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President Marcos has streamlined the processes for the building of telecommunications and internet infrastructure as part of the government’s effort to enhance digital connectivity in the country.

Travelers who test positive for COVID-19 upon entering the country may soon be allowed to just undergo home isolation.

The Philippines, under the administration of President Marcos, has filed a total of 97 diplomatic protests over China’s presence and activities in the West Philippine Sea, including 30 lodged this year, the Department of Foreign Affairs said yesterday.

A chemical analysis of 564 food products sold in local markets found that 17 percent of the products or brands had high trans fatty acid or TFA content posing health risk to consumers.

Without providing details, the Office of Vice President Sara Duterte on Wednesday maintained that it “utilized appropriately” the P125 million tagged as confidential expenses last year.

Banking regulators lobbied for the inclusion of two more financial reform bills in the priority list under the Marcos administration, bringing to 44 the number of measures endorsed by the Legislative Executive Development Advisory Council.

Wage setting should be left with the regional wage boards instead of having a uniform legislated wage hike, the National Economic and Development Authority said, noting that regions have varying conditions.

The Department of Justice is building a case of economic sabotage against a network of industry players allegedly involved in an onion cartel that has been blamed for a spike in prices last year, Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla said yesterday.

The Commission on Elections has warned candidates against buying votes in all forms as this year’s barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections approach.

President Marcos will sign into law today the New Agrarian Emancipation Act, which will officially condone at least P58 billion in arrears incurred by more than 600,000 farmer-beneficiaries from his late father’s land reform program under Presidential Decree 27, including agrarian reform beneficiaries under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program of the late former president Corazon Aquino.

Officer examining scanned images.

Established in April 2022, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Border Management Branch (BMB) brings together a range of global programmes working with Member States to ensure a comprehensive approach to border management and crimes that affect the env

July 06, 2023 10:20 PM

India had also taken up with the US vandalism at the Indian consulate in San Francisco earlier this week.

Tel Aviv [Israel], July 6 (ANI/TPS): Israel's Ministry of Tourism reported that in the first half of 2023, 1.97 million tourists entered Israel. The income brought into the country from the tourism was estimated at the income is estimated at 11.7 billion Shekels (USD 3.2 billion) compared to 5.4 billion Shekels (USD 1.46 billion) in the first half of 2022 (an increase of 109 per cent). Unfortunately, this figure was way d

China received at least 5.3 million tonnes of nickel from Indonesia between January 2020 and June 2022, customs data showed.

July 06, 2023 8:30 PM

The Chinese President was inspecting forces operating in a flashpoint region near Taiwan.

The frenzy surrounding the April 2023 cover of Vogue Philippine edition drew my attention to the story of this famous 106-year-old cover girl. As we were already planning a trip to the Rice Terraces in the Cordilleras, I conferred with our tour operator on how to go about visiting Buscalan after Banaue and before Sagada.

We left Batad at mid-morning and precariously maneuvered the winding roads, swerving to avoid landslide debris and incoming traffic. This was a road that needed drivers used to this terrain because the twists and turns were not for the faint-hearted.

By the time we parked in front of the makeshift tourism center, we found out we had it easy; in the past, the first long walk would have been to get to that center. Since it was also a weekday, there were just a few people coming and going. During weekends, buses and private cars queue for guides to get them sorted out and a lot of these visitors return from the mountain village frustrated because Apo Whang-Od retired early for the day. This increase in visitors can be traced back from the time broadcast journalist Jessica Soho featured her in one of her segments in 2017, six years prior to the Vogue cover.

Our assigned guide briefed us on how we should go about the crossing. We went down the mountain we stood on, crossed the river through a footbridge, and went up the mountain across us all the way to the top.

She pointed to a barely visible flag and declared: “Behind that is the house of Apo so, maybe it will take us around 30 minutes.” We were all silent as our driver whispered to us that the first time he went up there, it took him three hours! This was about 12 years ago when there were no clear passageways.

To the right of the tourism center, we saw what looked like a chair lift hooked to a cable line from base to village. We asked if that could be our alternate mode of transport and they laughed. Apparently, it served as a supply line for emergencies. It was intended to be used to transport people but the project did not get the green light from authorities.

Walking sticks in hand, our group headed down an uneven trail of soil, rocks and pebbles for the first 100 meters. Then we arrived on a flat, cemented trail that went all the way to the river where we crossed a foot bridge.

It took us about 15 minutes to get to the river and once we got to the opposite mountain, cemented steps with metal railings guided the climb all the way up to the village. Resting huts and trees provided shelter from the sun and by the time we got to the village. Forty-five minutes had passed.

Vendors lined the path leading to the waiting area where we were told that Apo Whang-Od was taking her lunch. This celebrated centenarian, born as Maria Oggay, has been hand-tapping tattoos on skin since she was in her teens, under her father’s mentorship. She was the first and only female “mambabatok” of her time and at around 16, she was already traveling to neighboring villages, at the request of the leaders of those communities, to tattoo their sacred symbols on individuals who were about to or have undergone transformational moments in their life.

