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More public funds seen needed for cancer care in PHL

Image by Marco Verch/CC BY 2.0

Medical advances have made cancer treatable even at stage 4, or when the disease has spread to other organs in the body, but public resources in the Philippines have yet to fill the gap in cancer care, according to an expert.

The 2023 General Appropriations Act includes P1.56 billion for two cancer funds. However, an expert pointed out the cost needed for each cancer case.

Each breast cancer patient needs P300,000 to P450,000 to complete the required 18 treatment cycles for the disease, according to Marvin Jonne Mendoza, head of the section of medical oncology of the National Kidney and Transplant Institute. 

The Philippines adds at least 27,000 new cases of breast cancer each year, he noted.

“If we have to save more lives, we need more funds from the government not just for treatment but for testing, because early diagnosis and treatment is far more effective than treating late-stage disease,” Mr. Mendoza said in an e-mailed statement.

The medicines for different kinds of cancer are already available locally, he said. The government provides free, targeted therapies for two types of cancer, breast and lymphoma, in 23 public hospitals nationwide.   

A cancer center at the University of the Philippines-Philippine General Hospital is in the works after it became the Marcos administration’s first approved public-private partnership.  

“We can beat cancer now. We can save lives. And we are trying our best to make treatment accessible nationwide, especially to those who cannot afford the treatment,” added Mr. Mendoza.  

Neoplasms, commonly known as cancer, was the third leading cause of death in the Philippines in 2022. One hundred eighty-nine of every 100,000 Filipinos are affected by cancer, with four Filipinos dying of the disease every hour. — Patricia B. Mirasol

Some footnotes to financial stability

BW FILE PHOTO

Thanks to the global financial crisis of 2007-2009, the world is many times richer in valuable lessons to avoid another crisis. Yes, excessive risk-taking even in a period of relative macroeconomic calm is bad. There is always a time of reckoning. Escalating borrowings beyond notional limits both by banks and investors to finance their own lending and investment activities turned out to be a cardinal sin. As in the US, allowing some financial institutions and activities outside regulatory bounds proved fatal to the whole system. As a result, a whole bunch of regulations and standards was mainstreamed including the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act in the United States. Both the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Bank for International Settlements (BIS) agreed that the crisis had forced the overhaul of the global financial regulatory architecture.

The key message was achieving greater financial system safety.

Greater safety is understood to simply mean a resilient financial system that is “less leveraged, more liquid and better supervised.” Globally, the implementation of the Basel III capital and liquidity accords and adoption of stress testing were the watershed in promoting what came to be fashionable after the global financial crisis — financial stability. Shadow banking by nonbank entities was flushed out and dealt with. Many jurisdictions established macroprudential authorities. Even bank executive pays did not escape regulatory reach.

For many emerging markets, this shotgun regulatory approach could be overwhelming because many of the factors that birthed the global financial crisis were not even heard of, or the opportunities for excessive leveraging, for instance, were quite limited. Thus, they opted for a proportionate approach to regulation and supervision. This means the technical standards and supervisory assessment were to be applied in proportion to the supervised entity’s systemic importance and the jurisdiction’s global importance.

But across all jurisdictions and financial institutions, the call was to be intensely attentive to risks.  It looks like the reforms generally worked.

More than two years ago, the BIS’ Claudio Borio, Marc Farag and Nikola Tarashev in their “Post-Crisis International Financial Regulatory Reform: A Primer,” reviewed these regulatory and supervisory reforms and concluded that one, they have greatly strengthened the financial system by improving their loss-absorbing resources and risk standards; two, the system’s shock-absorbing capacity depends significantly on the internal consistency and synergy of individual standards; and three, there remain “barren patches” requiring authorities’ attention, warranting a conservative regulatory approach.

In the case of the Philippines, financial stability became a buzzword while the global financial crisis was beginning to wind down in 2009.

We remember we would always debate the meaning of financial stability, which is the absence of financial instability. So, for a couple of years, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) struggled on how to monitor financial stability because its very definition proved elusive, and appropriate indicators were yet to be established. BSP’s conviction about dealing and promoting financial stability was always a key agenda item in its annual planning conference and at many Monetary Board meetings.

Notwithstanding the absence of explicit legal cover, being only a de facto authority on financial stability, the BSP started the groundwork by defining the parameters of financial stability and the relevant parties to be involved. A whole-of-government approach is required because financial stability cuts across public goals and institutions.

It was two years later, in 2011, when a voluntary inter-agency Financial Stability Coordination Council (FSCC) was formed. This council does not have any decision-making powers but focused only on coordinating macroprudential policies and crisis management practices. In 2017, a financial stability unit was organized within the BSP to start work on macroprudential analysis and prepare policy papers for discussion. Three years later, the Monetary Board established the Financial Stability Policy Committee to decide on macroprudential issues. The Monetary Board continued to decide on monetary policy and financial sector supervision.

