ANGKAS is seeking a 72-hour temporary restraining order (TRO) against the implementation of a policy allowing the inclusion of JoyRide and Move It in the extended pilot program for motorcycle taxis and imposing a limit on the number of bikers.
The move from motorcycle-hailing firm Angkas (DBDOYC, Inc.) comes after its bikers themselves earlier secured a hold order from a Mandaluyong court blocking the same policy.
In an order issued by the Quezon City Regional Trial Court, a copy of which was obtained by BusinessWorld, respondents Department of Transportation (DoTr) and Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) were directed to attend a hearing on Wednesday on the petition filed by Angkas on Jan. 3 for the issuance of the TRO.
Angkas is questioning the cap on the number of the petitioners’ bikers, apprehension of the excess bikers, and the inclusion of JoyRide (We Move Things Philippines, Inc.) and Move It (We-Load Transcargo Corp.) in the pilot program for motorcycle taxis that is being implemented by the government’s technical working group (TWG).
The order was signed by Pairing Judge Catherine P. Manodon on Jan. 6.
The court said the petition for TRO also wishes to stop the respondents from “performing any act that will defeat or impair rights of the motorcycle taxis.”
The hearing was scheduled at 8:30 in the morning at the Session Hall of RTC Branch 104 of Quezon City.
George I. Royeca, regulatory and public affairs head at Angkas, declined to comment on the case.
“I can’t comment on the case. Just read the petition, you have it naman with you,” he said in a phone interview.
For her part, DoTr Assistant Secretary Goddess Hope Oliveros-Libiran said in an interview: “Nakakalungkot na kailangang humantong sa ganyan, kasi in the first place, matagal nang sinasabi ng Angkas na wala raw silang problema sa pag-join ng JoyRide at Move It at ang pini-petition lang nila ay ‘yung tungkol lang sa cap. Pero ngayon ‘yung in-apply nila na TRO ay nakalagay doon na pinapa-TRO din nila, aside from the cap, ‘yung pag-join ng Move It and JoyRide.”
(It’s sad that it has come to this, because in the first place, Angkas had said it has no problem with the joining of JoyRide and Move It, and that what they are petitioning against is only on the cap. But now, they also applied for a TRO against the joining of Move It and JoyRide.)
“This is just a pilot study. I mean kung walang pilot study, technically hindi pa sila considered as a legal public transportation mode. That’s precisely the reason why the TWG for motorcycle taxis is conducting this pilot study para tulungan nga sila ma-legalize at ma-regulate silang maayos,” she added.
(This is just a pilot study. If there was no pilot study, technically they will still not be considered as a legal public transportation mode. That’s precisely the reason why the TWG for motorcycle taxis is conducting this pilot study — to help them be legalized and be regulated properly.)
In a news conference in Makati City on Wednesday, Mr. Royeca said that he was not against competition in the motorcycle taxi industry.
“I would like to emphasize that even back then, I knew there will be new players as soon as motorcycle taxis become the subject of legislation and regulated,” he said.
“I have never aspired to establish a monopoly,” he added.
The LTFRB announced in December that the pilot program, which was supposed to end on the 26th of that month, would be extended to March 23 this year. The regulator said the extended pilot program would include JoyRide and Move It.
Also in its new policy, the regulator set a limit of 10,000 bikers per transport network company (TNC) for Metro Manila and 3,000 bikers per TNC for Metro Cebu operations.
But Angkas bikers opposed the policy as 17,000 of them could lose their jobs. They asked the Mandaluyong City RTC to issue a TRO against it.
Mandaluyong City RTC Vice/Acting Executive Judge Ofelia L. Calo issued the 72-hour TRO against the new policy on Monday.
The court said the policy “puts a cap on the number of bikers that Angkas is entitled to” and enjoined the respondents “from performing any act that limits and impairs their rights to deal with and continue with their contracts with Angkas.” — withVincent Mariel P. Galang
INFORMATION technology (IT) system management solutions provider ASG Technologies Group, Inc. sees an increase in the number of Filipino data scientists this year driven by the growing demand from enterprises.
“The data science profession is growing. There will be an increase in the number of data scientists in the Philippines this year. In fact, according to The Gartner Data and Analytics Summit, by 2020, 40% or more of data science tasks will be automated, presenting opportunities for citizen data scientists to add more strategic value and not be consumed by routine,” ASG Technologies General Manager for Asia Pacific Praveen Kumar told BusinessWorld in an e-mailed reply to questions on Monday.
He added that the number of Filipino data scientists could “more than double” this year, fueled by increasing demand from businesses “for timely access to reliable data” while still complying with regulations such as the General Data Protection Regulation and the country’s Data Privacy Act.
