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Ease of Doing Business Bill passed on Senate 3rd Reading

The Senate passed on third reading the Senate Bill 1311 or the Ease of Doing Business (EODB) Act of 2017 which seeks to establish a national policy of ease of doing business, creating for the purpose the Ease of Doing Business Commission. The bill was sponsored by Senator Juan Miguel Zubiri, chair of the Senate Committee on Trade, Commerce and Entrepreneurship.

The bill sets a new prescribed processing period under which both national and local government offices will have to process the application and communicate the decision regarding the status of the application. This period will not be longer than three (3) working days for simple transactions and seven (7) working days for complex transactions from the time the application was received. For highly technical applications, the bill prescribes a maximum processing time of thirty (30) working days.

To ensure the attainment of the objective of this Act, an Ease of Doing Business Commission will be created. The Commission shall be the policy-making body on business registration and regulatory management and shall set the overall direction for the implementation of the National Policy on Ease of Doing Business.

Likewise, the House Committee on Trade and Industry recently approved the same version of the aforesaid bill. The House of Representatives is targeting to pass the measure before its Session break on 14 October 2017. The EODB Act is certified as urgent by President Rodrigo Duterte. –Ma. Divine Grace T. Derez

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DTI conducts a Roadshow to Seamless Philippine Logistics

The Department of Trade and Industry’s Competitiveness Bureau conducts a Roadshow to Seamless Philippine Logistics: Analysis of Logistics Performance to present the results of the survey completed last June 2017.

Logistics Efficiency Indicators (LEI) Assessment Project was launched by The Department of Trade and Industry’s Competitiveness Bureau, in partnership with the World Bank-International Finance Corporation (WB-IFC), the Board of Investments (BOI) and the Export Development Council (EDC).

The LEI Project is designed to develop measurement and baseline assessment of Philippine logistics cost, time efficiency and reliability of transporting goods/cargoes and services, which is critical for a meaningful policy formulation for the logistics and supply chain management sectors.

Results of the survey will be used in the Logistics Performance Index (LPI) by World Bank. LPI is an interactive benchmarking tool created to help countries identify the challenges and opportunities they face in their performance on trade logistics and what they can do to improve it.

DTI also invited their partners to present the current projects and advocacies that will highlight the government and private sector’s initiatives to improve the country’s overall logistics capability.

The roadshow was held in Puerto Princesa and La Union last September. More sessions will be held in Bacolod, Tuguegarao, Tacloban, Tagaytay and Bataan in October & November. Traders, especially exporters who want to participate may contact the DTI-SCLMD at +632 899 6247 or email at: sclm@dti.gov.ph / dti.sclmd@gmail.com. –Maria Jobellieza A. Alzate

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Mindanao and Cebu exporters input to PEDP 2018-2022

Mindanao and Cebu exporters provided inputs to the next Philippine Export Development Plan (PEDP) 2018-2022

The exporters underscored the need to increase government budget to finance exporters’ participation in international trade fairs and have bigger and more presentable Philippine booths to be at par with exporters of other ASEAN countries.

They also requested to intensify government information dissemination programs to communicate new and repealed regulations to prevent confusion among government officials and exporters regarding export clearances.

They also need information on potential local suppliers. DTI encouraged exporters to always visit the DTI website (http://www.tradelinephilippines.dti.gov.ph/), specifically Tradeline Philippines which contains trade data and a facility to match would-be and existing exporters with potential foreign buyers and local suppliers.

Other recommendations include Filipino product branding, lowering of logistics and power costs, addressing the issue on the overlapping of regulations and automating government transactions.

These inputs were gathered during the recent Focus Group Discussions (FGD) for the PEDP 2018-2022 in Cebu and Davao attended by various sectors from handicraft, shell, agrimarine products, food, banana, cacao, furniture, lifestyle products and activated carbon. The next FGD will be conducted with the services sector specifically IT-BPM, audiovisual, animation, franchising and retailing and tourism and travel-related services. –Asnia R. Bayao

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Factoring and Crowdsourcing your way to Financing

To address the need of the export sector for innovative financing options, factoring and crowdsourcing platforms were introduced in a seminar conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry- Export Marketing Bureau (DTI-EMB), in collaboration with the Export Development Council and PHILEXPORT under the Philippine Export Competitiveness Program (PECP).

Factoring is a financial transaction and a type of debtor finance in which a business sells its accounts receivables, i.e., invoices to a third party (called a factor) at a discount. Factoring is not the same as invoice discounting. Factoring is the sale of receivables, whereas invoice discounting is a borrowing that involves the use of accounts receivable assets as collateral for the loan. Export factoring on the other hand, is a package that encompasses credit protection, export working capital financing, foreign accounts receivable bookkeeping and collection services. The financier (factor, which usually are the banks) will purchase accounts receivable of invoices, which are raised once the seller (exporter) ships the goods to the buyer. Factoring was discussed by Mr. Etienne Von de Bogaert of the Eurofin Asia Group Pte Ltd., a company based in Singapore.

Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising many small amounts of money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding offers a chance of success for MSMEs by showcasing their businesses and projects to the entire world. Crowdsourcing was discussed by Mr. Edison Tsai of New Union.

DTI-EMB regularly conducts these information sessions through its Philippine Export Competitiveness Program (PECP)featuring current concerns of exporters. For more details and updates on topics, contact DTI-EMB at telephone number 465-3300 loc. 109 or email to exponent@dti.gov.ph.-Grace T. Mirasol