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By Luis Leoncio  The Duterte administration must take prompt and decisive steps to raise agricultural productivity if it is to make a dent on the 25-percent poverty rate that the previous administration failed to address, despite its claims of the country’s steady economic growth, according to an agricultural expert.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has endorsed the initial fiscal policy actions of the Duterte administration, primarily the proposed increase in government spending that would raise the closely watched shortfall in the budget.

Telecommunications giant Globe Telecom has denied allegations it was blocking the Philippine Competition Commission (PCC) from exercising its mandate by seeking a court order to prevent the antitrust body from reviewing the P70-billion sale of San Miguel Corp. (SMC) unit Vega Telecom to Globe and Philippine Long Distance Telephone (PLDT) Inc. 

Export receipts continued to dip for the 14th consecutive month in May because of weak global demand, raising the need to refocus export strategies of firms, the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) said. 

By Luis Leoncio The P3.35-trillion proposed budget for next year will contain P80-million appropriations for each legislator but these will not be pork-barrel allocations since they will be incorporated as specific items in the draft budget, Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno said. 

By Luis Leoncio  The economic managers of President Duterte are determined to undo the effects of the “massive underspending” of the previous administration, but Budget Secretary Benjamin E. Diokno said the public must be prepared for some painful measures, as “things will get worse before they get better.”

As a show of commitment to the administration of President Duterte, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) offered last Friday an unprecedented $1 billion or P47 billion in sovereign loans to the country. 

Customs Commissioner Nicanor Faeldon said President Duterte’s marching order to him is to eliminate corruption in the Bureau of Customs (BOC) within six months, which he committed to meet through “tough” reform measures. Faeldon, a former captain in the Philippine Marines, said in a statement that under his wing, trade facilitation, rather than revenue collection, would be the top priority …

Now it can be told: Not too many people know that in the last two years of his administration, former President Aquino sat on or just plain ignored proposed solutions to Metro Manila’s traffic problems submitted to him and his advisers by the Japan Internatiional Cooperation Agency (Jica), which conducted a study on the problem in 2014. 

By Luis Leoncio  The Senate is proposing the establishment of an “urban traffic management authority,” the sole function of which would be to streamline the management of traffic in urban areas.