In the Asia Pacific region, Mr. Kumar said there will be an increased utilization of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning in the business sector.
In the area of IT systems management, he said there will be a “decisive shift” from hybrid infrastructure from an option to a necessity for all business organizations.
He also sees the “rise of development and operations (DevOps) and its role in interrupting the IT status quo.”
The re-emergence of the mainframe (computers) as a critical enterprise tool and the need for new people, applications and products to bridge the resulting talent gap can also be expected, he added.
Another prediction is the movement toward technology decisions coming from business leaders versus traditional IT channels.
ASG technologies offers information management and IT system management solutions.
ASG has been in the Philippines for more than a decade. The company has its headquarters in Florida, United States. — Arjay L. Balinbin
A SHAREHOLDER of Maynilad Water Services, Inc. was at a loss as to what prompted President Rodrigo R. Duterte to resume his attacks on Metro Manila’s water concessionaires, after the company last year expressed its willingness to discuss new contract terms with the government.
“I don’t know where the President is coming from because we participated in the bid,” Isidro A. Consunji, chairman of DMCI Holdings, Inc. told reporters on Wednesday.
Although he said it was “good that we’re negotiating,” it would be up to Maynilad’s board of directors whether it would accept the new contract being offered by the government, which Malacañang said on Tuesday had been drafted without “onerous provisions.”
DMCI Holdings has a 25.24% stake in Maynilad, which is led by Metro Pacific Investments Corp. (MPIC), with a stake of 52.8%. Japanese firm Marubeni Corp. has a 20% stake in the utility, while the balance is held by other shareholders.
Mr. Consunji said the previous contract was not drafted by the private sector to begin with, with Maynilad having “zero input” in it.
“It was government who drafted the contract. I think they were advised by the World Bank-IFC (International Finance Corp.). It (contract) was passed through NEDA (National Economic and Development Authority), passed through DoJ (Department of Justice),” he said.
Mr. Consunji, who is also DMCI’s president and chief executive officer, was referring to the time when the government privatized the distribution of water in 1997 in a public bidding won by the Ayalas’ Manila Water Co., Inc. and a group led by the Lopezes’ Benpres Holdings Corp. and its foreign partner.
“The concession was really underperforming, badly managed,” he said, adding that it would have been difficult for the bidder to be bankable “so they had to create a contract provision that will allow the winning party to be able to borrow money.”
Maynilad and Manila Water are allowed to adjust water tariff each quarter based on the performance of the peso against the dollar and the yen as most of their foreign loans are denominated in these currencies.
“I think those provisions were probably made to make sure the concessionaires who [will] win are bankable,” he said.
Maynilad turned out to be unbankable and was taken over by MPIC when the government re-privatized the west zone water distribution in 2007.
On Tuesday, Mr. Duterte said the new contract he was offering to the concessionaires, even if accepted, would not free them from criminal prosecution. Should it be rejected, he said water distribution would be nationalized.
The concession agreements were first signed in 1997 during the administration of former President Fidel V. Ramos. Their validity is until 2022, but in 2009 former Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo approved the contract’s extension to 2037, a move questioned by lawmakers. Mr. Duterte has so far largely lashed out on the private sector.
“I don’t know what specific provisions are being cited. I haven’t read it,” Mr. Consunji said, referring to news reports.
“Hindi kami nag-draft ng contract, ano lang kami, sign on the dotted line (We did not draft the contract, we just signed the dotted line),” he added.
Mr. Consunji said the government’s move sends a negative signal to investors.
“All business[es] siyempre don’t like volatility. Of course, when there is uncertainty, sentiment turns negative. Situation like today creates uncertainty,” he said.
“Uncertainty creates negative sentiment,” he added.
Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Philippines declined to comment when asked about the government’s latest move.
But Martin Henkelmann, executive director of the German-Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said investors want “security of contract.”
“In general, without knowing the details of the contracts of the concession at the time when the concession was given, it is important that companies that are here investing that they have this visibility and security of contracts and they have this reliability,” he said.
Mr. Henkelmann said aside from the contract’s security, it is also important for investors that international arbitration is followed if there is a conflict between the contracting parties. He said international companies take on risks when they invest in large scale concessions.
“If there’s a contract normally it should be in a form that on the long term, you can rely on each other,” he said.
At the stock market, investors are on edge over the next move of Manila Water and the companies behind Maynilad in the coming days.
Philstocks Financial, Inc. Senior Research Analyst Japhet Louis O. Tantiangco said the brokerage is advising investors to stay cautious at the moment, noting uncertainties hound the issue at this point.