This was after the BSP charter was amended by Congress in 2019 giving it explicit authority over financial stability.

In July 2020, the BSP, together with members of the FSCC such as the Department of Finance, Insurance Commission, Securities and Exchange Commission and Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp. issued the Macroprudential Policy Strategy Framework for the Philippines. This contains the views of the country’s financial authorities, the existing institutional arrangements and the possible tools to ensure the health of the financial system.

In June 2022, the council completed and released the Systemic Risk Crisis Management Framework that identifies key actions required to assess, categorize, manage and communicate systemic risks. Crisis preparedness is the focus of this publication.

The secretariat of the council, the “financial stability unit” or Office of Systemic Risk Management of the BSP, also prepared what it called a “perimeter paper” to help clarify the financial stability agenda on its coverage.

How did the IMF assess Philippine efforts to develop the framework and institutional arrangements for macroprudential supervision?

After completing its Financial Sector Assessment Program in early 2022, the Fund issued a technical note on the country’s macroprudential policy framework and tools. While noting that the BSP, together with the other FSCC members have “made significant progress,” it called for greater efforts within the BSP to further enhance the conduct of essential macroprudential risk analysis. It also challenged the council to further improve its coverage beyond risk monitoring. Cautioning against potential inaction bias, the Fund advised the council to seek formal authority so that its recommendations could be considered in their respective agencies on a comply-or-explain modality.

The Fund also advised the BSP to expand its macroprudential tools and form its operational procedures systemically. Data gaps have to be reduced to enhance risk monitoring.

In short, more work had to be done.

While all of these housekeeping concerns were being addressed and some key policy papers were being worked out, the BSP — then the council —  had been publishing the Financial Stability Report. This was a difficult task because the working model for ensuring financial stability was still evolving, though attempts were already made to identify systemic risks in the financial system to enable the council to measure and manage such risks.

This long journey in institutionalizing financial stability as an explicit mandate of the BSP has been useful in highlighting potential systemic risks in the financial system. In its 2022 Financial Stability Report issued recently, the council stressed that “the crux of our systemic risk assessment is that the market is going through a storm.” This is quite consistent with the earlier analysis of the international financial institutions particularly the IMF, that “our world economy is like a ship in choppy waters.” The council’s call was to be prepared for more rains, and more rainy days. For IMF head Kristalina Georgieva, a similar challenge is to prevent this highly unstable situation from becoming a dangerous new normal.

It was correct for the 2022 Financial Stability Report to have decided to be consistent with the definition of systemic risks after the joint seminal paper of the Financial Stability Board, IMF and BIS from early 2009. This would afford international comparison, and speaking with one language, understanding and mitigating systemic risks should not be difficult to achieve.

From the perspective of monetary policy, the most interesting aspect of the Financial Stability Report can be found in Chapter 3 which dwells on “financial market risks that will affect the general market.”

Its reassessment of valuation shows that “it does not take an officially called recession to drag financial markets.” Expectations of recession translate into expected lower income streams. Therefore, if inflation remains elevated, and in the Philippines, it is very much so, central banks are more likely to keep interest rates high.

The Financial Stability Report also made the point that while inflation should be decisively addressed and supply side issues do not lend themselves easily to monetary actions, it is possible central banks would end up either too aggressive or too timid. Both could be disruptive.

Finally, with growth constraints on further monetary action, government interventions are needed to sustain the growth momentum. Social expenditures are indispensable because of the unprecedented rise in basic commodity prices. The January 2023 inflation at 8.7% will require greater efforts from fiscal authorities to mitigate the supply side. Herein lies the dilemma. The lower growth forecast for this year is expected to have some dampening effect on public revenues so state borrowings will have to rise. The problem is made worse by the recent proposal to create a Maharlika Investment Fund that would effectively earmark revenues from government-owned or -controlled corporations, government financial institutions and even the dividends from the BSP directly to the fund. Indeed, the Financial Stability Report could not have put it more clearly: “There will be a trade-off between present day requirements and desired future outcomes.” This could be destabilizing.

That is not exactly what it means by financial stability, that is, the absence of financial instability.

 

Diwa C. Guinigundo is the former deputy governor for the Monetary and Economics Sector, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP). He served the BSP for 41 years. In 2001-2003, he was alternate executive director at the International Monetary Fund in Washington, DC. He is the senior pastor of the Fullness of Christ International Ministries in Mandaluyong.

Foreign policy predicament

PRESIDENT FERDINAND R. MARCOS, JR. welcomes United States Defense Chief Lloyd Austin III at Malacañang Palace on Feb. 2. — NOEL B. PABALATE/PPA POOL

United States Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s recent visit to the Philippines was only one of several that high-ranking US officials have made since Ferdinand Marcos, Jr. assumed the Presidency. The visits underscore this country’s continuing relevance to the strategic and other interests of its former colonizer. They also indicate a departure from the less than idyllic US-Philippine relations that Mr. Marcos’ pro-China predecessor cultivated.

