Costly projects get top priority – Pernia
Credit to Author: MAYVELIN U. CARABALLO, TMT| Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2019 16:57:44 +0000
CLARK, Pampanga: The government will prioritize costly infrastructure projects while the Philippines remains eligible to borrow funds at a lower cost, Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto Pernia said here on Tuesday night.
“What we have to do now is to prioritize projects, such that those that are more costly than others….. The more costly ones — we want them to move faster than the [less] costly ones,” Pernia said at a briefing after the 8th High-Level Meeting of the Philippines-Japan Joint Committee on Infrastructure Development and Economic Cooperation.
This strategy, he explained, is based on the government’s projection that the country is likely to achieve upper middle-income status by 2020 from its current lower middle-income status.
A higher income status means the Philippines would no longer be eligible for loans that grant lower interest rates with fixed terms, like Japan’s Special Terms for Economic Partnership (STEP) facility.
“Once we do achieve upper-middle income country status, then we will not be qualified for the Special Terms on Economic Partnership funding,” the National Economic and Development Authority chief said.
He added, however, that there is “a grace period of two years between the time we achieve upper middle-income country and the nonqualification for us to be able to avail [ourselves] of STEP funding.”
Within this period, Pernia said priority projects include the Metro Manila Subway Project and the North South Commuter Railway, as well as those in Mindanao.
The first project involves the construction of a 25.3-kilometer subway running run from Mindanao Avenue in Quezon City to FTI in Taguig City, with an extension to the Ninoy Aquino International Airport.
The second involves building a 51-km northward extension from Malolos City in Bulacan province to Clark International Airport in Pampanga province, and a 55-km southward from Solis Street in Manila to Calamba City, Laguna province.
These “big infrastructure projects…aim to make the Philippines reach upper middle-income status by the end of 2019 or in 2020,” Pernia said.
WITH A REPORT FROM JERRY M. HERNANDEZ
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