“We don’t know the provisions of the contract, if its advantageous or disadvantageous for the firms. Also, we don’t know if the water firms are going to accept it or not. A lot of things are still needed to be addressed,” he said in a text message Wednesday.
Diversified Securities, Inc. Equity Trader Aniceto K. Pangan likewise said investors were “spook[ed]” by the developments, as any uncertainty on companies are taken as bad news by investors.
“Per Justice Secretary (Menardo I. Guevarra), this will undergo negotiation with the concessionaires so as to come up with a good contract that will be amenable to both the end-users, as well as the concessionaires… (But) uncertainties are not (a) good thing for investors,” he said in a text message.
Shares in Manila Water lost 66 centavos or 6.12% to P10.12 apiece on Wednesday. The company’s listed parent Ayala Corp. (AC) also saw a P10 or 1.25% decline in its shares to P790 each yesterday.
For Maynilad investor MPIC, shares took a hit by losing 8 centavos or 2.20% to close at P3.55 each yesterday. Its other listed investor, DMCI, gained 2 centavos or 0.29% to P7 each.
Philstocks’ Mr. Tantiangco said long-term investors with high risk profiles are able to take positions on the holding companies because they are currently at bargain levels.
“What’s good with the holding companies is that if ever things take a turn for the worse, their fundamentals can still be supported by their other subsidiaries,” he said.
For example, AC still has robust businesses in the property, power, banking and telecommunications segments; MPIC has operations in power, toll roads, hospitals and railways; and DMCI Holdings has mining, property, power and construction.
Mr. Tantiangco said given this, AC, MPIC and DMCI are expected to be more resilient during these times, “given that these holding companies have other income streams which could support their fundamentals.”
John D. Forbes, senior adviser of the American Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines, said foreign investors are certainly following the developments regarding the two water concessions.
“There are serious implications for all investors and suppliers in projects involving contracts with the government in regards to how contractual disagreements are manages and on the future supply and cost of water in Metro Manila,” he said.
WOULD you give up Facebook for one month in exchange for $50?
The question, posed by MIT’s Erik Brynjolfsson and four co-authors of a new paper, may help economists get a better measure of the extent to which new, free technologies are reshaping the economy and our lives. The answer, unsurprisingly, is a lot.
They estimate that the social network by itself could add as much as 0.11 percentage points annually to US gross domestic product (GDP) if measured by its benefit to users. The paper was presented Saturday at the annual meeting of the American Economic Association in San Diego.
The paper gets at a broader question facing economists: How much is technology improving our lives? Traditionally, they’ve addressed that question by asking how much richer various innovations have made us. Thus the answer would show up in GDP, an imperfect but reasonable measure of aggregate welfare.
That task gets harder, however, when the technologies transforming society are free, at least in dollar terms, though the authors also nod to the idea that “free” goods and services can come at an implicit price.
After all, if Facebook, Twitter, GPS map services and a host of other apps on your smart phone come at zero cost, then they won’t show up in GDP, nor in traditional measures of productivity — even if they improve our lives and make us more productive.
To solve this, Brynjolfsson and his co-authors first conducted a set of experiments and surveys aimed at teasing out the monetary value people assign to certain free goods and services. This allows them to construct an alternative to GDP, which they call GDP-B, based not on actual costs but on perceived benefits.
Among a representative sample of US internet users, they found the median price of giving up Facebook for a month was $42.17.
Among a separate group of test subjects in the Netherlands, asked about a handful of free internet-based services, the group assigned the highest value to WhatsApp, owned by Facebook Inc., at a staggering €535.73 ($598) for just one month’s abstinence. Facebook was next highest at around €100. Twitter, used by just a third of the group, was valued at less than €1.
“GDP-B and the related metrics proposed in this paper enable a more thorough exploration of the impacts of new and free goods on welfare, with significant potential policy implications,” the authors concluded.
For starters, they said, the implied adjustments to GDP “may go some way to explaining the much documented and debated productivity growth slowdown experienced by industrialized countries since 2004.” — Bloomberg
ARTHALAND Corp. is eyeing to complete P60-billion worth of projects within the next two years as it fills its pipeline with new development projects in Makati City, Cebu City and Biñan, Laguna.
The niche property developer said in a briefing in Taguig City yesterday it is looking to launch at least one high-end residential project within the Makati central business district within the year, along with a high-end residential condominium in Cebu City and upscale apartments in its Sevina Park in Biñan, Laguna.
This would boost the company’s list of projects composed of the Cebu Exchange, Savya Financial Center and Sevina Park and yet-to-be-launched ones in newly acquired properties in Makati City and Cebu Business Park.