For most men, this was a rite of passage towards becoming a headhunting warrior — this kind of tattoo would take days to finish and payment in kind was expected. For women, such markings were made for fertility and aesthetic purposes because of traditional beliefs that they could take their tattoos with them in the afterlife, unlike material possessions.

A mambabatok can only pass the craft within their bloodline and since Apo Whang-Od is unmarried and childless, her two grand nieces — Grace Palicas and Elyang Wigan — are her personally chosen apprentices.

My husband took a peek of the next room and saw Apo Whang-Od moving about, her dowager’s hump seemingly the only sign of how advanced she was in her years. Her wrinkled skin appeared to be glowing; the lightness of her mood, evident. The interpreter conversed with her (she does not speak Tagalog or English, only Kalinga or Ilocano) and soon my husband was called in and guided towards a low stool.

Deciding to have his first-ever tattoo done in his deltoid area, he requested that instead of three dots in a straight line, he wanted them in a reverse triangle representing the Holy Trinity. This three-dot tattoo is the only one Apo Whang-Od does nowadays and it takes about five minutes to complete. Traditionally, ceremonial rituals like chanting and offering sacrifices accompanied the tattooing but much has changed since then.

Using an inked “gisi” (a bamboo stick with a thorn attached to one end), Apo Whang-Od traced a pattern on the chosen section and used a larger stick to pound furiously for over a minute per dot, until blood and ink poured out of the wounded spots.

The whole process looked painful and raw, but my husband, upon the advice of our tour operator, had been briefed not to show any sign of pain during the process as this usually upset her. I asked him later what it really felt like and he described it as painful but tolerable.

The next order of business was to get her signature on our Vogue copy and all in all, this whole activity cost P400. P100 per dot, times three dots and P100 for the autograph. Money well spent from someone who is surely on the path to being a national artist.

Idle talk during waiting time even mentioned a rumor that Apo Whang-Od was once fetched by helicopter and brought to Manila for some VIPs who wanted her famous “signature” on their skin. This celebrity status, gained quite late in life, has visitors coming from all over the world now, and that number is foreseen to increase even more in the coming months.

The return trek to the tourism center was much easier because it was already late afternoon and pretty soon, we were on the road once again, heading to Sagada.

To say that it was an afternoon well spent would be an understatement. It would be more apt to call it one truly one for the books. To quote Audrey Carpio in her Vogue article: “The stories of the Butbut people and their beliefs will continue to be passed along through the vector of a thorn, plucked from a tree grown in Kalinga soil.”

July 06, 2023 8:02 PM

Asian Insider brings you insights into a fast-changing region from our network of correspondents and commentators.

INFLATION decreased in June 2023 to 5.4 percent from 6.1 percent in May, and economists predict further easing in the coming months if economic conditions remain favorable.

“The trend for the remaining of the year is a continuous downturn with our December inflation possibly hitting less than four percent,” said economist Ronilo Balbieran in an interview on Wednesday, July 5, 2023.

The inflation slowdown in June is primarily attributed to slower food inflation, which declined to 6.7 percent from 7.5 percent in the previous month, according to the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda).

Non-food inflation likewise decelerated to 4.1 percent in June from five percent in May 2023.

The slowdown in food prices is due to slower inflation of meat (0.3 percent from 3.2 percent), eggs and dairy products (11.2 percent from 12.1 percent), and bread and other cereals (11 percent from 11.4 percent).

Neda Secretary Arsenio Balisacan expressed optimism that inflation will decline to within two to four percent by the end of the year.

“We are making progress in managing inflation and we can expect that it will decline to within two to four percent by the end of the year. The government remains committed to protecting the purchasing power of the Filipino people by ensuring food security, reducing transport and logistics costs, and lowering energy costs for Filipino households,” Balisacan said in a statement.

For his part, Balbieran said the downward trend in inflation is expected because of three things: the base effect of the Ukraine-Russia conflict; the slowdown of the world economy for 2023 that cooled down world demand resulting in deceleration of global inflation; and more-than-expected Philippine agriculture growth.

Inflation started to ease in March this year at 7.6 percent from 8.6 percent in February and 8.7 percent in January.

Balbieran explained this is because the country and the rest of the world have already “priced in” the impact of the Ukraine-Russia conflict to inflation.

Agriculture

Economists, including BPI’s lead economist Emilio Neri Jr., anticipate that headline inflation may return to the target set by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas by September or October if favorable conditions persist.

“With the global economy still struggling from weak demand, stable commodity prices should continue to pull inflation back to target. However, we also see upside risks that could prevent inflation from declining faster,” said Neri.

The potential risks include the forecast of El Niño’s negative impact, faster-than-projected economic growth, and challenges in the food, transport infrastructure, and supply chain systems.

Balbieran emphasized the need to accelerate the digitalization and e-commercialization of agriculture and logistics to mitigate these risks.

Balbieran also encouraged Cebuano entrepreneurs to invest in agriculture, highlighting its potential to revitalize other industries and generate more employment opportunities.