Among the country’s recent visitors from the US was Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who was in the Philippines last August. US Vice-President Kamala Harris was also in the country only last November, during which time the Marcos II administration received a pledge of continuing military aid and agreed to allow US visiting forces and their equipment access to additional Philippine military bases as provided for by the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) and the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA). Which Philippine military bases the US troops would have additional access to and other details were presumably discussed during the Austin visit.

US media have been celebrating the access of US troops to more Philippine military bases. It will disperse US military forces in Asia so they can act pro-actively or respond more quickly to any threat from China, which President Joseph Biden has described as the leading “geopolitical challenge” to his country. Indeed, if Philippine military bases in Luzon will be among those to which US troops will have additional access, it will put them only a few kilometers from Taiwan, which China regards as one of its provinces.

The expanded Philippine commitment under the VFA and EDCA is in fact occurring in the context of heightened tensions between China and the US, which the latter has attributed to the former’s supposed threat to forcibly annex Taiwan and the possibility of its supporting North Korea in the event of a confrontation between North and South in the Korean Peninsula. The most recent indication of the rising tensions between the two countries was Blinken’s postponement of his Feb. 4 visit to China because one of its surveillance balloons traversed the air space of the continental USA in violation of international law.

These tensions are fundamentally the consequences of the US policy of preventing the rise of China to superpower status through its “Pivot to Asia,” of which President Joseph Biden’s pledge to defend Taiwan in the event of any Chinese attempt to forcibly unite that island with the mainland is a major component.

The possibility of a war with China has made the expansion of EDCA coverage vital to US strategic interests. But it raises for the Philippines questions over what its consequences could be, such as whether the current administration has carefully weighed the possibility that it would involve the country in a confrontation that could escalate into a nuclear war between the only superpower on the planet and the country aspiring to equal if not replace it.

The US has emphasized that no permanent military bases will be established on Philippine soil. But US troop access to more Philippine military bases hardly makes a difference — and even multiplies their capacity to launch both offensive and defensive actions against any actual or anticipated adversary, hence China’s objections.

The brutal truth is that both the VFA and EDCA were crafty schemes to go around the ban in Article XVIII Section 25 of the Constitution on “foreign military bases, troops or facilities” in the Philippines except under three conditions. Foreign military troops, bases, and facilities can be allowed in the Philippines only if, first, it is through “a treaty duly concurred in by the Senate.” Second, should “Congress so requires,” the same treaty must also be “ratified by a majority of the votes cast by the people in a national referendum held for that purpose,” and third, it must be “recognized as a treaty by the contracting party.”

Neither the VFA nor the EDCA is a treaty between the US and the Philippines. Both are executive agreements that through the subterfuge that the presence of US troops would only be temporary, and that they will only have access to Philippine military bases rather than have their own, nevertheless bind the Philippines to the support of US strategic interests.

Despite Article XVIII, Section 25 of the Constitution, in 1999 the Joseph Estrada Presidency signed the VFA, under the terms of which Philippine troops have since held joint military exercises with their “visiting” US counterparts. The Benigno Aquino III administration complemented that already problematic agreement in 2014 by signing and ratifying the EDCA, the provisions of which allow visiting US forces, with their equipment, to access selected Philippine military bases.

Former President Rodrigo Duterte threatened to rescind the VFA while he cozied up to China by practically ignoring its intrusions in the West Philippine Sea (WPS) and welcoming into the country tens of thousands of its workers and gamers in Philippine Offshore Gaming Operations (POGO), but that threat never went beyond words. Both the VFA and the EDCA are still very much in force.

While declaring that the country would remain “close” to China, it is becoming increasingly clear that the Marcos II regime policy, as indicated by its expansion of US EDCA access, is to restore and nurture the decades-long “special relations” between the US and the Philippines.

Despite the possibly dire consequences of its VFA and EDCA pacts with the US, the Philippines hardly has any choice. There is also its Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT) with the US, which its officials have repeatedly declared they would honor by defending the Philippines from external threats. Vice-President Harris herself reiterated that pledge on Nov. 21 in reference to Philippine problems in the WPS.

The Philippines has been having its own problems with its Chinese “friend,” especially over its incursions into the WPS. That does not justify this country’s inviting US intervention in resolving the issue, given its likely consequences. But thanks to the policies of both past and present administrations, as in the Cold War years, the Philippines is being thrust into a situation over which it will have no control.

