Gunmen shoot Philippine passenger bus, wound 11

An official says suspected extortionists opened fire on a passenger bus in the southern Philippines, wounding at least 11 people on board.

Regional military chief Lt. Gen. Benjamin Dolorfino says two gunmen attacked the bus late Saturday as it was traveling to Pagadian city in Zamboanga Sibugay province.

He said troops rushed to the scene to evacuate victims and track down the attackers. He said the driver was listed in serious condition Sunday at a local hospital.

Extortion gangs and Muslim rebels are known to operate in that part of the country's south. Much of the highway there has no street lights, making it dangerous for motorists to travel at night.

One in three newborns in Philippines 'unwanted'

One in three newborns in the Philippines is unwanted or unplanned, the government said Thursday, as the country struggles with a population explosion and the Church's opposition to birth control.

The fertility rate of Filipino women stood at 3.3 children, even though four out of 10 said they preferred to have only two children, the National Statistics Office said in a statement, citing the results of a national survey.

Among its findings, the study found that 36 percent of all newborn children were either unwanted or "mistimed".

Fifty three percent of births to women aged between 40 and 44 were unplanned, with 84 percent of such births unwanted, it added.

In general, women with a lower level of education and those from poorer households wanted to have more children.

The Philippines population is projected to reach 94 million this year, up by more than five million from the 2007 census count.

The influential Roman Catholic Church, which forbids artificial birth control, has consistently opposed population control programmes. As a result, the government is reluctant to fund family planning schemes.

The survey also found 73 percent of married women would use birth control if it were available, 22 percentage points higher than the 51 percent that did use such methods.

The rate of those wanting, but not having access to, family planning had increased since a similar survey in 2003, it added.

Philippines gives price guidance on 2020,2034 bonds-sources

The Asian order book for the Philippines' $1.5 billion global bond to be issued later on Wednesday has reached $3 billion, market sources said.

The Philippines, one of Asia's largest sovereign debt issuers, has given formal price guidance of around 106 cents on the dollar for the re-issue of its 2020 bonds, one Manila-based source said, citing advice from the issue underwriters.

It also gave price guidance of about 96.25 cents on the dollar for the 2034 bonds, the same source said. (Reporting by Rosemarie Francisco; Editing by Kim Coghill)

Philippines says may cut 2010 revenue targets

The Philippines is looking at reducing revenue targets of its main collection agencies this year as the country's economic recovery is expected to be slow, a senior finance official said on Wednesday.

Finance undersecretary Gil Beltran said economic managers were considering lowering the Bureau of Internal Revenue's revenue goal by about 5 percent to 830 billion pesos ($18 billion) against an 875.1 billion peso target set under the proposed 2010 budget.

The Bureau of Customs's target may be pegged at 275 billion pesos, down from 309.5 billion pesos programmed earlier, he said.

"The numbers are still preliminary. We will announce the final figures once we have approved them," Beltran said, adding the government is taking into account the weak 2009 performance in setting this year's targets.

The Bureau of Internal Revenue, which accounts for about two-thirds of total government tax collections, said it missed its 2009 target by 7 percent as a slowing economy eroded revenues.

The agency said on Wednesday its tax take last year reached 743.4 billion pesos, versus its goal of 798.5 billion pesos.

The Customs bureau also looks set to miss its 2009 target of 273.3 billion pesos, with January-November collections only reaching 201.4 billion pesos.

The government expects to incur a wider-than-expected budget deficit of 293 billion pesos, or 3.5 percent of GDP, this year, as the country funds reconstruction projects after last year's typhoons and as the revenue take remains weak.

Manila was originally looking at limiting this year's fiscal shortfall to 233.4 billion pesos, or 2.8 percent of GDP, from a projected deficit of at least 290 billion pesos in 2009.

To bridge this year's budget gap, the Philippines is looking to raise $3.8 billion overseas, $2 billion of which would come from bond issues.

2 Philippine Coast Guard executives suspended

Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) commandant Admiral Wilfredo Tamayo yesterday suspended his detachment commander and clearing officer in Calapan, Oriental Mindoro in connection with the sinking of the M/V Baleno 9 that killed at least six people late Saturday.

Tamayo said he temporarily relieved PCG Calapan detachment commander Petty Officer 1 Danilo Sanchez and clearing officer Petty Officer 2 Rizal Maligaya who received the Masters’ Oath of Safety Departure (MOSD).

Tamayo, however, said that the suspension is part of standard operating procedure (SOP) and is not an indication that the two have already been found guilty.

“This is not an accusation. We just want to give them time to prepare themselves for the investigation to determine if they are administratively liable, to give them time to express their side. Their

relief is also to avoid accusations that there is a whitewash in the investigation,” said Tamayo.