“It’s about P60 billion in gross development value. That covers Cebu Exchange, Sevina, Savya, the two Makati projects that are in the pipeline, as well as the Cebu Business Park property,” Arthaland Senior Vice-President for Strategic Funding and Investments Sheryll P. Verano said during the briefing.
Arthaland announced in 2018 it was targeting to increase its projects five times within the next five years, which would raise its gross floor area to a little over 500,000 square meters from 100,000 square meters.
“We are on-track in terms of the growth objectives that we’ve placed on ourselves. We are also on-track in terms of managing the company conservatively. We had said two years ago that we would grow the development portfolio of the company five-fold. We’re there. We got all the projects in the pipeline,” Arthaland Vice-Chairman and President Jaime C. Gonzalez said.
The company reported that in 2019, it was able to hit P10 billion in reservation sales for its Cebu Exchange, Savya Financial Center and Sevina Park projects.
The first phase of Cebu Exchange, an 11-hectare green office building located at the Cebu I.T. Park, is due to be turned over to buyers by the third quarter of the year.
The Savya Financial Center, a twin tower development in Taguig City, is on-track to be completed by 2021.
The Sevina Park, a low-density, mixed-use townhouse complex in Laguna, is seen to drive more demand in the coming months following the opening of the Cavite-Laguna Expressway.
“With the overwhelming positive response towards our green developments in 2019, we are on-track to grow our development portfolio by 5 times by 2024,” Mr. Gonzalez said.
Arthaland was able to record an attributable net income of P647.36 million in the nine months to September, higher from the P75.64 million it saw in the same period in 2018.
Shares in the company at the stock exchange lost 3 centavos or 3.70% to close at P0.78 each on Wednesday. — Denise A. Valdez
SAMSUNG Electronics Co.’s experimental research arm has brought to CES 2020 a demonstration of what it calls the world’s first artificial human, a virtual simulation of a human intelligence that learns, converses and sympathizes like a regular person.
Each simulated human — which would exist only on screens, not in the real world — would be called NEON, and Samsung’s concept is that they would grow to develop believable personalities that would eventually make them friendly companions, yoga instructors, TV anchors and spokespeople.
“NEON is like a new kind of life,” said Pranav Mistry, chief executive officer of STAR Labs, short for Samsung Technology & Advanced Research. “There are millions of species on our planet and we hope to add one more. NEONs will be our friends, collaborators, and companions, continually learning, evolving, and forming memories from their interactions.”
Mistry has tweeted one example of a NEON that is dressed in the signature look of the late Apple Inc. co-founder Steve Jobs.
Underpinning Samsung’s big promises is a proprietary technology platform the company is developing that’s called CORE R3, standing for Reality, Realtime and Responsive. Using neural networks and other artificial intelligence (AI) techniques, CORE R3 has been trained up with information about how humans look, behave and interact and “can computationally create lifelike reality that is beyond normal perception to distinguish,” according to STAR Labs.
Samsung will be giving in-person demonstrations to CES 2020 attendees in Las Vegas this week. — Bloomberg
A consortium led by Filinvest Land, Inc. (FLI) has completed buying a 19.2-hectare property in South Road Properties (SRP) in Cebu City yesterday, which it plans to develop into a mixed-use development project.
In a statement to the stock exchange Wednesday, the Gotianun-led property developer said it had signed the deed of absolute sale with the city government of Cebu yesterday indicating a price of P6.7 billion for the parcel of land.
Apart from FLI, the consortium is joined by Filinvest Alabang, Inc.; Cyberzone Properties, Inc.; Sytengco-owned Anesy Holding Corp.; Betterfield Phils. Corp. and Igold Holdings Corp.
“We were the first investor in SRP, the first to see its high growth potentials, and the first to believe in it. We are very happy with the fulfillment of this acquisition,” Josephine Gotianun-Yap, president and chief executive officer of FLI parent Filinvest Development Corp. (FDC), said in the statement.
The consortium is looking at building a mixed-use development with residential, office, commercial and retail elements in the piece of land. This project is eyed to fit FLI’s existing 40-hectare City di Mare township and 10-hectare Il Corso commercial development in SRP.
“We now have a total developable land size of around 70 hectares which is the biggest share owned by any developer in the SRP. We are excited about what we can develop given the large size of land we have and influence the trend and development directions in SRP to maximize its growth potentials,” Ms. Gotianun-Yap added.
The signing of the deed of sale yesterday follows the consortium’s full payment of P6.7 billion to the Cebu City government last Dec. 19. It had earned the right to buy the 19.2-hectare land when it won a public bidding by the local government in July 2015.
