DOST urges MSMEs to submit project proposals for its LIGTAS COVID-19
The Technology Application and Promotion Institute of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST-TAPI) is encouraging the country’s micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) to submit project proposals for 2021 and be part of its Level-up Innovation Government Support for Technologies against the Spread of COVID-19 program or LIGTAS COVID-19.

Based on the statement issued by DOST-Science and Technology Information Institute (STII), the TAPI “has fully implemented” LIGTAS COVID-19 and that six projects received financial support with an aggregate amount of P8 million in 2020.
Prime Innov8 Manufacturing Co., which manufactures disinfectants, is one of the beneficiaries of LIGTAS COVID-19 in 2020, it noted.
"Because of the urgency to address the negative impact of COVID-19, now that new strains have been discovered like the UK, Brazil, and South Africa variants, the program has become more relevant. LIGTAS COVID-19 Program is now accepting project proposals for 2021,” the statement read.
Under LIGTAS COVID, financial assistance is given to qualified MSMEs to enable them to acquire raw materials for the production of relevant essential products used against the spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19), it said.
"The assistance provides as much as P1 million per proponent provided that the proponent shoulders at least 30 percent of the total project cost,” the DOST-STII said.
It noted that the program "is in line with the government’s thrust to address the pandemic under the Bayanihan to Heal as One Act that liberalizes the grant of incentives for the manufacturing or importation of critical equipment and supplies related to activities that respond to mitigating the risks against COVID-19.”