No one can blame the ruling circles of either the US or China for defending and advancing their respective economic and strategic interests at all costs. In contrast, rather than advancing the country’s own, the Philippine ruling elite has not deviated from its decades-long, US-dependent foreign policy. It has failed to develop the capacity of the country to defend itself on the basis of the fundamental truth that no nation can depend on anyone else, and that, as the late Senator Claro M. Recto pointed out decades ago, involvement in “the quarrels of the strong” is not only dangerous; it also distracts government from addressing the country’s legions of problems.

Whether against China or any other external threat, the Philippines is depending on the US to defend it — and as recent events are demonstrating, in the pursuit of its interests, the US has pledged that it will do so.

The Marcos II administration has declared that part of its foreign policy is strengthening Philippine relations with other ASEAN countries and with China. But it is still the US on which the country has to depend for its external defense because, despite the billions spent on its supposed “modernization,” the Armed Forces of the Philippines cannot even protect Filipino fisherfolk from Chinese harassment and is most expert only at the suppression of dissent and social unrest. No government is to blame for this predicament except the Philippines’ own.

 

Luis V. Teodoro is on Facebook and Twitter (@luisteodoro).

www.luisteodoro.com

TikTok is not only annoying. It’s much worse than that

MAY GAUTHIER-UNSPLASH
MAY GAUTHIER-UNSPLASH

It’s widely acknowledged that depression and suicide have risen among the youth, with commonly attributed factors being traumatic events and dramatic life changes (death in the family, divorce, romantic breakups, etc.), drug use, alcoholism, and over-medication.

Nevertheless, experts (including the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) have long seen social media as a primary cause for mental health issues. “Over the past couple of decades, social media has impacted every generation, but none more than children and young adults,” wrote Sherry Dillon, RN, CPHRM, in a feature in bravadohealth.com (“Is Social Media Impacting Youth Depression?” May 22, 2018).

She states: “Dr. Laurel Williams, Chief of Psychiatry at Texas Children’s Hospital says, ‘Many people are worried about how busy they [children] are. There’s a lack of community. There’s the amount of time we spend in front of screens and not in front of other people. If you don’t have community to reach out to, then your hopelessness doesn’t have a place to go’.”

Additionally, “Dr. Karyn Horowitz of Bradley Hospital in Rhode Island also cites social media as a major factor for the rise in youth depression. ‘For some kids, video games can become an addiction leading to social isolation, poor school performance, and impaired sleep,’ she says.”

And the worst social media culprit? TikTok.

One study (“Accelerating dynamics of collective attention,” Lorenz-Spreen, Mønsted, et al., April 2019) found that a person’s attention span dramatically decreases over time from using TikTok and yet the same pattern is not seen in other social media platforms such as Twitter or Facebook.

Indeed, “TikTok brain’ is a real thing.” Merely viewing a “90-second video clip from the mobile app causes problems in the collective attention span of a person. Now, experts are looking into its effects on kids’ brains using TikTok.” (“TikTok Brain Explained: Endless Dopamine Rush From Short Videos Get Kids Hooked,” Science Times, April 2022)

Ultimately, TikTok is a drug dealer and the drug is dopamine. And right now, 44.4 million Filipinos (with a staggering 67.9% of Filipinos aged between 16-64) are potential addicts: “The app features short videos of lip-synched songs, acting, dances and memes of various sorts. At first glance, TikTok seems like a harmless platform for sharing content and meeting new people. However, this application is a dopamine factory,” says a feature in The Gauntlet (“TikTok is a dopamine factory,” Andrea Silva Santisteban Fort, The Gauntlet, Feb. 14, 2021).

“Dopamine is an excitatory brain neurotransmitter,” Ms. Santisteban Fort explains. “To put it simply, it’s a chemical messenger that sends information from your nerve cells to other parts of the body. The brain releases it when we eat food that we crave, drink alcohol or scroll through social media. This important neurochemical boosts our mood and motivation, giving us a feeling of pleasure and satisfaction as part of its reward system. Dopamine is what makes us desire things and take action based on how much dopamine it is expecting to get from a certain activity. It creates reward-seeking loops in the sense that people will seek to repeat pleasurable behavior, such as spending time on Instagram. Our brains reward us for absorbing information the same way our brains reward us for eating good food. By fulfilling a craving, our brains release dopamine, allowing us to feel pleasure and satisfaction. Nevertheless, dopamine wears out. When this happens, we seek more of it — and the addictive cycle continues,” says Ms. Santisteban Fort.

“TikTok takes advantage of this pattern of behavior. Users receive a constant stream of new videos — a dopamine stimulation — every 15 seconds to one minute. In a Forbes article, Dr. Julie Albright, a sociologist specializing in digital culture and communication, mentioned that TikTok users find themselves ‘in this pleasurable dopamine state, carried away. It’s almost hypnotic, you’ll keep watching and watching’.”