FLI currently has more than 200 residential developments spread across the country, some of which are the 60-hectare Manna East in Rizal, Ciudad de Calamba, 50-hectare City di Mare in Cebu and 51-hectare Palm Estates in Talisay City.
It is also the developer behind the 288-hectare industrial and logistics park at the New Clark City and 201-hectare Filinvest Mimosa+Leisure City in the Clark Special Economic Zone.
FLI reported its earnings in the first three quarters of 2019 rose 7% to P4.44 billion amid a 15% increase in revenues to P18.43 billion.
Its shares at the stock exchange showed a 3-centavo or 1.97% uptick to P1.55 apiece on Wednesday. Shares in FLI parent FDC, meanwhile, slipped 10 centavos or 0.75% to P13.20 each. — Denise A. Valdez
ADVANCED Micro Devices Inc., trying to justify a meteoric stock performance last year, said its new laptop processors will eclipse the performance of offerings from rival Intel Corp.
New Ryzen 4000 U series chips are aimed at the thinnest and lightest notebooks, a lucrative market where Intel has traditionally dominated. The highest-end version will have eight cores, each one capable of handling two processing loads at the same time, a first for the market, AMD said Monday.
Chief Executive Officer Lisa Su is pitching new products at the CES technology show in Las Vegas. AMD’s stock was the best performer on the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index last year, bid up almost 150% by investors who believe the company’s improved chips will help it grab market share and finally shed its status as a cheap alternative to Intel.
Santa Clara, California-based AMD closed the gap with Intel in desktop machines and server computers in 2019. Still, the bulk of product shipments by volume are laptop parts where Intel’s hold has remained more resilient, at above 80% of the market.
The first laptops featuring the 4000 U series will debut in the first quarter and AMD is predicting that more than 100 systems will go on sale in 2020. The company showed off a Lenovo Yoga model featuring the 4800 version, demonstrating that its chips are getting into more expensive machinery.
At the same event, AMD executives debuted a new desktop aimed in part at proving that the company’s technology is improving quickly and challenging Intel everywhere. The Threadripper 3990X has 64 computer cores and can count at 4.3 gigahertz. The massive chip is the first to carry these capabilities and is aimed at users working on professional workloads including video rendering. Capable of outperforming two Intel server chips, AMD said, it will cost $3,990 for a single chip when it goes on sale in February. — Bloomberg
MONEY SUPPLY in November saw a quicker expansion on the back of the central bank’s easing stance being absorbed by the market.
Domestic liquidity or M3, which is the broadest measure of money supply in an economy, grew 9.8% year on year to P12.4 trillion in November, a faster pace compared to the 8.5% print in October, according to preliminary Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) data released on Wednesday.
Month on month, M3 inched up by 1.7%.
The central bank said credit demand continued to fuel money supply growth.
“The pickup in liquidity reflect the copious amount funds released by BSP’s reductions to its reserve requirement ratio (RRR). With inflation in check and falling below target, this was the perfect time to do so,” ING Bank-NV Manila Senior Economist Nicholas Antonio T. Mapa said in an e-mail.
The central bank slashed banks’ reserve requirements by 400 basis points (bps) in 2019. The RRR of big banks stands at 14%, while that of thrift banks and rural banks are at five percent and four percent, respectively.
BSP Governor Benjamin E. Diokno has vowed to reduce big banks’ RRR to the single-digit level by the end of his term in 2023 to be at par with the regional levels.
BSP data showed net claims on the central government climbed 13.9% year on year in November, quicker than the upward-revised 6.6% print in October.
Meanwhile, domestic claims, which were mainly supported by the private sector, rose 8.3%, a pickup from the 6.7% seen in October.
The central bank has identified key sectors as drivers for production activities including real estate activities; financial and insurance activities; construction; and electricity, gas, steam and air-conditioning supply.
Meanwhile, net foreign assets (NFA) in peso terms saw a faster expansion of 11.5% in November from the 9.6% logged in the preceding month.
“NFA position increased during the month, supported by foreign exchange inflows coming mainly from overseas Filipinos’ remittances and business process outsourcing receipts,” Mr. Diokno said in a statement.
Bank-held NFAs also grew by 18.3% in November, a faster pace from the downward-revised 12.1% in October.
LENDING PICKS UP
Meanwhile, after a slowdown in October, credit growth also picked up in November.
Outstanding loans of universal and commercial banks grew by 10.1% in November. Inclusive of reverse repurchase agreements, bank lending rose 10.2% in November, also quicker compared to the 9.1% seen the previous month.
