The recent enactment of Republic Act 11524, also known as the Coconut Famers and Industry Trust Fund Act (or Coco Levy Act) brings into sharp focus the significance of the coconut industry. “Can we call the coconut industry a sleeping giant?” inquired Agriculture Secretary William Dar in an...
A ray of hope shone through the thick fog of anxiety over the latest COVID upsurge: the signing into law by President Duterte of Republic Act 11534, the Corporate Recovery and Tax Incentives for Enterprises Act (CREATE). It is regarded as a “historic economic reform” that is “one of the...
This year’s Easter observance is muted and subdued by the sobering realities brought on by COVID-19. An unprecedented surge has transformed the NCR+ bubble area from a hotspot into a cauldron of infection with more than 80 per cent of new cases. The trauma of the initial outbreak a year ago...
After months of eager anticipation, the faithful in the Archdiocese of Manila learned from the Vatican the appointment last March 25 of Cardinal Jose Fuerte Advincula, Jr. as their new Archbishop. It coincided with the celebration of the Annunciation, when it was announced to Mary that she would...
For the second year in a row, the faithful will witness this year’s Holy Week solemnity on TV, laptop, tablet or smart-phone screens. They will perform vicariously the ritual waving of palaspas (palm leaves) this Palm Sunday. Images of Christ’s entry into Jerusalem atop a donkey are vividly...
As consumers complain of dizzying hikes in oil prices, or at times, unsatisfied at the amount of rollbacks in recent weeks, the oil companies are consequentially suspect of profit-taking. The deregulation of the downstream oil industry is already traversing roughly 23 years -- yet the fires of...
As public anxiety grows over the renewed spike in COVID-19 cases, increasing the inflow of vaccine supply and accelerating the pace of vaccination have become even more imperative. “We have to keep pace with our neighbors, which except for Indonesia, have (a) lower infection rate than us...
If the prevalence of COVID-19 pandemic is not yet bad enough, there is also now a Senate proposal to put the entire country under a state of emergency due to an African Swine Fever (ASF) outbreak, which has already cost about P50 billion in losses to the swine industry and pushed pork market prices...
With roughly four million of Filipinos out of work, compounded by the incessantly rising prices of basic commodities, Filipino consumers are indeed in a dizzying ride for survival through the economic mare’s nest stirred up by the COVID-19 pandemic. There’s still one item in the monthly...
The Philippine COVID-19 vaccination program is finally underway. For weeks, we could only read about some countries like the United States innoculating hundreds of millions of their people. The Philippines has now joined their ranks as it began its own mass-vaccination program last Monday,...
It was in 1521 that Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan landed in the Philippines at the head of a Spanish expedition to reach the East by sailing West. He planted a cross and led in the celebration of the first mass in the Philippines on Easter Sunday in what church...
Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga of Japan has added a “Minister for Loneliness” to his cabinet in the wake of a rise in suicides for the first time in 11 years. “The number of suicides is on a rising trend. I hope you will identify problems and promote policy measures comprehensively,”...