The foregoing takes on a magnitude of a crisis when one considers that 57% of our population are under the age of 30, those under 50 about 90%. And then consider that 57% of newborn babies in the Philippines are illegitimate, many being children of teenage mothers, still more later to become the children of broken homes due to annulled marriages. And every child will grow up amidst a culture seeking to normalize premarital sex, homosexuality, and drugs.

Consider further that the Philippine fertility rate (for women between 15 to 49 years of age) is currently 1.9. Hence, declared the Philippine Statistics Authority, “the Philippines is already below the replacement fertility level [i.e., 2.1]”.

The utterly plausible health, psychological, social, economic, security implications of all that for the country is devastating.

The Marcos administration should take a deep look into what is not only a health and security crisis but also an existential one. A good first step would be to ban TikTok in all government or government-issued computers or devices. Legislation can be made prohibiting children from using TikTok.

But indeed, it would just be better to ban TikTok all together. Philippine and international law are replete with provisions authorizing this for reasons of health and national security.

And really, just for the simple reason of maintaining good taste.

 

Jemy Gatdula is a senior fellow of the Philippine Council for Foreign Relations and a Philippine Judicial Academy law lecturer for constitutional philosophy and jurisprudence

https://www.facebook.com/jigatdula/

Twitter  @jemygatdula

Chinese state media, AI companies warn of risks in ChatGPT stock frenzy

A VIEW of the city skyline in Shanghai, China, Feb. 24, 2022. — REUTERS

SHANGHAI — Chinese state media on Thursday cautioned against risks in chasing local ChatGPT-concept stocks, while domestic artificial intelligence (AI) companies urged investors to be rational after their soaring share prices caught regulators’ attention.

ChatGPT, a chatbot developed by US firm OpenAI and backed by Microsoft Corp, gives strikingly human-like responses to user queries. 

Frenzy around the technology launched at November-end has seen shares of Beijing Haitian Ruisheng Science Technology Ltd soar 217% this year.

Hanwang Technology Co Ltd has risen as much as 129% as of Wednesday, CloudWalk Technology Co Ltd 128% and TRS Information Technology Co Ltd 66%.

The stocks retreated on Thursday after the state media warning as well as a slump in Alphabet Inc shares that wiped out $100 billion in market value after the Google parent’s ChatGPT rival shared inaccurate information.

In a front-page editorial, the Securities Times highlighted several technological concepts that previously spurred stock buying in China – such as fifth-generation telecommunications networks (5G), augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR) and anti-virus garments – the excitement for which has died down.

Though some hotly chased concepts have been successful, “many more new ideas haven’t been commercialized, or require more time to prove,” the state-backed newspaper said.

“However, some people avidly speculate on fake concepts, luring others into schemes of pumps and dumps. Investors eventually end up in tears so they should not follow.”

Companies developing ChatGPT-like concepts have also flagged risks at the request of regulators after their prices shot up amid intense interest in generative AI – technology that can generate new data and media such as text and images.

Beijing Haitian Ruisheng Science Technology said its ChatGPT-style products and services do not yet generate revenue, and that it has no relationship with OpenAI.

Though such technology “is on a long-term uptrend, we need to analyse its speed of growth, and effect, in a cool-headed way,” it said in a filing in response to queries from the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

The company said it expects a roughly 50% slump in 2022 net profit, and admonished investors to be cautious as its valuation is currently much higher than the industry average.

360 Security Technology Co Inc, in response to regulators’ queries, said its self-developed ChatGPT-related technology is still at a nascent stage and is used only internally as a productivity tool.

It is uncertain about when it can market ChatGPT-style products, and how effective they will be, so “we advise investors to pay attention to market trading risks, decide rationally, and invest cautiously.”

Among deep-pocketed Chinese firms joining the latest chatbot race, e-commerce leader Alibaba Group Holding Ltd on Wednesday said it is developing a ChatGPT-style tool, while rival JD.com Inc said it aims to integrate ChatGPT-like technology into some products.

Gaming major NetEase Inc plans to deploy similar “large language model” technology in its education business, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters. — Reuters

South Korea fines German automakers for rigging diesel car emissions

REUTERS

SEOUL — South Korea’s anti-trust regulator said on Thursday it would impose a combined fine of 42.3 billion won ($33.48 million) on three German automakers for colluding to rig emissions of its diesel cars using software.

Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Volkswagen and Audi were involved in collusion that reduced competition and restricted consumer choice, the Korea Fair Trade Commission (KFTC) said in a statement.

Mercedes-Benz was fined 20.7 billion won, BMW 15.7 billion won and Audi 6 billion won, the regulator said, adding that Volkswagen was not fined because it did not earn revenue relevant to the issue.

Mercedes, BMW, Volkswagen and Audi were not immediately available for comment.

Last year, Mercedes-Benz and its Korean unit were fined 20.2 billion won for false advertising tied to gas emissions of diesel passenger vehicles.