Production loans continued to comprise the bulk of lenders’ portfolio as it made up 87.2% of the total. Loans for said activities went up 8.1%, picking up from the 7.5% pace in October.
Credit for construction activities saw the fastest rate of expansion at 29.1%, followed by real estate activities (19.3%), financial and insurance activities (15.3%), and electricity, gas, steam, and air-conditioning supply (7.6%).
Loans extended to other sectors also picked up in November, except for those which saw contraction including community, social and personal activities (-35.7%), professional, scientific and technical activities (-16.6%), mining and quarrying (-10.8%), and manufacturing (-2.3%).
Economists said the BSP’s monetary easing was a major factor for the pickup in credit growth.
“The cheaper cost of borrowing money for business and consumer credit expansion is definitely fuelling the upticks in M3 and bank lending,” UnionBank of the Philippines, Inc. Chief Economist Ruben Carlo O. Asuncion said in an e-mail.
The BSP cut key rates by 75 bps in 2019, reducing the yields on the overnight deposit, overnight reverse repurchase, and overnight lending facilities to 3.5%, 4% and 4.5%, respectively.
Security Bank Corp. Chief Economist Robert Dan J. Roces said that the credit growth is indeed an “indication of the forward guidance being provided by the BSP.”
“Monetary policy operates on a lag, and the pre-announced cuts temper speculation and market expectations,” he explained.
Mr. Roces added that the pickup in loan growth is a positive development for the country’s economic expansion.
“Moving forward, the turnaround of credit growth in November bodes well for 2019 fourth quarter GDP (gross domestic product) growth, and if sustained will contribute to the economy hitting the lower end of the government’s six to seven percent GDP growth target,” he said in an e-mail.
Economic growth picked up to 6.1% in the third quarter from the 5.6% and 5.5% pace logged in the first two quarters of the year amid the budget’s delay.
This brought the end-September rate to 5.8% which is still a miss from the government’s minimum target of 6%.
“Passage of more reform measures especially the CITIRA (Corporate Income Tax and Incentives Rationalization Act) Bill would help create greater certainty for prospective investors (local and foreign) and eventually lead to greater demand for loans to finance these additional investments into the country,” Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. Chief Economist Michael L. Ricafort said.
The bill, which was already approved in the House of Representatives on September, mandates the decrease of corporate income tax from the current 30% to 20% gradually as it is one of the biggest rates among major Asian economies. — Luz Wendy T. Noble
I WILL TELL YOU now that this review will be clouded over by a certain incident. Before going to Maginhawa’s Van Gogh is Bipolar, a restaurant in Quezon City, this reporter was listening to the song “Dominique” by Souer Sourire. I was thinking of a story my mother told me, that in another world, I might have been named Dominic (a variant of the name), because of her and her father’s shared fondness for the song. I was contemplating what life would have been with another name — that name — right before meeting artist and chef Jetro Rafael, the founder of Van Gogh is Bipolar (which we will call Van Gogh from here on in). As I stepped into the restaurant, Mr. Rafael greeted me: “Ah! Dominic.” I then proceeded to interview Mr. Rafael with the sort of wide-eyed curiosity one accords to a magician.
The restaurant’s decor didn’t help much to clear up my vision. One enters the restaurant through a wardrobe, as is the trope in many fantasy novels for children. Mr. Rafael led me away from the wicker and brightness of the restaurant’s “Light” area. “You’ll fit much better here,” he said about the restaurant’s “Shadow” area, bidding me to sit on an antique chair draped with a pelt. This part of the restaurant makes one feel like they were entering the home of a bohemian aunt who told fortunes as a hobby. Teapots and tchotchkes of every shape and size are crammed into shelves, and Mr. Rafael hummed along to music as he set the table (covered with a star chart) with an antique silver Turkish tea set.
The restaurant has been around since 2009, and had been featured at least twice by the BBC. Its menu revolves around food that supposedly improves the mood by stimulating the production of certain neurotransmitters. The search for mood-healing food is centered around Mr. Rafael’s own struggle with bipolar disorder. “I have a background in chemistry, and I grew up in a laboratory. My mother is a medical technologist. More than that, I needed this kind of — I call it natural medicine, homeopathic medicine. For a while, it served as my medicine for my mood disorder — before. Now I can fairly and safely say I’m healed. The last pill I took was 10 years ago.”