As of 5:45 p.m. yesterday, six persons were declared dead, 51 missing and 69 survived the tragedy, accounting for a total of 126 passengers and crew.

The fatalities were identified as Leahlyn Peñaranda, 19; John Panagsagan, 40; Hermina Largado, 18-25; Johnny Mutya, 36; Barbara Galanza, eight months old; and Jenelyn Gutierez, 20.

The PCG, assisted by the Philippine National Red Cross (PNRC), the Philippine Navy (PN) and the Philippine Air Force (PAF), continued search and rescue operations yesterday for the passengers of Baleno 9 and M/V Catalyn B, which sank after colliding with a fishing vessel on Christmas Eve.

Coast guard spokesman Lt. Commander Armand Balilo said deep-sea divers have found 12 bodies inside the Catalyn B in addition to the four passengers already confirmed dead, with 11 still missing.

Exploring the depths

American national Matthew Caldwell, who holds the rank of captain in the Philippine Coast Guard Auxiliary (PCGA), was able to get up close to the 79-gross ton wooden-hulled Catalyn B.

“There were at least a dozen bodies. There are two small children and male and female inside and on the floor, really in just the position that they passed away, some were lying down on the floor, they were not floating. Their belongings were also messed up,” Caldwell told reporters yesterday.

He said it took him four minutes to reach the depth of 221 feet, where the vessel was found in its upright position, lying on the sand with its bow damaged. The propeller was partly covered with sand.

Visibility was poor as he was going down, but when he reached the ship he saw its white paint.

A pail filled with cement tied to a rope, with the other end tied to the PCG vessel, served as a weight and was dropped into the water close to the vessel so they would know its exact location. When he was close to the ship he tied the rope to it so it would not be dragged away by the underwater current.

Caldwell circled the wooden-hulled vessel twice, looked through the windows and started counting the bodies for about 17 to 20 minutes before deciding that about 12 bodies were spread out on deck.

It took him 56 minutes to decompress and ascend to the surface.

Tamayo said they could not officially include the 12 bodies reportedly trapped inside the ship “because we cannot be certain if they were humans. They could be dolls or mannequins. We first have to recover the bodies completely and count them visually.”

But Caldwell explained that while they have located the ship and established its position, getting the bodies out would not be an easy task.

“It would be difficult to recover the bodies because of the depth and the dangers involved. This is not a trivial matter,” he said, citing the lack of equipment for deep-sea diving.

“This is a matter of resources and the available time for divers to stay at that depth. Two diver teams would have to be formed for this kind of operation,” he added.

Earlier, the PCG admitted that their divers could only swim up to 120 to 150 feet.

Considering these factors, a team of deep-sea divers can only go down to the depth of 221 feet twice a day and if there are a dozen bodies, it might take them two weeks to finish the job.

The PCG Commandant said they are also considering availing of the services of Malayan Towage which, along with its international counterpart, is reportedly willing to refloat the ship.

However, Tamayo said that for this option they would have to coordinate with the ship’s owner, San Nicholas Shipping Lines.

Racing against time

But hopes of finding survivors or the remains of those who perished in the two accidents get slimmer by the hour as search and rescue efforts continue to yield negative results, Navy spokesman Lt. Col. Edgard Arevalo said yesterday.

Arevalo said five Navy ships scouring some 400 nautical miles off Verde Island have returned empty handed 24 hours after the ill-fated Baleno 9 sank in the area.

“The weather is fine and the sea is calm, so it means if there are survivors or casualties floating in the waters, they could have already been seen by our vessels,” he said.

Arevalo said the 24 hours that already passed could have allowed the bodies to float.

“Within that window, we could have recovered the survivors or the casualties. After 74 hours, the cadavers could have sunk again,” he said, adding that two Islander planes of the Navy and Coast Guard and two UH-1H helicopters have also aided the search and rescue vessels.

The spokesman said the search for the survivors started at around 8 a.m. Monday in what is called the Northern Pass, in between Verde Island and Mindoro.

“This is the most probable area where survivors and casualties could have drifted, but our efforts have yielded negative results,” he said.

He said that the vessels have started retracing their route heading east to west and are now targeting the shorelines.

“We are racing against time because our hopes of finding survivors or casualties are getting dimmer by the hour,” he said.

No overloading

Tamayo, for his part, explained the discrepancy in the passenger manifest. In the MOSD, there were only 20 passengers, but the ship later submitted a list with 47 others in the supplemental passenger manifest and 41 classified as passenger not included in the manifest.

The names in the supplemental manifest represent the “last-minute passengers” or those who signed up after the MOSD had been submitted, while the 19 others who were classified “passengers not manifest” were the drivers and their assistants who accompanied the vehicles loaded on board the ship.

