GOVERNMENT subsidies to state-owned firms increased in July, the bulk of which went to the Land Bank of the Philippines (LANDBANK) as it started releasing fuel subsidies to jeepney drivers for this year, the Bureau of the Treasury (BTr) said.

BusinessWorld is publishing the following letter from the Governance Commission for Government-Owned and -Controlled Corporations (GOCCs) in response to a Sept. 4 item published in this newspaper. The letter has been lightly edited due to space considerations:

Financial markets globally are preparing the shift from referring to Interbank offered rates (IBORs) as a benchmark for financial products and services to alternative reference rates (ARRs).

A FARMERS’ association pressed the government to regulate rice imports more closely to allow domestic farmers and traders to dispose of their inventory particularly during the current harvest, and called for an increase in the National Food Autority’s buffer stock minimum to support the market.

PRICE increases are expected to lose momentum until October before a recovery in headline inflation to around the 2% level in December, according to an economic bulletin issued by the Department of Finance (DoF).

THE National Privacy Commission (NPC) has found three online lending firms to have violated the privacy of persons who were allegedly shamed publicly, including maliciously disclosing the private information of borrowers.

AN INITIAL 5,000 metric tons (MT) of rice from Mindanao will be shipped to Papua New Guinea following the signing of a memorandum of understanding between farmers’ groups represented by the Mindanao Development Authority (MinDA) and PNG’s Central Province government.

THE House appropriations committee on Friday approved the P8.201 billion budget of the Office of the President for 2020, taking under six minutes with no interpellation.

THE government will honor a Supreme Court ruling to expand payments to local governments from national government revenue starting 2022, rebuffing a request by governors to implement the new payment scheme earlier.

ECONOMIC managers told the Senate that a Supreme Court ruling expanding the share of local governments in national government revenue has led to ongoing discussions about the scaling back of certain national government projects.

THE Department of Transportation (DoTr) said measures to decongest Metro Manila’s main thoroughfare, known as EDSA, can be implemented without the use of emergency powers but will take longer to complete.

THIRTY local government units have committed to procure, process, and market palay, or unmilled rice, directly from farmers to support the market amid the collapse in farmgate prices.