ARTA Council mulls nat’l one-stop-shop center for business

The Anti-Red Tape Advisory Council has agreed to establish the National Business One-Stop Shop and the adoption of one Doing Business Reform Committee to jumpstart the implementation of ease of doing business in the country under the ARTA Law.

This was agreed at the inaugural meeting of the Ease of Doing Business-Anti-Red Tape Advisory Council following the appointment of its first Director General, Atty. Jeremiah B. Belgica and the subsequent appointment of one of its two private sector representatives, Peter Wallace last July 29.

Trade and Industry Secretary Ramon M. Lopez and Anti-Red Tape Authority (ARTA) Director General Jeremiah B. Belgica led the meeting of the Council which discussed a briefing on ARTA and the proposed projects. Other council members present were Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) Assistant Secretary Emmanuel Caintic, Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) Assistant Secretary Ester Aldana, Department of Finance (DOF) Director Angelica Sarmiento, and from the private Sector Peter Wallace with resource person Mr. Guillermo Luz.

They also tackled the designation of permanent alternates and the schedule and hosting of the regular Council meetings.

The EODB-ARTA Advisory Council was created under Section 19 of RA 11032 and is tasked to formulate policies and programs to enhance and improve the country’s competitiveness and ease of doing business as well as promote anti-red tape initiatives. Furthermore, the Council is also responsible for recommending to the Authority issuances of the relevant measures to promote transparency and efficiency in business practices and government service delivery.

Earlier, ARTA echoed its support to the Senate Committee on Finance chair Senator Juan Edgardo “Sonny” Angara, who pushed for requiring all state agencies to report on their antired tape performance and targets on the 2020 budget deliberations.

Angara, one of the authors of RA 11032 or the Ease of Doing BusinessLaw, said the government agencies will be asked to report their initiatives to implement RA 11032 at the budget hearing of the Senate Committee on Finance. Their anti-red tape measures will now also be part of their key performance indicators in exchange of the appropriations they will get.

Following Angara’s statement, the Authority has called on all government offices and agencies to double their efforts to be in line with the President’s directive: To make government service more responsive to the clients’ needs.

All government agencies are called to incessantly see through their anti-red tape initiatives and not just until their 2020 budget proposals are approved.

The Authority is positive that this move will further encourage government agencies to comply with the law, especially now that its Implementing Rules and Regulations is already effective.

In line with this, we reiterate our firm commitment to assist and support all government agencies in their anti-red tape initiatives and efforts.

As part of our mandate to help government agencies re-engineer and streamline their services, the Authority actively pursues and supports initiatives pertaining to the improvement of regulatory management towards better regulatory quality. For one, it is currently undertaking efforts to develop the Regulatory Management System, which shall be comprised of a regulatory management framework, institutional arrangements, a regulatory policy cycle, and enforcement and compliance strategies.