But even if “there is a gap in the manifest, it did not affect the loading,” meaning it did not result in overloading since the total number of passengers and crew on board - 126 - was way below the 284 allowable total capacity.

There are speculations that the maritime incident could have been caused by an open ramp that allowed the ingress of water.

Upon reaching 1.6 nautical miles Southeast of San Agapito, Verde Island in Batangas, water allegedly entered the roll-on, roll-off type vessel through the ramp.

If this was the case, Tamayo said responsibility on the “the overall maintenance of the structure of ship belongs to the ship owner. When they are out there at sea, it is up to the crewmembers already.”

There were also unconfirmed reports that rough waves caused the cargo, which were allegedly loosely tied, to disrupt the balance of the vessel and caused it to sink.

Tamayo said that all these information would be considered in the formal investigation to be conducted by the Special Board of Marine Inquiry (SBMI) to be headed by PCG district Batangas commander Commodore Cecil Chen.

The PCG said the 199-gross ton steel-hulled Baleno 9 carried 87 passengers and 14 crewmembers when it left the port of Calapan in Oriental Mindoro at around 11 p.m. of Dec. 26 on its way to Batangas.

The sunken ship is owned by Besta Shipping Lines which owns four other vessels: M/V Baleno 1, M/V Baleno 3, M/V Baleno 5, and M/V Baleno 8.

Legarda: Government should be responsible

Meanwhile, Sen. Loren Legarda said the latest twin maritime tragedies could have been prevented had government authorities been more careful in ensuring the seaworthiness of inter-island vessels.

Legarda also called on maritime authorities to continuously monitor compliance of shipping firms with existing safety standards and regularly check the seaworthiness of all inter-island vessels.

“With the country experiencing major sea disasters every so often, it is incumbent upon the government to take firm steps to protect the lives of people who depend on inter-island shipping,” she said.

Legarda said the sea accidents underscore once more the shortcomings of the concerned government agencies in the proper monitoring of maritime vessels.

“While accidents do happen, government cannot evade responsibility for its lax enforcement of maritime safety standards,” she said. “While the Maritime Industry Authority has done the right thing in suspending the franchises of the two shipping firms involved in the accident, government must do much more so that we can avoid more sea tragedies.” -Report from Arnell Ozaeta, Christina Mendez, James Mananghaya - By Evelyn Macairan (Philstar News Service, www।philstar.com)

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Philippines confident of creating more 'green' jobs next year

Starting next year, the Philippine government will be able to create more “green" jobs and workplaces and promote economic growth at the same time.

This was announced by the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) after it signed a “green" pact with the Federation of Free Workers, and the Philippine Green Building Council.

Besides generating “green" jobs, the pact will also promote awareness of green workplaces, Labor Secretary Marianito Roque said in an article posted at the department’s website (www.dole.gov.ph).

The agreement will also supplement the government’s new resiliency program slated for next year which includes investments in new industries such as renewable energy and innovative technologies.

The department is working towards climate change adaptation programs through knowledge building, organizational strategies, and green jobs advocacy, Roque said.

Next year, the labor department will also help further raise climate change awareness through the National Green Jobs Conference.

The conference will address concerns of seven sectors with different types of exposure to climate change policy drivers.

These seven sectors are: energy generating sectors, renewable energy sectors, alternative energy sectors, employment sensitive sectors, competition intensive sectors, sectors vulnerable to climate policies and climate sensitive sectors.

The department also urged both labor and management to adjust their work standards to cope with the consequences of climate change.

“All work with [an] environmental component is a green job. I know companies that invest in green jobs, implement green workplace, and promote green jobs," he said in the same article.

Report from with RJAB, Jr., GMANews.TV

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Poor Filipinos on the rise despite economic growth, says ADB

The Philippines holds the peculiarity of being the only country in East Asia where the number of poor people is increasing despite relatively steady economic growth, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) said.

In a study titled ‘Poverty in the Philippines: Causes, Constraints, and Opportunities,’ the Manila-based lender said the country's yearly poverty reduction rate of 0.47 percent is slower than neighboring Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam.

The number could further rise as a result of the global economic crisis and recent increases in the poverty incidence, the ADB warned.

“Because of the current global economic crisis and recent increases in the poverty incidence, the goal of reducing the proportion of people living in extreme poverty may not be achieved," it said.

The poorest provinces in the country are mostly located in Mindanao. These are Tawi-Tawi, Zamboanga del Norte, Maguindanao, Lanao del Sur, Surigao del Norte, and Misamis Occidental. The ther poorest provinces are Apayao, Masbate, Northern Samar and Abra.

