FORMER PALAWAN governor Joel T. Reyes, whom the Court of Appeals recently released over the objections of the family of murdered broadcaster-environmentalist Gerry Ortega, has been ordered re-arrested — but not over the assassination seven years ago. — interaksyon.com
See full story on https://goo.gl/Gd58o9
LA JOLLA — Tiger Woods had taken his bow and left the stage when fierce drama unfolded Sunday at Torrey Pines, with Alex Noren and Jason Day locked in a playoff duel as darkness fell.
The spotlight had been all on Woods as the 14-time major champion wrapped up his first US PGA Tour tournament in a year with an even par 72 for a 72-hole total of 285.
That was good enough for a promising tie for 23rd as Woods launched his latest bid to return to form in the wake of spinal fusion surgery last April.
Woods was never in site of the 10-under par total of 278 that sent Australia’s Day, Sweden’s Noren and American Ryan Palmer into sudden death.
Palmer was eliminated with a par at the first playoff hole, the par-five 18th, where Noren’s third shot into the green spun back toward the pin to leave him a tap-in birdie and Day drained a tough, downhill eight-footer.
The remaining duo returned to 18 and birdied again — both reaching the green in two.
After pars at the par-three 16th, the fourth playoff hole took them to the par-four 17th, where both Day and Noren were in a fairway bunker off the tee.
Both reached the green from there and both two-putted for par, Day’s birdie effort stopping only inches short. — AFP
What do the world’s seven largest economies (G7 nations) and emerging powerhouses like China, India, and Brazil have in common? All have entrepreneur-driven societies.
At the heart of every wealthy nation is a legion of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) owned and operated by entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs are the foundation from which strong economies are built and what keeps them competitive. Not only do SME’s bridge the supply chain gaps of larger companies, they also contribute to national productivity, push innovation, and increase the standard living for all.
For developing nations like the Philippines, entrepreneurship is the most effective way to curb poverty especially in far flung communities. This is because simple cottage industries do not require sophisticated infrastructure to operate — they can be set up anywhere, so long as there is a market with expendable income. Entrepreneurship fast-tracks development in the countryside which, in turn, creates additional employment and prevents migration of people from rural to urban areas. Moreover, entrepreneurship promotes capital formation by utilizing idle assets (capital, land, and unemployed workers) and converting them into something productive.
Entrepreneurship also promotes a culture of creativity, invention, and business dynamism among the populace. This is due to the fact that small businesses must continue to evolve and innovate in order to compete in the marketplace. They must think outside the box to survive. All these leads to the development of new technologies and/or new business practices.
The more entrepreneurs operate within a society, the less people depend on government subsidies. This is why entrepreneurship is said to be the cornerstones of national self-reliance.
Developing a culture of entrepreneurship was not in the forefront of government’s agenda until Secretary Mon Lopez took the helm of the Department of Trade and Industry last year. Under his baton, programs like Kapatid Mentorship, Shared Services Facilities, Go Lokal and Pondo sa Pagbabago at Pag Asenso were established. All these aim to promote the gospel of entrepreneurship among Filipinos.
Unfortunately, the DTI cannot do it alone. Developing a culture of entrepreneurship starts at home.
ENTREPRENEURSHIP STARTS AT HOME
In Philippine society, parents typically encourage their children to become professionals, whether it be a lawyer, architect, doctor, or even a nurse. The rationale is that professionals earn relatively more than the common corporate man while enjoying a semblance of stability and prestige. The more desperate parents raise their kids to be celebrities, politicians, or both. For them, this offers the fastest way to fame and fortune, a fact I cannot refute, unfortunately.
It is only the business owners who typically train their children to become entrepreneurs. They do so to ensure the proper succession of the family business. As a result, business owners become wealthier by the generation. They are the Sys, Gokongweis, Razons, and Ayalas among us. Sadly, there are only a handful of them.