The European Commission in 2021 fined Volkswagen and BMW a total of 875 million euros for colluding to curb the use of emissions cleaning technology they had developed. — Reuters

Japan exchanging information on China spy balloon with US — gov’t

CHRIS BARBALIS-UNSPLASH

JAPAN is exchanging information on Chinese spy balloons with the United States, top government spokesperson Hirokazu Matsuno said on Thursday.

There have been confirmations of suspected balloons flying over Japan, including in the open waters off the southwestern region of Kyushu in 2022, Matsuno told reporters at a regular news conference.

“We will continue to monitor the situation with utmost interest and gather information,” he added. — Reuters

North Korea shows off largest-ever number of nuclear missiles at nighttime parade

SEOUL — Nuclear-armed North Korea showcased its missile production muscle during a nighttime parade, state media reported on Thursday, displaying more intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) than ever before and hinting at a new solid-fuel weapon.

North Korea held the widely anticipated nighttime military parade in Pyongyang on Wednesday to mark the 75th anniversary of the founding of its army, state news agency KCNA said.

Leader Kim Jong Un attended with his daughter, who is seen as playing a possible future leadership role in the hereditary dictatorship.

The ICBMs showed North Korea’s “greatest” nuclear strike capability, KCNA said, adding that the parade also featured tactical nuclear units.

Imagery released by state media showed as many as 11 Hwasong-17s, North Korea’s largest ICBMs, which are suspected to have the range to strike nearly anywhere in the world with a nuclear warhead.

“This is cumulatively more ICBM launchers than we’ve ever seen before at a North Korean parade,” Ankit Panda of the United States–based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said on Twitter.

If such ICBMs are equipped with multiple warheads, that number could be enough to saturate existing U.S. missile defence systems, he added.

The Hwasong-17 was first tested last year.

NEW MISSILES
The country has forged ahead with its ballistic missile programme, launching larger and more advanced missiles despite United Nations Security Council resolutions and sanctions.

“This time, Kim Jong Un let North Korea’s expanding tactical and long-range missile forces speak for themselves,” said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul. “The message Pyongyang wants to send internationally, demonstrating its capabilities to deter and coerce, will likely come in the form of solid-fuel missile tests and detonation of a miniaturized nuclear device.”

The Hwasong-17s were followed by what some analysts said could be a prototype or mockup of a new solid-fuel ICBM in canister launchers.

The canisterized ICBMs appeared different from those shown in a 2017 parade, Panda said.

Most of the country’s largest ballistic missiles use liquid fuel, which requires them to be loaded with propellant at their launch site – a time-consuming process.

Developing a solid-fuel ICBM has long been seen as a key goal for the country, as it could make its nuclear missiles harder to spot and destroy during a conflict.

It is unclear how close the suspected new missile could be to testing. North Korea has sometimes displayed mockups at the parades. — Reuters

What’s in store for the travel accommodation industry in 2023?

Despite economic challenges, the rebound in hotel markets is expected to continue as countries open their borders, according to an industry expert.

“People are talking about revenge travel. I don’t necessarily believe that one. I think there has always been a desire to travel, and now that the gates have opened up, I see people returning to travel and enjoying themselves, especially in the luxury segment,” Mark Willis, chief executive officer of Fairmont Hotels & Resorts, tells BusinessWorld.

Text and interview: Arjay L. Balinbin

Videography/Video editing: Joseph Emmanuel L. Garcia and Earl R. Lagundino

Alphabet shares dive after Google AI chatbot Bard flubs answer in ad

STOCK PHOTO | Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

LONDON – Alphabet, Inc. lost $100 billion in market value on Wednesday after its new chatbot shared inaccurate information in a promotional video and a company event failed to dazzle, feeding worries that the Google parent is losing ground to rival Microsoft Corp.

Alphabet shares slid as much as 9% during regular trading with volumes nearly three times the 50-day moving average. They pared losses after hours and were roughly flat. The stock had lost 40% of its value last year but rallied 15% since the beginning of this year, excluding Wednesday’s losses.

Reuters was first to point out an error in Google’s advertisement for chatbot Bard, which debuted on Monday, about which satellite first took pictures of a planet outside the Earth’s solar system.

Google has been on its heels after OpenAI, a startup Microsoft is backing with around $10 billion, introduced software in November that has wowed consumers and become a fixation in Silicon Valley circles for its surprisingly accurate and well-written answers to simple prompts.

Google’s live-streamed presentation on Wednesday morning did not include details about how and when it would integrate Bard into its core search function. A day earlier, Microsoft held an event touting that it had already released to the public a version of its Bing search with ChatGPT functions integrated.

Bard’s error was discovered just before the presentation by Google, based in Mountain View, California.