Poverty trap “For the Philippines, given the main assumption of gross domestic product growth rate of 1.6 percent and considering three scenarios, the poverty incidence will still be in the range of 21.1 percent to 28.7 percent by 2020. Unless the Philippine economy is able to shift to a higher growth trajectory, it might be stuck in a poverty trap," the ADB said.

The main causes of poverty in the country were the low to moderate economic growth for the past 40 years; low growth elasticity of poverty reduction; weak in job generation and low-quality jobs; and the government’s failure to develop the agriculture sector.

The bank also cited high consumer prices during crisis periods; high population growth; inequality in income and assets, which dampen economic expansion; and exposure to economic crisis, conflicts, natural disasters, and environmental poverty.

The study noted that the poverty incidence among households increased from a fourth to 26.9 percent in 2006, while the number of poor families rose from 4 million in 2003 to 4.7 million three years ago.

Meanwhile, the headcount index went up to 32.9 percent in 2006 from 30 percent in 2003, while the number of poor people jumped from 23.8 million in 2003 to 27.6 million three years ago.

The ADB said, self-rated poverty has ranged from 50 percent to 52 percent for most of 2008, peaking at 59 percent — an estimated 10.6 million Filipinos — in the second quarter.

Large families The poor usually have large families — up to six or more members. “Family size is also positively correlated with poverty incidence and vulnerability," the bank said.

Less than a fifth of households with four members or less are poor, and the percentage doubles to more than 40 percent when the household size is six or more, the ADBsaid.

To ensure better anti-poverty efforts, the ADB said the Philippines needs a more coordinated response to attain higher levels of sustained growth and bolster the country's overall development.

“Poverty reduction will not only benefit the poor themselves but society as a whole. It is in everyone's interest to make poverty reduction a priority," said Camila Holmemo, a poverty reduction specialist at ADB"s Southeast Asia Department.

Key priorities should include strengthened social protection, improved human development, more efficient population management, job creation, infrastructure investments, and continued economic reforms for sustained and inclusive growth, the ADB said।

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Philippines doing better than most emerging economies

Global investment bank Goldman Sachs said the Philippines performed better than most of the next 11 emerging economies (N-11) during the global crisis.

"Within the N-11, Indonesia and the Philippines have positively surprised," Goldman Sachs said in its latest Global Economics Paper.

The N-11 and the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) are 2 terms coined by Goldman Sachs several years ago. The investment bank considers the BRIC as the fastest-growing developing economies, and the N-11 as the ones "worth keeping an eye on" outside of the BRIC.

Aside from the Philippines and Indonesia, other members of the N-11 include Bangladesh, Egypt, Korea, Turkey, Nigeria, Vietnam, Iran, Pakistan, and Mexico.

Goldman Sachs said the Philippines exceeded growth expectations, along with China, Brazil, India, and Indonesia. On the other hand, countries which performed in line with the investment bank's projections include Bangladesh, Egypt, Korea, Turkey, Nigeria, and Vietnam.

Meanwhile, Goldman Sachs said Iran, Pakistan, and Mexico have "largely disappointed" its expectations.

Stronger rebounds

While the BRIC and N-11 saw sharper contractions than developed countries in general, Goldman Sachs said these economies also posted stronger rebounds. The investment bank grouped the BRIC and the N-11 in terms of the differentiation, with the Philippines still at the top tier.

"This group of winners includes Brazil, China, India, Egypt, Indonesia, and the Philippines. They have experienced a relatively mild slowdown, and have shown an impressive rebound in growth and activity this year."

In the middle group are Korea, Nigeria, Turkey, and Vietnam, which have also seen impressive rebounds despite relatively sharp contractions, Goldman Sachs said.

Meanwhile, Iran, Mexico, Pakistan, and Russia belong to the bottom level given the depth of their recessions and sluggishness of recoveries.

"While overall the BRICs and N-11 saw much sharper contractions than the developed countries, they also saw much stronger rebounds," Goldman Sachs said.

World growth

Since 2007, Goldman Sachs said the BRIC has contributed 45% of world growth, while the N-11 countries account for 11%. The Group of 7 (G7), on the other hand, only contributed 20% in the past 2 years.

The G7, a group of industrialized nations, includes Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, United Kingdom, and the United States.

"While the 2000-2006 contribution to global growth was almost equally split between the developed and developing world, the last 2 years saw the trend change sharply, with the divergence mainly driven by the BRICs," Goldman Sachs said.

On an individual country basis, Goldman Sachs said all of the BRICs and 7 of the N-11 (Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Nigeria, Philippines, and Vietnam) contributed more to world growth in 2007 to 2008 than from 2000 to 2006.

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