Of course, there are mavericks in society who start and build their own businesses from the ground, up. They are the unsung heroes of our economy. We need more of them to trail blaze new industries and generate jobs. This is why it is our duty, as parents, to impress upon our children that entrepreneurship is an outstanding career choice, not one to be avoided for its inherent risks.
Entrepreneurs are a rare breed. They are people who are self motivated, have a vision, and possess the ability to lead the people around them toward that vision. An entrepreneur is a motivator, a passionate speaker, an organizer, and a chronic planner. He is able to foretell outcomes of certain acts or courses of action.
Academic performance is not a gauge of entrepreneurial talent.
Studies show that there is no correlation between scholastic grades and one’s probability of succeeding as an entrepreneur.
More often than not, entrepreneurs are those who cheat in examinations, barter toys in the school grounds, and lead gangs. This is because entrepreneurs innately figure out how the world works. They know how to make a profit or get ahead in the fastest, most efficient way. They see needs, wants and sources and figure out a way to bridge them. They are creative and not stymied by rules. More importantly, they are willing to assume the risks and consequences of their actions.
The greatest entrepreneurs of our generation — Steve Jobs, Ted Turner, and even our own Ricky Razon of ICTSI — were all scholastically challenged and kicked out of school for not conforming to the norm.
Children display entrepreneurial characteristics early in life and it is every parent’s duty to hone these traits, not vilify them. Cameron Harold, book author and YALE lecturer, describes some of the characteristics typical of natural entrepreneurs.
Children who don’t take instructions at face value. They question the reasons for such instructions and have the gumption to negotiate its terms; children who are self-empowered to make money. You find them selling door to door, making things with their hands to sell or even collect old junk to resell at second-hand stores; children with the innate knowledge to buy low and sell high. These are the kids who buy toys from wholesalers to sell to their peers on the playground; children who recognize opportunity and take advantage of it. These are the young tykes who supply their father’s company with pens, paper and envelopes, just because his father is in the position to approve the purchase.
More sophisticated young entrepreneurs recognize that recurring income is better than a one-time sale. They are those who peddle meat and vegetables to restaurants or provide cooked lunches to office workers. They also recognize the power of “branding.” They have the ability to create a story (or context) for their products and brand it accordingly to create perceived added value.
What do parents do once they detect entrepreneurial characteristics in their children?
Experts advise that children be allowed to execute their plans.
If they fail, parents must acknowledge the effort and encourage them to try again, this time, using the lessons learned from the first attempt.
At an early age, children must be taught the value of money. Giving out allowance without earning it sends the wrong message, experts say. Allowance should be tied to chores. The more chores are done, the more allowance a child is entitled to. This teaches them that there is no free ticket to life — that money is not an entitlement but needs to be earned. It teaches them that the state of one’s wealth is not dependent on others but on their own hard work and industry. Along with this, parents must teach their children to save at least 20% of their earnings, no questions asked. Savings are every person’s weapon against desperation.
Children must be mentored on the dos and don’ts of entrepreneurship and to have an appreciation of good business practices. Experts recommend that parents talk about both good and bad business habits to their children through relatable examples. Perhaps they can tell the story of how Ben Chan grew from a single store in SM City to a retail conglomerate. Conversely, how Texas Chicken failed in the local market. All these make business interesting to our children whilst imparting important business lessons.
Its important, too, to encourage our children to face people and perform. Recitals, declamation contests, and school debates are means to teach our children not to sit in the proverbial back of the bus but to be alphas. The ability to “perform” — to speak publicly, to persuade, to sell, to negotiate, to argue — are all traits they will need in their life as entrepreneurs.
Traits of entrepreneurs are as much a function of nature as it is of nurture.
Parents should do their fair share to breed the next generation of Filipino entrepreneurs. To do so will help the Philippines take its rightful place in the “grown-up table,” along with the G7 nations and new powerhouse economies. It could be our best contribution to nation building.
Andrew J. Masigan is an economist.