The economist challenged entrepreneurs to invest in various industries that play a critical role in growing the agriculture sector.

“If possible, within the scope of your businesses, get into the intersection of infrastructure in transportation, logistics, and digital tools, and think about the welfare of our farmers by bringing e-commerce to them,” he said.

Price levels and inflation started increasing in March 2022 as a result of the Ukraine-Russia conflict which began in February that year. The conflict pushed the prices of many food and non-food-related inputs to the economy’s supply chain like feeds, fertilizer, oil, etc.

Balbieran also pointed out that the easing of inflation can also be attributed to the overall slowdown in the global growth due to many factors, including the Ukraine-Russia conflict, China slowdown, and the probable slowdown of the US economy due to its efforts to contain its own inflation.

Moreover, the first quarter result of gross domestic product for agriculture was welcome news for inflation since a large part of the country’s inflation is driven by agricultural output, Balbieran said.

The agriculture sector posted a surprise 2.1 percent growth in the first quarter of 2023 due to annual increases in the value of production of crops, livestock, poultry, and fisheries, said the Philippine Statistics Authority.

This was a turnaround from the 0.3 percent drop in the first quarter of 2022 and the one percent contraction in the fourth quarter of 2022.

The state weather bureau said recently that the effects of El Niño may last until the first quarter of 2024.

“Importing food from abroad might become less effective in addressing supply problems since El Niño is expected to affect other parts of the world,” Neri added.

Balbieran said “digitalization and ‘ecommercialization’ of agriculture and logistics must be accelerated in light of these risks.”

SPANNING six months, from July to December of this year, Cebu Business Months (CBM) 2023 will feature a series of activities aimed at promoting regional development, introducing new technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), and highlighting entrepreneurship in Cebu.

Business leaders and members of the Cebu Chamber Commerce and Industry (CCCI) gathered at SM Seaside City Cebu in South Road Properties, Cebu City on Wednesday night, July 5, for the opening salvo of CBM’s 27th edition.

The months-long business activity, which carries the theme “Cebu ‘ta Bai-Shaping the Future, Moving Forward,” has four sectors, namely tourism, entrepreneurship, information technology and creative entertainment.

The sectors will hold events and discussions on tourism, regenerative tourism, product development, artificial intelligence, startups, leadership and corporate innovation. It also aims to support micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) and improve the livelihoods of local artists.

CCCI president Charles Kenneth Co said CMB 2023 “aims to highlight regional development by inspiring and motivating through impactful stories while introducing new tourism programs and interventions.

“Entrepreneurship lies at the heart of every Cebuano,” he said.

The overall chairman of CBM 2023 is John Paul “JP” Chiongbian, who said that their goal is to maintain Cebu’s entrepreneurial spirit and position Cebu in the global arena by embracing AI.

“If we embrace it, we believe that Cebu can be a global player in the years to come,” he said.

Tourism

On tourism sector, Chiongbian said it is one of the key drivers in Cebu’s economy.

“We want to promote authentic destinations and food stamping our local cuisines,” he said.

In the coming months, CBM participants will attend various tourism-based events, including the Tourism Congress, Safari Adventure Race, Golf Tournament and Cebu Food Congress. These events will be led by tourism chairperson Cathleen “Kate” Anzani.

Technology

Explaining why businesses must adopt technology, Chiongban’s avatar or the digital representation of himself appeared on screen and told the audience: “Technology will support and promote startups. We’ll be showcasing smartphones, offices and personal spaces.”

Chiongban’s avatar was just made in five minutes. Artificial intelligence refers to computer programs or algorithms that can imitate cognitive processes such as problem-solving and simulate human intelligence.

Under the leadership of Information and Communication Technology and Business Process Management chairman Ryan Tan Yu, CBM’s Innovation and Technology for All 2023 will be providing immersive experiences, learning opportunities, and networking platforms.

The collaboration with technology leaders, entrepreneurs, and innovators will enable participants to explore, learn, and connect through various activities such as panel discussions, programs, pitching sessions, and demos.

Entrepreneurship

Leading the entrepreneurship committee is Anne Gretchen Choa, vice president of the Camden Trading Corp.

The theme for the entrepreneurship sector is “creating conscious and purposeful collaborations,” focusing on establishing connections and collaborations, driving and celebrating innovations, fostering community and mentorship. The aim is to make business decisions that not only lead to profits but also prioritize sustainability.

The committee will concentrate on MSMEs, which are the fundamental pillar of Cebu’s economy. It strives to create business decisions that not only generate profits but also promote sustainability.

According to the CBM leadership, it is crucial to protect the players in the food ecosystem, including SMEs, startups, and proprietors of home-based businesses.

Creative entertainment

The creative entertainment sector, led by Lawrence Po Panganiban, aims to showcase prominent artists and writers who will share their wisdom and insights on how to enhance the local artists of Cebu.

Before the opening salvo ended, CCCI officials went on stage and touched the screen to signal the start of CBM 2023. (UP CEBU INTERN CHRYS CHELSEA BERNALES & CNU INTERN CLAUDINE FLORES)