THE Department of Energy (DoE) said it submitted to the President last week its recommendation on the national policy on nuclear energy, which will detail how the country should proceed with the Bataan nuclear power plant.
“I submitted it to the President. I submitted the papers, the policy direction and the national policy proposal,” DoE Secretary Alfonso G. Cusi told reporters, adding that the submission of the formal transmission letter was done last week.
Asked whether the President has acted on the DoE’s recommendation, he said no action has been taken.
“If the President approves that, I will move forward to the next step and that is procurement,” Mr. Cusi said, adding that a “modular [nuclear reactor] is available.”
He said the objective of coming up with a national nuclear policy is not just to answer whether the Bataan nuclear plant should be rehabilitated but “to find final closure” on the facility because it sits on a 300-hectare site.
“So we have to do something about it,” he said.
But he said doing so would require a process, since he cannot declare the abandonment of the nuclear plant on his authority as Energy secretary.
He said the nuclear policy answers whether nuclear energy is going to be an option for the country, especially since “there are provinces already that are available [and] ready to take nuclear as a power source.”
“So in the absence of a national policy, I can’t just say, let’s put the nuclear plant there,” he said. “We’re processing it as an alternative power source,” he added.
Asked about the provinces that are willing to take a modular facility, Mr. Cusi cited Sulu, a southern province and part of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. He dismissed concerns about security, saying a modular reactor “is very low grade” and cannot be used for military purposes. — Victor V. Saulon

NATIONAL GOVERNMENT agencies used 98% of their budget allocations in the first quarter, the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) said.
The utilization rate tops the year-earlier rate of 93%.
Utilization rates are based on the Notice of Cash Allocation (NCA) — a quarterly disbursement authority issued by the DBM to government agencies, allowing them to withdraw funds from the Bureau of the Treasury to pay for contracted projects.
A total of P606.33 billion was spent by government offices during the period out of the P618.23 billion the DBM authorized them to disburse, leaving a balance of P11.90 billion.
In the first quarter of 2017 agencies spent P453.52 billion out of P485.72 billion released, with P32.20 billion left unutilized.
Ten out of the 36 agencies recorded a 100% utilization rate — the Departments of Agriculture, Energy, Foreign Affairs, Interior and Local Government, Public Works and Highways, Trade and Industry, as well as the Judiciary, Commission on Elections, Office of the Ombudsman, and the Commission on Human Rights.
A year earlier four government offices had full utilization over the same period.
Nine agencies also approached 100% the Office of the Vice-President, the departments of Agrarian Reform, Education, Information and Communication Technology, Justice, National Defense, and Science and Technology; State Universities and Colleges, the Civil Service Commission, and the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.
Special Purpose Funds such as Budgetary Support to Government Owned and Controlled Corporations, Allotment to Local Government Units were likewise fully utilized.
The DBM, however, recorded the lowest utilization ratio at 77% during the period.
The Budget department has said that improved government spending was attributable to its shift to a cash-based appropriation scheme beginning 2017, which limits all payments for contractual obligations within a fiscal year — compared to an obligation-based appropriation previously that allows payments to extend by over two years after a given fiscal year.
The government has a P3.767-trillion budget this year, with 84% or P3.165 trillion released as of the first quarter, leaving a balance of P601.67 billion. — Elijah Joseph C. Tubayan

THE Senate on Monday will resume its inquiry into unauthorized deductions from mobile prepaid balances, or incidents of so-called “nakaw load.”
Senator Paolo Benigno A. Aquino IV, chair of the Senate committee on science and technology, said telecommunication companies are expected to provide updates into their efforts to address complaints regarding third-party value-added services (VAS) providers automatically enrolling consumers and deducting from their balances without consent.
“It has been more than a month (since the first hearing) so we are expecting they fulfill these resolutions,” he said in a statement.
At the previous hearing, an internet group proposed a notification system for mobile subscribers for transactions that propose to deduct from their balances.
Mr. Aquino said the proposal would allow subscribers to monitor their load spending and cancel services they do not wish to avail of.
While officials from Smart Communications, Inc. and Globe Telecom, Inc. were open to the proposal, they have yet to commit on adopting it in their services.
“Yes, we agree to it. In fact, we are already implementing that particular requirement with respect to value-added services,” PLDT-Smart Public Affairs Head Ramon R. Isberto earlier told reporters.
“We’ll take that into serious consideration. But just the same, we also have ways of notifying our customers of their current prepaid load,” Globe General Counsel Froilan M. Castelo said at the previous hearing.
Mr. Aquino also reiterated his call to telecommunication companies to conduct a complete audit of all their VAS and impose more transparent procedures for services that users pay for to avert incidents of missing load. — Camille A. Aguinaldo

GOVERNMENT borrowing was P108.87 billion in February, down 17.67% year on year, after the reduced issue of Treasury bonds (T-bonds) and a net repayment of Treasury bills (T-bills), the Bureau of the Treasury said.
Compared with January, however, borrowing was sharply higher compared with the P47.66 billion in the first month of the year.
The decline in overall borrowing was due to P1.47 billion worth of net redemptions of debt owed to domestic creditors, reversing the P31.66 billion in net borrowing from a year earlier.
This was mainly due to the P10.32 billion in net repayments of T-bills from a P1.66 billion net borrowing position a year earlier, and supported by lower issues of T-bonds worth P8.85 billion, down from P30 billion a year earlier.
Foreign borrowing grew 9.71% to P110.34 billion.
Project and program loans from overseas amounted to P1.33 billion and P6.33 billion in February, while the global bonds exchange yielded P102.68 billion.
This compares to the year-earlier totals of P1 billion for project loans, zero for program loans, and P99.57 billion for global bonds exchange.
In the first two months, borrowing was P156.53 billion, down 8.89% from a year earlier.
Borrowing in the first two months is equivalent to 17.62% of the P888.23 billion the government expects to borrow this year.
Borrowed funds help pay for government projects and maturing debt, among others. The government plans to drastically raise spending, particularly on infrastructure. The budget deficit is pegged at 3% of gross domestic product (GDP).
This year, the government has adopted a 74-26% financing mix in favor of local sources at P711.96 billion, with a P176.27-billion projection for gross foreign borrowing. — Elijah Joseph C. Tubayan