OIL COMPANIES on Monday maintained the five-week upward price movement of fuel products, which takes effect at 6 a.m. today, Jan. 30. PTT Philippines Corp., Eastern Petroleum Corp., TOTAL (Philippines) Corp., Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corp., and Seaoil Philippines, Inc. have the same increases at P0.45 per liter (/L) for gasoline, and P0.50/L for diesel and kerosene. Seaoil, in its advisory, cited the movements in the international petroleum market as the reason for the price adjustments. — Anna Gabriela A. Mogato
SBS PHILIPPINES Corp. is infusing more capital into its subsidiary to fund the acquisition of warehouse facility owned by a subsidiary of multinational beverage giant The Coca-Cola Corp.
In a disclosure to the stock exchange on Monday, SBS said its board approved the additional subscription to P351.65 million worth of shares of Lence Holdings Corp. (LHC) involving some 52 million shares at P6.7625 apiece.
The shares comprise 65% of LHC’s outstanding shares.
The subscription to additional common shares will be issued from the unissued capital stock of LHC, with the payment of the consideration expected to be made on Feb. 5.
“The additional share subscription is intended as added capital infusion in LHC to partially finance the closing of the acquisition of a warehouse facility property comprising of land, buildings, and fixed assets,” SBS said.
LHC is in the process of completing the P520-million takeover of the facility complex owned by CocaCola Export Corp. — Philippine Branch and its related parties in Laguna. The closing date of the transaction was moved to Feb. 9 instead of Jan. 29.
SBS will use the property for its warehouse and distribution operations that will serve as a key distribution hub for regional market customers south of Metro Manila.
The transaction is expected to result in gains from real estate investments and operational enhancements to be generated from the property acquisition, which will grow and diversify SBS’ income streams in the future.
LHC, which was incorporated in November, is 65% owned by SBS. SBS Holdings and Enterprises Corp. controls 25% and the Sytengco family holds the remaining 10%.
A chemical trader and distributor, SBS diversified into the property and investments business last year to offset some of the fluctuations in the chemical trading business and, at the same time, provide a new income source for the company.
Shares in SBS lost two centavos or 0.35% to end at P5.74 apiece on Monday. — Krista Angela M. Montealegre
LOS ANGELES — The Miseducation of Cameron Post, a powerful drama about the real-life controversial practice of gay conversion therapy, came away with the top prize as the Sundance Film Festival wrapped Saturday.
Starring Chloe Grace Moretz, it delighted and shocked audiences at its world premiere in the Utah mountains with its story of a teenage girl forced into therapy after being caught having a sexual encounter with the prom queen.
“On behalf of the entire Cameron Post team we want to dedicate this to the LGBTQ survivors of sexual conversion therapy,” said Moretz.
“We just wanted to make this movie to shine a light onto the fact that it is only illegal in nine states out of the 50 states in this country to practice sexual conversion therapy.”
Its director Desiree Akhavan had pre-recorded an acceptance speech for the grand jury prize in Sundance’s “US dramatic competition” section but it could not be played on a night beset by technical difficulties.
Kailash, about one man’s crusade to end child slavery, won best US documentary while the US dramatic audience award — the second prize to the grand jury award — went to Andrew Heckler’s Burden.
The US documentary directing prize went to Alexandria Bombach for On Her Shoulders — a portrait of a Yazidi girl who survived sexual slavery at the hands of the Islamic State group — while the US documentary audience award went to The Sentence.
Butterflies came away with the grand jury prize for world drama while Of Fathers and Sons, a study of jihadi radicalization in the home, from celebrated Syrian filmmaker Talal Derki, won the world cinema documentary competition.
The Sundance Film Festival, founded by actor Robert Redford, is considered a showcase for independent and documentary films, and festival winners often go on to receive critical acclaim and Hollywood awards season glory.
Among the titles from the 2017 edition of the festival picking up trophies at Hollywood’s various ceremonies are Jordan Peele’s Get Out, which played out of competition as a midnight screening. The dark comedy has four Oscar nominations, including best film, director and screenplay.