He talked about what his condition was like prior to doing research on mentally therapeutic dining, and his dissatisfaction with the anti-psychotic medication he was taking. “Lumobo ako (I swelled up like a balloon). Para akong sedated (it was like I was sedated). Minsan wala akong facial expressions (sometimes I didn’t have facial expressions),” he recalled. He then invited his friends over to dinner made with ingredients that his studies said were good for improving his mood. The name of the restaurant, meanwhile, comes from his friend shooting down two other names for the restaurant, and his third try settled on the blighted artist. “I started creating my own medicine, which I initially called the cuckoo diet (as in the expression for ‘crazy’). Scientifically speaking, it’s mind-healing nutrition. It’s designed nutritionally and biochemically to activate specific neurotransmitters in the brain.” He then ran down a list: “Dopamine, serotonin, GABA, etc. They’re known to make you happy and calm.
“That’s a very simple understanding from my direct experience. I remember. I was taking all these synthetic medications before: mood stabilizers, anti-psychotics… I said that if these pills can make me feel this way — supposedly, the most natural form of it, which are living molecules from food — may also make me feel this way.”
It’s not that he rejects Western models of mental health treatment (we wouldn’t advise you, in any way, to stop any current mental health treatments). “I don’t have issues with science, or medicine. It’s more of the synthetic — I want to emphasize that. It’s not about the West. There are non-synthetic methods of healing,” he said, citing his belief in the field of psychiatry. “I just don’t agree with the synthetic way; the synthetic method of healing. I have an in-house psychiatrist here in Van Gogh. She comes every now and then to share her free services to the community.”
Well, and fine, but we’re still curious about the scientific spine propping up Mr. Rafael’s cooking.
He told us that when the BBC first approached him, they decided to bring the diet plan to a nutrition scientist. We dug up the report on BBC’s website (“Eating your way to happiness in the Philippines” by Kate McGeown, 2012), which said: “According to nutrition experts, there is increasing evidence that he is right — food does have mood-altering properties — although this is still an area of science that needs to be better understood. Dr. Sandrine Thuret, from the Institute of Psychiatry at King’s College London, says the omega-3 in oily fish and flavonoids like those in blueberries, cranberries, and dark chocolate are thought to improve a person’s mood. She believes certain diets might work in a similar way to clinically prescribed anti-depressants.”
HAVING DINNER
For dinner, we sat at a marble-topped table, with its legs from a repurposed old sewing machine. A “life server” at the restaurant (what Mr. Rafael calls the bright, attentive staff; usually they also have mood disorders similar to his) washed my hands with vinegar, baking soda, and warm water. She told me that if I needed assistance, I should ring the antique bell from Tibet on my right. She served me a drink, the Courtney Love Potion (the menu is populated with names of stars who had mental health issues), made with dalandan juice and sprinkled with butterfly pea flowers, said to relieve anxiety. It woke up the palate, at least, though I didn’t like it much — not for anything but a personal aversion to citrus.
The soup came next, a concoction named Virginia Woolf’s Tears (yup), with a mushroom base, vegetables, and quail eggs. It had a light texture but had many layers of flavor, and crisp vegetables and fresh herbs added life to what would have been a staid dining experience (the exotic flavor of mushrooms and citrus in the broth notwithstanding).
The life server then offered me the Axl Rose egg shot, made with a raw egg (which contains amino acids, Omega-3, Vitamin D, and fatty acids for the brain), Jägermeister, and cayenne pepper (which supposedly reduces cortisol, the stress hormone).
I guess that’s the joy in the restaurant: the food is simple, and uncomplicated, and made with a purpose — but then it’s served in such extraordinary surroundings and in such strange ways that it becomes an entirely new experience.
For example: my main course was a fried free-range chicken with a side of rice and vegetables. Mr. Rafael explained the mental health benefits of the dish: the chicken’s white meat contains tryptophan, which the body converts to serotonin. The heirloom black rice from the uplands is high in folic acid and B-vitamins, while a compound from broccoli, according to a study, may increase brain function. Furthermore, every bit of the restaurant the eye may land on stimulates the mind, and begs for an opening to a conversation.
Dessert was served next, called Mel Gibson’s Darkest Sin: absinthe and muscovado sugar flamed in a glass teapot, served as a shot and chased with a dollop of melted dark chocolate (which helps the mind thanks to flavanols, theobromine, and phenylethylamine).
The meal ended with a pot of mood-improving tea — I chose “happy chill,” made from the dried leaves of mango trees.
A SAFE SPACE
In the years since it opened in 2009, Van Gogh has evolved from a restaurant to a mental health community hub: Mr. Rafael says that they’re open every day except Tuesday at lunchtime until 3 p.m., and they open again at 6 p.m.. In the hours between 3 and 6 p.m., the “Light” area serves as a meditation center for what he calls The Love Project.