“While Google has been a leader in AI innovation over the last several years, they seemed to have fallen asleep on implementing this technology into their search product,” said Gil Luria, senior software analyst at D.A. Davidson. “Google has been scrambling over the last few weeks to catch up on Search and that caused the announcement yesterday (Tuesday) to be rushed and the embarrassing mess up of posting a wrong answer during their demo.”

Microsoft shares rose around 3% on Wednesday, and were flat in post-market trading.

Alphabet posted a short GIF video of Bard in action via Twitter, promising it would help simplify complex topics, but it instead delivered an inaccurate answer.

In the advertisement, Bard is given the prompt: “What new discoveries from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) can I tell my 9-year old about?” Bard responds with a number of answers, including one suggesting the JWST was used to take the very first pictures of a planet outside the Earth’s solar system, or exoplanets. The first pictures of exoplanets were, however, taken by the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) in 2004, as confirmed by NASA.

“This highlights the importance of a rigorous testing process, something that we’re kicking off this week with our Trusted Tester program,” a Google spokesperson said. “We’ll combine external feedback with our own internal testing to make sure Bard’s responses meet a high bar for quality, safety and groundedness in real-world information.”

FORMIDABLE COMPETITOR

Alphabet is coming off a disappointing fourth quarter as advertisers cut spending.

The search and advertising giant is moving quickly to keep pace with OpenAI and rivals, reportedly bringing in founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page to accelerate its efforts.
“People are starting to question is Microsoft going to be a formidable competitor now against Google’s really bread-and-butter business,” said King Lip, chief strategist at Baker Avenue Wealth Management, which owns Alphabet and Microsoft shares.

Lip cautioned, though, that concerns about Alphabet may be overblown, saying: “I think still Bing is a far, far cry away from Google’s search capabilities.”

The new ChatGPT software has injected excitement into technology firms after tens of thousands of job cuts in recent weeks and executive pledges to pare back on so-called moonshot projects. AI has become a fixation for tech executives who have mentioned it as much as six times more often on recent earnings calls than in prior quarters, Reuters found.

The appeal of AI-driven search is that it could spit out results in plain language, rather than in a list of links, which could make browsing faster and more efficient. It remains unclear what impact that might have on targeted advertising, the backbone of search engines like Google.

Chatbot AI systems also carry risks for corporations because of inherent biases in their algorithms that can skew results, sexualize images or even plagiarize, as consumers testing the service have discovered. Microsoft, for instance, released a chatbot on Twitter in 2016 that quickly began generating racist content before being shut down. And an AI used by news site CNET was found to produce factually incorrect or plagiarized stories.

At the time of writing, the Bard ad had been viewed on Twitter more than a million times. — Reuters

VOX POPULI | After three years of travel restrictions, where do Filipinos want to go now?

MANY FILIPINOS are now going on “revenge travels” after spending the past three years confined to their homes due to strict mobility rules amid a public health crisis.

In a post-pandemic world, Filipinos are eager to create new memories, whether they travel locally or abroad.

The Philippine Travel Agencies Association, Inc. held its annual Travel Expo from Feb. 3 to 5, offering a variety of travel deals. As the first one taking place post-pandemic, many Filipinos flocked to the scene.

The requirements were what stopped people from traveling, said Angelica, 32, who went to the expo hoping for flight packages.

“We waited for the pandemic to die down before even checking flights,” she said.

When it comes to dream destinations, Filipinos have been eyeing neighboring Southeast Asian countries.

For Aldrin, 43, who has done vlogs in Catanduanes, foreign culture and heritage are the next boxes he’s looking to tick.

“Vietnam is where I want to go because of the deep culture that they have,” he said. “When it comes to heritage sites, I would go with Thailand.”

For distant countries, it’s important to find promos that can somewhat get costs down, said Kenji, 47.

“I’m planning to go to the United States by this year, so I hope I can get a promo from this event.” he said.

Edward, 38, already acted on his excitement to travel last year and managed to book a trip to Japan, his dream destination.

Cristina, 34, and Nino, 35, lamented that they had traveled a lot before the pandemic, to countries like the United Arab Emirates and Australia. They hope to add more stamps to their passports this year as a family.

For younger Filipinos like Patrick, 24, the hunt for affordable deals is all the more important given his limited budget.

“It will only be my second time traveling internationally,” he shared.

When it comes to why Filipinos travel, the answers are simple: “family bonding” and “building memories,” according to Imelda, 57.

Marie, 23, added that stress is a major factor since traveling refreshes people by exposing them to beautiful sights. — Brönte H. Lacsamana

Jobless rate eases to 3-year low in ’22

A worker makes Christmas decorations in a workshop in Barangay San Vicente, Angono, Rizal. The jobless rate improved to 4.3% in December, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority. — PHILIPPINE STAR/WALTER BOLLOZOS

THE PHILIPPINES’ unemployment rate eased to a three-year low of 5.4% in 2022, despite a slight uptick in December, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) said on Wednesday. 