Call Me by Your Name, which director Luca Guadagnino took to last year’s Sundance, also has four Oscar nominations, including best picture.
Dee Rees’s Mudbound, picked up by Netflix for a considerable $12.5 million at last year’s festival, has Academy nods for adapted screenplay, supporting actress, cinematography, and original song.
Here is a full list of prizewinners from Saturday’s awards:
US DRAMA
• Grand Jury Prize: The Miseducation of Cameron Post
• Audience Award: Burden
• Directing: Sara Colangelo, The Kindergarten Teacher
• Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award: Christina Choe, Nancy
• Special Jury Award for Outstanding First Feature: Reinaldo Marcus Green, Monsters and Men
• Special Jury Award for Excellence in Filmmaking: Reed Morano, I Think We’re Alone Now
• Special Jury Award for Acting: Benjamin Dickey, Blaze
US DOCUMENTARY
• Grand Jury Prize: Kailash
• Audience Award: The Sentence
• Directing: Alexandria Bombach, On Her Shoulders
• Special Jury Award for Social Impact Filmmaking: Crime + Punishment
• Special Jury Award for Creative Vision: Hale County This Morning, This Evening
• Special Jury Award for Storytelling: Three Identical Strangers
• Special Jury Award for Breakthrough Filmmaking: Minding the Gap
WORLD CINEMA DRAMA
• Grand Jury Prize: Butterflies
• Audience Award: The Guilty
• Directing Award: Isold Uggadottir, And Breathe Normally
• Special Jury Award for Acting: Valeria Bertuccelli, The Queen of Fear
• Special Jury Award for Screenwriting: Julio Chavezmontes and Sebastian Hofmann, Time Share
• Special Jury Award for Ensemble Acting: Dead Pigs
WORLD CINEMA DOCUMENTARY
• Grand Jury Prize: Of Fathers and Sons
• Audience Award: This is Home
• Directing Award: Sandi Tan, Shirkers
• Special Jury Award for Masterful Storytelling: Steven Loveridge, M.I.A.
• Special Jury Award for Editing: Our New President
• Special Jury Award for Cinematography: Maxim Arbugaev, Peter Indergand Genesis 2.0 — AFP
Scarborough Shoal (also known as Bajo de Masinloc, Panatag, Panacot), Benham Rise (now Philippine Rise) and the Celebes Sea have been making the news in the past week or so.
About two weeks ago, the USS Hopper, an American destroyer grazed past Scarborough Shoal, once a gunnery range for US and Philippine naval forces when America still had its bases in the country, until the 1987 Constitution banned foreign troops based on sovereign soil. This got China hopping mad, accusing the United States of violating its “sovereignty.” Naturally, Filipino patriots gave the spurious claimant the finger.
Scarborough is well within our EEZ. We claim it as part of our regime of islands with a history of actual use without a challenge until China began claiming almost all of the South China Sea (SCS) as part of its territory. It claimed “indisputable sovereignty” based on its fictitious 9-dash line (originally 11-dashes, then down to 9-dashes, now 10-dashes) that the Arbitral Tribunal in The Hague trashed in 2016.
When it forcibly occupied Scarborough in April 2012 after a Philippine Navy was deputized to apprehend Chinese poachers in the Shoal, in the absence of a Coast Guard vessel in the area at the time, we rushed Coast Guard vessels to confront them. The tense situation prompted the US to broker a deal where both sides would withdraw simultaneously from Scarborough. To make a long story short, we did, China didn’t, and the US was nowhere to be heard after that.
Despite the thawing of relations and the return of Filipino fishermen to Scarborough, China continues to occupy the area and control entry into the Shoal. It’s widely suspected that it will build a forward operating base within Scarborough in rapid fashion like what they did in Subi, Fiery Cross, and five other artificial islands in the Kalayaan island group (KIG). Once that fait accompli is done, it would have total de facto control of the SCS including the EEZs of 5 ASEAN countries.
