FIA, new retail trade bill, Public Service Act amendments pushed

WITH the country’s economic managers eyeing the shift to a modified general community quarantine (MGCQ) and following the recent move of the House of Representatives to adopt Senate Bill 2057 to expedite the procurement and administration of vaccines for the protection against Covid-19, lawmakers on Wednesday said now is also the time to pass key economic measures that will liberalize the economy and the bill providing another stimulus package.

AAMBIS-OWA Rep. Sharon Garin made a statement after five key business groups—the Foundation for Economic Freedom, Federation of Filipino-chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry, Management Association of the Philippines, Subdivision and Housing Developers Association, and the UP School of Economics Alumni Association—released a joint statement urging Congress to expedite the passage of economic and constitutional reforms.

Garin, principal sponsor of the New Public Service Act (House Bill 78), Foreign Investments Act (House Bill 300), and Retail Trade Liberalization Act (House Bill 59), said these bills will make the Philippines more accessible to foreign investments and open new economic opportunities for Filipinos. The National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) had identified these as crucial measures to aid the country’s economic recovery,

Garin said these bills will provide much-need investments to supplement Filipino capital as the economy gradually recovers from the adverse economic impact of the pandemic.

“These economic reforms will boost the country’s performance and competitiveness. By reducing some restrictions, we can look forward to more jobs being generated, improved quality of human resource, and sustainable economic growth,” Garin said.

She added that the bills espouse the goal of providing a “stronglyrooted, comfortable, and secure life” for all Filipinos inscribed in Ambisyon 2040. As of March 2020, the House of Representatives has approved the three key bills on third and final reading.

Charter change

IN January 2021, political power blocs in the House of Representatives also manifested their support to ease foreign restrictions in the Constitution. Garin underscored the importance of new capital, ideas, and technology as the country treads the road toward economic resiliency.

As debates on the adoption of Resolution of Both Houses Number 2 (RBH 2) get underway, House Ways and Means Chairman Joey Salceda, for his part, said that approving proposals to amend the restrictive economic provisions of the Constitution will address the “staggering” cost of the country’s inability to open its doors to foreign investments.

Salceda told the House plenary that the Philippines had the tightest foreign direct investment (FDI) restrictions, performing poorly in terms of accumulating FDI stocks.

“In other words, we opened the fewest doors, so we were visited by the fewest opportunities,” said Salceda.

Also, Garin said passage of these economic bills and the bill on the Covid-19 Vaccination Program will help the country recover from the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

For his part, Speaker Velasco said the crucial fight against Covid-19 is the vaccination of a significant part of the population to attain herd immunity and return to normal, noting that the country could no longer absorb the economic losses of any further restriction in economic activity.

On Tuesday, the House adopted the Senate version, Senate Bill 2057, establishing the Covid-19 Vaccination Program that would expedite the vaccine procurement and administration processes. The House and the Senate will no longer need a bicameral conference meeting following the House adoption of the Senate bill. The proposed “Covid-19 Vaccination Program Act of 2021” would appropriate a P500million augmentation to the Philhealth as an indemnity fund.

Bayanihan 3

MEANWHILE, Salceda said Congress should also pass another stimulus package during the worst of the economic crisis.

“We need to face certain difficult truths. When the House pushed for an aggressive spending package, we were told that a credit stimulus measure was more preferable. We were told that credit measures could be leveraged at least five times,” said Salceda during a technical working group meeting of the House Committee on Economic Affairs.

As of January 2021, Salceda said equity infusion into government financial institutions under Bayanihan 2 has not yet been released. Also, he said credit growth

went negative for the first time in December 2020.

“And if we were hesitant to adopt big spending, at least we should have done the other measures in that bill. It’s painful to see that the interventions proposed there are working in other countries. We should have coupled credit interventions with zero or negative interest loans and interest rate subsidies. We should have done credit mediation and refinancing. We should have written off agrarian reform debt,” he added.

Salceda, along with Garin and Majority Leader Martin Romualdez, filed his own version of Bayanihan 3 in November.

SALCEDA: “When the House pushed for an aggressive spending package, we were told that a credit stimulus measure was more preferable. We were told that credit measures could be leveraged at least five times.”