The National Electrification Administration (NEA) has formally laid down to Congress a whopping P70 billion budget to achieve the goal of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. for nationwide electrification of all Filipino households within his term.

NEA Administrator Antonio Mariano C. Almeda forthrightly stated during a Congressional budget briefing that the total energization goal of the Marcos administration “will require total budget of P69.79 billion for the five-year period -- of which P12.77 billion will be needed for 2024.”

In his State of the Nation Address (SONA) last month, President Marcos declared that “alongside power generation, we are also as relentless in pursuing total electrification.”

He primarily stated that “since my assumption into office, almost half a million homes have been given access to electricity. We will spare no effort to achieve full household-electrification by the end of my term – 100-percent is within our reach..”

Taking cue from the President’s mandate, Almeda apprised the House of Representatives that NEA has already “prepared an action plan that will pursue three-pronged strategy” to advance the President’s directive on providing electricity services to all Filipinos.

The NEA-blueprinted strategies, he said, will focus on the Sitio Electrification Program (SEP), Barangay Line Enhancement Program (BLEP); and Photovoltaic (PV) Mainstreaming which delves with the deployment of renewables or hybrid technologies to energize the off-grid domains of the country.

With P12.77 billion funding for 2024, Almeda indicated that the country’s electrification level may already reach 91-percent; then fresh allocation of P15.62 billion will be needed to ramp up energization level to 93.75-percent in 2025.

By year 2026, the warranted electrification budget has been calculated at P14.96 billion to achieve 96.25-percent electrification level; then P14.37 billion outlay must be set in 2027 to escalate electrification target to 98.5-percent.

Almeda further noted that by the end of the Marcos administration in 2028, 100-percent electrification can be pulled off with final P12.08 billion allocation; and that shall cover 17.863 million households.

The NEA chief, nevertheless, admitted that the funding being earmarked for the State-underpinned electrification program is way lower than recommended capital outlay, thus, it is seen that the target would be on catch-up mode starting this year.

On the part of NEA, in particular, its total budget for 2024 had just been set at P4.566 billion – manifestly trimmed versus the required P12 billion financing to gain traction on the targeted 17.05 million households with electricity service connections.

“NEA’s 2024 budget is at P4.5669 billion - comprising of subsidies from the national government in the amount of P1.8 billion; equity from national government in the amount of P470 million; and NEA’s internally generated funds in the amount of P2.27 billion,” Almeda specified.

He qualified that “NEA requested for P14 billion subsidy, but only P1.8 billion was recommended by the DBM (Department of Budget and Management) including contribution in the fiscal year 2024 in the national expenditure program.”

Almeda expounded that “budgetary support from the national government for fiscal year 2024, based on net is 21-percent higher compared to the 2023 General Appropriations Act – mainly due to the inclusion of P470 million equity for release as loan or guarantee to the electric cooperatives.”