Last week, Benham Rise hit the headlines when the Chinese said that the Philippines doesn’t have sovereignty over it. Benham, or Philippine Rise, is part of our EEZ and exploitation of its resources is exclusively ours. Allowing joint exploration with Philippine counterparts and sharing its bounty, be it data or minerals, is strictly our sovereign decision to make. No one has to remind us about our exclusive entitlements in our EEZ, much less the one violating it.
The frenzy over that statement brought to mind China’s armed occupation of the SCS and its obvious imperial agenda to dominate the Indo-Pacific theater before conquering the world in due time; after all, China’s a very patient strategist and a master of timing. Its submarines are for certain exploring the depths of Benham to familiarize themselves with critical pathways and hiding places in preparation for future conflict, citing innocent passage to mask their intentions. What else could it be for? And if they control the depths, they will control the surface long before we know it.
A few days ago, social media resurrected a news report about China being invited early last year to help out address piracy in the Sulu Sea and Celebes Sea. I guess it was meant to return the spotlight to an issue that may have been forgotten.
By mid-2017, just after Marawi’s occupation by the Daesh, the Philippines, Indonesia, and Malaysia began their joint operations to deter and defeat lawlessness and terrorism in that area. Singapore, which had been sharing its intelligence date base, was invited to join.
How are the joint patrols coming along? What’s the status of their “jointness?” Do they have a joint headquarters? Are they meeting the objectives? Are there enough redundant ground, sea and air assets, including unmanned aircraft, to cover suspected camps, trails and staging areas 24/7? Why is China needed to help out? What value does it bring in addressing our joint security concerns given its aggressive behavior in the SCS? That’s like jumping from the frying pan to the fire.
The Sulu and Celebes Seas are strategic sea lines of communication. Scarborough is a vital sea line of communication within our EEZ. Benham Rise is a crucial sea line of communication as well. If we have China freely gallivanting in all these areas, we’d be totally surrounded. Have we asked ourselves what the long-term consequences would be to the Philippines, to ASEAN and to the entire Indo-Pacific region should that come to pass?
China’s island fortifications in the SCS are vital components of its imperial agenda. Apart from Woody Island in the Paracels, China has built significant point-defense capabilities — anti-aircraft guns and close-in weapons systems (CIWS) — at each of its outposts in the Spratlys: Fiery Cross, Mischief, Subi, Gaven, Hughes, Johnson, and Cuarteron Reefs. China won’t spend big money building and prepositioning war assets like fighters, bombers and long-range missiles if it doesn’t have a plan to suit its “Kingdom under Heaven.”
Unfettered access in Scarborough, Benham, and Celebes would transform the Philippines into China’s giant fulcrum to deny the US the ability to secure the Pacific Ocean, SCS and Indian Ocean. As Deng Xiao Ping once said: “There can’t be two tigers on the same hill.” The Philippines seems to be that hill which is strategic real estate. No less than US President Donald Trump said so when he visited the country late last year. I’m pretty certain he wasn’t referring to the Trump Tower in Makati City.
Sooner or later there will be a clash in the SCS between the US and China whether anyone likes it or not. Both powers have opposing national interests and we will be at their crosshairs, each one wanting us to side with them. The question to ask ourselves now is: What would be best in OUR national interest? My reply to that is: Build credible deterrence with deliberate speed. It is our constitutional duty to defend ourselves. We cannot, and must not, abdicate that responsibility and the right to remain free.
Rafael M. Alunan III served in the Cabinet of President Corazon C. Aquino as Secretary of Tourism, and in the Cabinet of President Fidel V. Ramos as Secretary of Interior and Local Government.
NEW YORK — It’s one of the most beloved movies in musical cinema and now Steven Spielberg is giving West Side Story a makeover — except this time, he is recruiting Latino talent to play the lead roles.
