Baldoz recently said that the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) will develop information materials on productivity and labor standards, including occupational safety and health (OSH), in the Chinese language to promote voluntary compliance with labor laws while improving the productivity of Filipino-Chinese owned firms, especially…

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates—Human Rights Watch has slammed a ruling by an Emirati court which condones the beating of wives by their husbands, saying it sends out a signal that violence against women and children is acceptable.

Buhay Party-List Rep. Irwin Tieng, one of principal authors of the “anti-cyberboso law,” has expressed alarm over the rising incidence of “cyberbullying” whereby children in schools all over the country are being harassed by their peers using mobile phones, social networking sites and other means in the Internet.

MANILA, Philippines—Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. has thumbed down the demand of some party-list representatives to be given an additional P50 million in pork barrel following the decision to provide the amount to regular members of the House of Representatives starting next year.

BOSTON — There are countless distractions, threats, and roadblocks to getting work done. Good bosses take pride in shielding their people from these annoyances. Here are three ways you can help your employees focus on what matters as adapted from “The Boss as Human Shield” by Robert I. Sutton:

TACLOBAN CITY — The German Technical Cooperation (GTZ) is assisting the Philippine government in developing “green” growth strategies for enterprises to deepen the business sector’s involvement in efforts against climate change.

Three Filipino English teachers were recognized as outstanding foreign experts by China’s Jilin Province for contributing to the province’s economic and social development.