NUSA DUA (AFP) – The Asian Development Bank (ADB) called Monday for a fundamental “rebalancing” of regional economies in response to the global crisis, while predicting a “mild recovery” next year.

The World Health Organization says countries must not lower their guard in the response to the swine flu outbreak.

EU economies will contract by 4% in 2009, the European Commission has forecast – more than twice what it predicted at the start of the year.

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MANILA, Philippines – Despite the global financial crisis and the massive layoffs in the country, more workers are still buying their own homes.

A disturbing trend in our society today is the increasing number of litigations. Records show that courts and government agencies vested with quasi-judicial functions are swamped with numerous civil, criminal, political, labor, administrative, and a potpourri of other cases arising from legal conflicts and clashes of rights.

MANILA, Philippines – The Commission on Higher Education (CHED) will not be able to implement the two-year pre-university level system for academic year 2009-2010.

NUSA DUA – More than 56,000 children in Asia will die as a result of the economic crisis gripping the world economy, the Asian Development Bank said Sunday.

The time is always right to do what is right. — Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. Always do right; this will gratify some people and astonish the rest. — Mark Twain

NUSA DUA, Indonesia – Asian countries must boost domestic consumption and end their dependence on exports as external demand plunges amid the world economic slump, the Asian Development Bank chief said Sunday.   

MANILA, Philippines – Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ralph Recto has reiterated that oil companies have been charging roughly P8 more per liter than the estimated gasoline price in the market.

MANILA, Philippines – The government is looking at building one grand central station in the North to make it more convenient for commuters to use the Light Rail Transit (LRT) and the Metro Rail Transit (MRT), one of the contractors of the project said.

NUSA DUA, Indonesia – The Asian Development Bank (ADB) will boost lending to the region’s poorest nations by more than $10 billion over two years, warning Saturday that the global economic crisis is jeopardizing the UN’s goal to halve poverty by 2020.

MANILA, Philippines – The Congressional Planning and Budget Department (CPBD), the think-tank of the House of Representatives, said the government should review the Oil Deregulation Law to help curb smuggling in the country.

MANILA, Philippines – The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) has agreed to give banks some regulatory relief to facilitate borrowing at a time when the economy is bracing against the impact of the global recession.

STATE-RUN Home Development Mutual Fund (Pag-IBIG Fund) said it approved a new loan program for its out-of-work members to mitigate the impact of the global financial crisis.

HAMBURG, Germany: From Yantian to Hamburg, world trade is in the doldrums and Christian Blauert, who heads the largest container terminal in Germany’s northern port of Hamburg, needs only check the webcams to know things aren’t getting better.

Ask 46-year-old Filipino woman how many children she has. “Ten,” said the woman, who asked not to be identified. “But I was supposed to have only six,” she added, snapping in a breath.

MANILA, Philippines – Washington has acknowledged that Philippine security forces are making progress in the fight against terrorism.

MANILA, Philippines – The worldwide mobile phone market started 2009 with an expected sequential downturn, exacerbated by the challenges of the worldwide recession.

Malacañang yesterday said the government will do all it can to alleviate the plight of workers despite the limited power of the President to rule on wage adjustments.

The country chalked up another dismal world record yesterday after a United Nations-backed report stated the biggest number of internally displaced people last year was in the country where an estimated 600,000 Filipinos fled fighting between the government and a break-away faction of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) after the aborted signing of the…

VIRAC, Catanduanes: Each day starts early for Aiza, her sister Angeline and their mother Emily.

AFTER a decade of one of the largest social reform movements ever seen, the end of child labor is now within grasp.

THEY are called “Shine Girls” in Davao. Batang tun-og or “children of the evening dew” in General Santos. “Vitamin C” in Cagayan de Oro.

“PROSTITUTION” to pay for school fees is just one of the many guises of children in the Philippine flesh trade.

“The government is committed to reduce and finally eradicate the incidence of child labor,” Labor and Employment Secretary Marianito Roque told The Manila Times. “Most of the country’s child labor arises from poverty in the countryside. That is why we launched last year our four-year project to help indigent parents send their children to school.”

“HOw can CARP be extended “with reforms” but without audit? How will the taxpayers know whether the new extension law will address the real causes of CARP’s failure during the past 20 years?

There is a no need to allow foreigners to own land in the country to encourage more foreign direct investment (FDI), the Federation of Philippine Industries (FPI) said.

WASHINGTON — Press freedom declined worldwide in 2008 as even once-unfettered nations such as Israel and Italy imposed new limits on media coverage, according to a report by media analysts.