The original film version of Leonard Bernstein’s musical — Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet reimagined in the world of warring New York gangs — came out in 1961, winning 10 Oscars and captivating a generation on the cusp of huge societal change.
For the remake, Spielberg is teaming up with playwright and screenwriter Tony Kushner, who has previously collaborated with the three-time Oscar-winning billionaire director on Lincoln (2012) and Munich (2005).
Casting director Cindy Tolan has issued a casting call for actors aged 15-25 to play the lead roles of Tony, Maria, Anita, and Bernardo. Candidates “must be able to sing,” with dance experience “a plus,” it said.
The ad also specified that Maria, Anita, and Bernardo were Hispanic characters.
In the original movie, the Puerto Rican character Maria was played by actress Natalie Wood, and Bernardo by George Chakiris, the son of Greek immigrants.
Anita was played by Rita Moreno, who is Puerto Rican and won an Oscar for her work.
West Side Story would be the first musical for 71-year-old Spielberg. It comes as the genre undergoes something of a renaissance in American cinema.
Last year’s live-action Beauty and the Beast and The Greatest Showman, and 2016’s La La Land have all entered the annals of the top 10 highest box-office takings in the history of North American musical cinema.
West Side Story pits warring gangs, the Sharks and the Jets, against each other in Manhattan’s Lincoln Square on the Upper West Side.
Today, the neighborhood is most famous as the site of the Lincoln Center, America’s premier performing arts venue where the Metropolitan Opera House first opened in 1966 and where apartments today can fetch millions of dollars. — AFP
WHILE his visit in the country was short and hectic, it was enough for Brazilian football legend Zico to be impressed with what he saw and expressed hope for the continued development of the Beautiful Game in the Philippines.
Went on the invitation of Seven Seas Properties, a company that promotes Philippine real estate and Philippine stocks in the Japanese market, Zico got a chance to immerse in the local football scene while here as well as share his knowledge and experience from a career that made him one of the best in the game all time.
“I could see lots of kids enjoying football [here] and that is what motivates me [to do these kinds of projects],” said Zico, whose real name is Arthur Antunes Coimbra, before leaving Sunday night.
Upon his arrival in the country on Friday, the former attacking midfielder was able to get a better idea of the growth of football in the country after attending training sessions and clinics in various parts of the metro as well as talking to stakeholders of the sport, including officials from the Philippine Football Federation and Philippines Football League and national men’s football team coach Thomas Dooley.
Zico, 64, said that he hopes his visit had contributed in one way or another to the football thrust in the country while also expressing support for greater achievements for the Philippine national team.
“I came here to contribute to football in the Philippines. I hope my visit will help develop the game here,” said Zico.
Adding, “I hope this is just the beginning, and hopefully one day the Philippines can qualify for the World Cup.”
Zico is considered one of the best footballers in the world during the late ’70s and early ’80s. He starred for the Brazilian national team, scoring 48 goals in 71 appearances. In 1999, the attacking midfielder came eighth in the FIFA Player of the Century grand jury vote, and in 2004 was named in FIFA’s list of the world’s greatest living players.
He also had a successful managerial career, leading Turkey’s Fenerbahce, Greek team Olympiacos, and CSKA Moscow to titles. Zico was also in charge of the Japanese national team when they won the AFC Asian Cup in 2004.
Zico’s visit in the country was also made possible in cooperation with Solar Philippines, the makers of Pocari isotonic drink, Inter Sports Partners, AgriNurture, and Primex. — Michael Angelo S. Murillo
BAMBOO is native through most of Asia — from the tropical jungles of Thailand and Vietnam, to the resort villages in Bali, to the periphery of the Angkor Wat in Cambodia, to the Arashiyama grove in Japan, and to both rural and urban Philippines.
The fact that this sun-loving grass is abundant in this region – such that it can grow into forests – made it earn a mixed reputation: to villagers, a poor man’s material; and, to builders, a boost to the aesthetics of luxury villas, posh homes, and hotels.