Preliminary results from the PSA showed the unemployment rate stood at 4.3% in December, a tad higher than November’s 4.2% jobless rate but smaller than the 6.6% in December 2021.

The PSA said there were 2.22 million jobless Filipinos in December, up 43,000 from the 2.18 million unemployed in November.  However, this was a better than the 3.28 million jobless recorded in December 2021.

Philippine Labor Force Situation

This brought the full-year jobless rate to 5.4%, which is the lowest since the 5.1% in 2019 or before the coronavirus pandemic, PSA Undersecretary and National Statistician Claire Dennis S. Mapa said during the briefing.

This was equivalent to 2.67 jobless Filipinos last year, the lowest number since 2.26 million in 2019. In 2021, the unemployment rate stood at 7.8%, equivalent to 3.71 million.

“The government remains committed to providing more, better and green job opportunities to Filipinos and sustaining a vibrant labor market through the strategies articulated in the Philippine Development Plan 2023-2028,” National Economic and Development Authority Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan said in the statement.

Job quality improved in December, as the underemployment rate fell to 12.6% from 14.4% in November and the 14.7% in December 2021. This translated to 6.197 million underemployed Filipinos or persons already working but still looking for more work or longer working hours.

For 2022, the underemployment rate averaged 14.2%, the lowest in three years or since the 14% in 2019.

PSA data showed the size of the labor force population reached 51.22 million in December, bringing the labor force participation rate (LFPR) to 66.4% of the country’s working-age population. This was lower than the 67.5% seen in November.

Last year, LFPR averaged to 64.7%, the largest share since the redefinition of the jobs situation survey in 2005.

The employment rate dipped to 95.7% in December, from 95.8% in the previous month. This means 49 million Filipinos had jobs in December, about 704,000 less than in November.

For the full year, the share of employed persons was at 94.6%, also the largest since 94.9% in 2019.

On average, an employed Filipino worked 40.3 hours a week in December, higher than the 39.3 hours logged the previous month and the 39.7 hours in the same month in 2021.

Philippine Annual Labor Force Situation

SEASONAL TREND?
ING Bank N.V. Manila Senior Economist Nicholas Antonio T. Mapa said the holiday season in December may have affected the manufacturing subsector as factories had their year-end shutdown.

“We also saw a decrease in jobs for the wholesale and retail trade, possibly as holiday spending wound down post-Christmas. We did see some offsetting increase in agriculture employment, but this was unable to fully offset the decrease,” Mr. Mapa said.

In terms of sectoral share of employment, services remained the top employer in December with an employment rate of 58.9%, down from 60.5% in November. Likewise, the share of workers in the industry sector narrowed to 17.1% from 18.1% previously.

The agriculture sector accounted for 24% of the total employed persons in December, up from 21.4% in November.

“Employment losses were seen in manufacturing, wholesale and retail trade, and accommodation and food service activities. This came as a surprise as we anticipated higher demand in these sectors given the holiday season,” China Banking Corp. Chief Economist Domini S. Velasquez said in a report sent to BusinessWorld.

Manufacturing, which accounts for about 44.7% of the industry sector, shed more than half a million jobs month on month in December.

Wholesale and retail trade, which accounts for 37.9% of the services sector, dropped 387,000 workers month on month in December.

MIXED OUTLOOK
After the month-on-month rise in unemployment in December, Ms. Velasquez said she expects “slightly worse figures” in January.

“However, as the economy continues its vigorous growth in 2023, the labor market will likely remain strong, posting unemployment rates around 5% moving forward,” she said.

“On the downside, although we have not seen layoffs in 2022 despite an environment of high interest rates, further monetary tightening might eventually push businesses to reduce the number of workers. Approval of another round of wage hike this year will also be a significant risk to the labor market,” she added.

For ING Bank’s Mr. Mapa, manufacturing jobs may see gains as factor activity hit a seven-month high in January, citing the S&P Global Philippines’ latest Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) report.

“Manufacturing activity was jumpstarted in January so we could see an improvement on this front. Slower growth may reverse some of the gains so far. We can hopefully see the unemployment rate stay at these levels while seeing the underemployment rate fall. This would signal improved job creation quality,” ING’s Mr. Mapa said the jobs market will take its cue from the economy’s recovery this year.

“Unfortunately, we believe growth momentum has the odds stacked against it given surging inflation and rising borrowing costs,” he added.

Inflation soared to a 14-year high of 8.7% in January, fueling bets of further interest rate hikes to anchor expectations.

The Monetary Board increased the benchmark key rate by 350 bps to a 14-year high of 5.5% in 2022. Its next policy review meeting is on Feb. 16.

The BSP sees inflation averaging 4.5% this year before easing to 2.8% in 2024. — Ana Olivia A. Tirona

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