By Leslie D. Venzon
MANILA, April 24 (PNA) — The government has vowed to continuously improve public sector governance and institute policy reforms to improve the business climate in the country, as it taps increased private sector participation in infrastructure development.
Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Arsenio Balisacan said that apart from priority programs and projects, several non-structural reforms have been pursued to streamline government processes.
Balisacan said these include the revision of the Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) Law implementing rules and regulations (IRR) and the Joint Venture (JV) Guidelines.
“(These will) make the business environment conducive to investments and to address constraints and bottlenecks in infrastructure provision… Indeed, the current administration has achieved major achievements in infrastructure development,” he said at the forum on financing options for public-private partnerships (PPPs) on Friday.
Balisacan said through private sector investments under the country’s pioneering PPP program, public resources can be freed up and be utilized for the provision of much needed social services.
He particularly cited investors, banks and other financing institutions that can provide the country’s PPP program with various financing options.
Balisacan, also the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) Director General, said these options include creating a suitable environment for issuance of project bonds for PPPs, packaging and financing for PPP projects, sovereign guarantees for PPPs and implementing measures to attract institutional investors.
Based on the Comprehensive and Integrated Infrastructure Program (CIIP) 2013-2016 and beyond, the priority programs and projects for the infrastructure sector comprises a total of 3,077 projects with total investment requirements amounting to about Php6.58 trillion.
As stipulated in the Philippine Development Plan (PDP), the government aims to increase public infrastructure spending from 2.7 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in 2013 to at least 5.0 percent or about PhP826 billion by 2016 to support the country’s growth requirements in the next few years. (PNA)