But there’s a common denominator among these groups: bamboo is a sustainable material.
Asian builders can learn from their Southern and Central American peers whose lush sub-tropical bamboo forests have been a source of strength for centuries, shielding homes from earthquakes.
Colombian Luis F. Lopez, a structural engineer for bamboo construction, has been building homes from bamboo for the Philippines’ poorest since 2014. The houses he makes are not the traditional bahay kubo – they can withstand magnitude 8 or 9 quakes and supertyphoons with wind speeds of up to 250 kilometers per hour.
How such a lightweight material as bamboo could weather nature’s harshest elements has basis in science. Growing up in Central America, also a seismic area along the Ring of Fire, Mr. Lopez knew how his hometown did not lose lives to disasters.
“The best houses to resist earthquakes are [made of] bamboo,” the Colombian engineer said during a recent interview with BusinessWorld in Manila.
“In Latin America especially Colombia, there’s tradition to build bamboo houses but in a different way. You can’t see bamboos outside the house. That technique of construction came from the coffee region of Colombia.”
In 2002, Colombia became the first country in the world to have a regulation governing bamboo construction, with homes employing that bamboo technology as old as two centuries, Mr. Lopez said.
The Colombian, who moved to the Philippines in 2014 to become head for product development and quality control at organization Base Bahay, brought that technology to the Philippines taking into account another variable: typhoons.
“We just take the technology from Colombia and Latin America because in Peru and Ecuador, they have similar technologies. We take that technology, we just adapt to Philippines with the conditions of the Philippines,” Mr. Lopez said.
“We don’t have typhoons in South America. We need to reinforce the house to resist their strong winds… And we also take things from the tradition of the bahay kubo and tradition of the people to make the people comfortable with the technology.”
The University of the Philippines in Los Baños helped Mr. Lopez’s team in testing Philippine bamboo’s resistance to earthquakes, but the final experiment was made not thru simulations but amid a real typhoon, with his team setting up wind instruments, cameras and a weather station.
“We had two options: go to Europe or Japan and test that or go thru a wind tunnel which are too expensive… We just waited for a typhoon in real life,” the engineer recounts.
The team built three houses in Iloilo and another three in Bicol.
“Yolanda passed but didn’t hit the houses. The first typhoon that hit the houses was Glenda. And after that Ruby, then Nina… We have records of these,” Mr. Lopez said.
The result of the experiments was a home whose walls are huge frames made of bamboo with claddings three centimeters thick. And unlike in resorts or in the typical bahay kubo, the bamboo poles are hidden within that plaster mesh.
“It’s a light frame made of bamboo. Then we put plaster, only three centimeters of plaster in mortar cement. Plaster metal mesh and bamboo frame. No more,” he explained.
“Many people think that we replaced the steel for bamboo. No, no, it’s not like that. It’s a frame made of bamboo,” Mr. Lopez added, noting that the bamboo homes still use steel but not in amounts found in houses made of concrete hollow blocks.
“We have some steel balls for the connection.”
Base Bahay is a not-for-profit organization established in 2014 as a spin-off from the Hilti Foundation and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) efforts to tackle urban housing, according to its website.
The organization has tapped foundations, mostly missionaries, to build affordable and disaster-resilient houses, with the first bamboo housing duplex inaugurated in Bagong Silangan in Quezon City.
It has also built 100 houses in Tacloban freely given to victims of Yolanda, one of the strongest cyclones to have hit the Philippines.
But with bamboo being a sustainable construction material, the goal is not just to build homes, Mr. Lopez said.
“The idea of Hilti Foundation is to make houses with sustainable materials that you can get from the country and make livelihood for people that produce those materials,” he said.
“We need to create the value chain for bamboo here in the Philippines.”
Base Bahay has a bamboo treatment facility in Negros, where mature poles are soaked to make them resistant to powder beetle infestation. The communities there produce 2,000 bamboo poles a month that the organization buys, therefore creating jobs.