“Between 1984 and 2005, estimates for the incidence of suicide in the Philippines have increased from 0.23 to 3.59 per 100,000 in males, and from 0.12 to 1.09 per 100,000 in females,” said an article BJPsych International under the UK’s Royal College of Psychiatrists (“Mental Health Services in the Philippines”). Van Gogh is Bipolar can then play a relevant role in the face of increasing diagnoses of mental health issues — not to mention an increasingly harum-scarum world.
“The place that we created is no longer that safe for everybody,” said Mr. Rafael about the world outside Van Gogh. If you just pay attention to what is happening, a lot of those mental illnesses, psychological imabalances, and emotional disturbances happen when we don’t feel safe: in our own body, heart, and mind. It’s like we created our own enemy and there’s constant battling with life. This space is more significant than ever, because it provides you with the need to be okay in our most vulnerable state. You are safe, you are okay (‘even though you’re not okay’). It makes you feel okay,” he said. “If you have these kinds of spaces, not just here but all over the world — it would be a safer place for everybody.”
Asked if it was possible to replicate the experience (or at least, the diet) at home, he said that it went beyond food: “You know who’s really hungry? More than the body, it’s our spirit.”
“I started perceiving the person who I was before: in pain, and in suffering; to be separate from that part of me who understands and deeply loves that part of me,” he said. “When I gave that my attention and love and understanding — the war within me disappeared.”
We parted with the following words: “It’s very important for me to make people understand that love is not a concept. It’s a direct experience of life. It’s a very open, unlimited, non-judging space: and this (Van Gogh) is a symbol of that.”
I left the restaurant with my suspicions still intact, thinking to myself that I may have been had, and maybe the chicken was a bit dry. I did, however, slip into one of the best slumbers and dreams I’ve ever had, and I woke up refreshed and with a purpose as I haven’t done in ages. Was it something I ate? You decide.
Van Gogh is Bipolar is located at 154 Maginhawa St., Teacher’s Village, Quezon City. Set meals range in price from P999 to P3,850. Reservations are advised, and you can make them either through their Facebook page (facebook.com/vgibipolar) orhttp://bit.ly/VGIB2020.
Duty Free Philippines Corp. (DFPC) doubled its sales growth in 2019 after a spike in tourist arrivals attributed to the Southeast Asian games and the rehabilitation of Boracay Island.
DFPC in a statement on Wednesday said its year-on-year sales growth grew by 4% in 2019, compared to 2% in 2018. Consolidated sales in 2019 grew to more than $226 million from $217 million
DFPC Chief Operating Officer Vicente Pelagio A. Angala said that the opening of Duty Free Luxe in November helped boost the sales growth. Duty Free Luxe is high-end, off-airport outlet housing international brands at Mall of Asia in Pasay City.
“We have always recognized the vital role that we play in making the Philippines a globally recognized quality destination. To realize that vision, we have officially launched Duty Free Luxe. It is a downtown store that will put the Philippines as a top-of-mind shopping destination to boost the country’s shopping tourism,” Mr. Angala said.
Filipino tourists, overseas Filipino workers, and balikbayan (visiting Filipinos who reside overseas) remained the top source of Duty Free sales, with a share of 85%.
The major growth driver is confectionaries, contributing 31% to total sales. Liquor products followed with 21%, fragrance and cosmetics at 18%, and fashion merchandise 10%.
DFPC, in partnership with the Department of Trade and Industry, launched in its Pasay store last year Go Lokal’s Marahuyo, a store for local products. DFPC also expanded its list of exclusive brands and renovated Fiestamall and NAIA Terminal 1 Arrival stores in 2019.
“Before the end of 2019, we have unveiled the newly-renovated Fiestamall. The elegant and more functional design will welcome customers particularly the remodelled food court, building facade, Customer Relations Registration lobby, and tourist lounge,” Mr. Angala said.
DFPC will be opening at Duty Free store at the Hilton Sun Valley Resort inside Clark Freeport Zone in the first quarter of 2020. — Jenina P. Ibañez
AMAZON.COM Inc. said on Monday its streaming device, Fire TV, has surpassed 40 million active users globally, maintaining its lead over rival Roku Inc.
Roku in November said it had 32.3 million active accounts.
Streaming devices such as Apple TV, Chromecast and Fire TV that bundle together content from different streaming platforms have gained popularity as more people shift away from cable TV.
Amazon in 2014 launched its Fire TV stick, which features content from Netflix Inc. and Hulu among others and casts video directly to television.
The newly disclosed figure is up 8% from 37 million users the device recorded in September. — Reuters
