In December, the Senate passed a bill on regulating “vaping,” or the sale and use of electronic cigarettes used to “smoke” or “vaporize” nicotine and non-nicotine products. The bill, which is yet to be signed by Malacañang into law, is being questioned by some medical groups, alleging that it paves the way for health risks.

THE most popular post today on r/wallstreetbets, the besieged citadel of the meme-stock revolution, was a meme depicting three smiling Wendy’s employees saying “Welcome back to work, ‘Diamond Hands.’”

On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the Novel Coronavirus outbreak a pandemic and reiterated the call for countries to take immediate actions and scale up their response to treat, detect, and reduce transmission to save people’s lives, per official resources. That was from a regular bulletin issued by WHO almost two years ago.

THE recent award of a Nobel Prize to a Filipina brought out some hidden envy from those aspiring for that prestigious recognition for so long. Anyway, not winning something like the gold medal of a sports competition can still be soothing if one is in the finals, or the short list — the first Filipino to be accepted as a competitor in some hitherto unscaled international meet.

A very crucial strategic move in the coming years to attain both improvement in the productivity of our farming and fisheries sector and to reduce poverty has to do with addressing the problem of the ageing of Filipino farmers whose average age is reaching 60 years.

The past five and a half years have been a volatile time for the private sector, not just in surviving the pandemic-triggered economic crisis but in terms of its relationship with the government.

It has been about two years since the COVID-19 pandemic broke out. Just when it appeared that we were about to reach our desired destination of a COVID-free Philippines, the situation seemingly became worse than ever.

VENTURE CAPITAL (VC) is by far the most interesting form of capital — and, along with tech entrepreneurs, venture capitalists are the most interesting sort of capitalists.

Corporations, especially publicly listed corporations (PLCs), are constantly on the lookout for individuals who can be invited or recruited to become Board members.

FOR CLOSE to 40 years, the US and much of the world were blessed with low inflation. No longer. Depending on whom you believe, the dramatic price and wage spike of the last few months is either a flash in the pan or the beginning of something more ominous. Both sides in this debate speak with confidence about what will happen next. But the history of inflation forecasting suggests that humility is in order.

Most power generation companies (gencos) — those that own big power plants and ensure we have 24/7 electricity except when there are major technical problems or natural calamities — also suffered major declines in revenues and net income in 2020’s lockdown and pandemic.

“The country entered 2022 with typhoon-related damage to power facilities that could lead to reserve shortfalls (yellow alerts) in the Luzon and Visayas grids.