The organization has built 400 houses in the Philippines so far and has set an annual target of 300 new homes.
“And maybe in three or four years more, we reach 500 per year,” Mr. Lopez said.
That meant new acres of bamboo shoots elsewhere in the country, and generation of more jobs — a cycle that other bamboo-rich areas can replicate and sustain. — Maria Eloisa I. Calderon
BRUSSELS — The European Union warned Monday it would react “swiftly and appropriately” if Washington imposed trade curbs, after US President Donald J. Trump accused the bloc of trading “very unfairly” and hinted at such action.
“The European Union (EU) stands ready to react swiftly and appropriately in case our exports are affected by any restrictive trade measures from the United States,” European Commission spokesman Margaritis Schinas told reporters.
Mr. Trump told Britain’s ITV channel that the EU has treated the US “very unfairly when it came to trade” and that his many problems with Brussels could “morph into something very big.”
In reaction to the Trump interview, Mr. Schinas said: “For us, trade policy is not a zero-sum game, it is not about winners and losers. We here in the European Union believe that trade can and should be win-win.”
“We also believe that while trade has to be open and fair it has also to be rules based,” he added.
Mr. Trump delivered the warning during an interview last Thursday on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, where he took his “America First” agenda to the global business elite. In a speech Friday he told the forum that his mantra “does not mean America alone” and hinted that the US could rejoin the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a deal he withdrew from a year ago.
But earlier this month the Trump Administration imposed steep tariffs on imported washing machines and solar panels. Last year it vowed to impose nearly 300% punitive tariffs on airplanes manufactured by Canada’s Bombardier. A bipartisan US trade panel blocked that decision on Friday but the dispute, which has inflamed relations with Ottawa — and to a lesser degree Britain, where Bombardier has a large workforce — could be a harbinger for the EU. — AFP
THE Philippine Stock Exchange, Inc. (PSE) is positive it can secure clearance from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for its acquisition of the Philippine Deposit System Holdings Corp. (PDSHC), after it conducts a stock rights offering next month.
In a disclosure on Monday, the PSE said the country’s corporate regulator approved its listing application for the P3.16-billion stock rights issuance on Jan. 25.
“With the approval, the company is confident that it will be able to fully comply with the Securities Regulation Code requirement to reduce ownership of broker shareholders to 20%,” the PSE said.
The PSE will be offering up to 11.5 million stock rights to existing shareholders at P275 each next month. Proceeds will be used to fund the acquisition of PDSHC, and working capital requirements. The company has already obtained a loan facility of up to P1.15 billion each from BDO Unibank, Inc., Metropolitan Bank & Trust Co., and Bank of Commerce for the acquisition.
The entitlement ratio for the offer has yet to be disclosed.
“The company has in place several layers of control in the system that will monitor the level of ownership and restrict purchases to maintain the ownership level at 20%,” the PSE said.
Bringing down broker ownership in the PSE to less than 20% is key to getting the SEC’s approval for the transaction, as Rule 33.2 (c) of the Securities and Regulation Code states that “no single industry or business group shall beneficially own or control, directly or indirectly, more than 20% of the voting rights of the Exchange Controller.”
PSE Chairman Jose T. Pardo said last week the stock rights offer would bring down ownership of trading participants in the PSE to 19%.
“Thus, the company is hopeful that it will obtain the exemptive relief from the SEC soon, which will then pave the way for the finalization of the acquisition of additional shares in PDSHC,” the bourse operator said.
BDO Capital Investment Corp. and First Metro Investment Corp. have been tapped to arrange the offering.
State-run Land Bank of the Philippines (Landbank) has also expressed its intent to buy a majority stake or at least 66.67% in the fixed-income bourse. The bank’s board of directors approved the plan last week.
Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III backed Landbank’s move, saying the PSE’s inability to secure exemptive relief has hampered the growth of the country’s capital markets.
Shares in PSE were up 0.82% or P2 to close at P247 apiece on Monday. — Arra B. Francia
