Invest in better English & science for economic progress

The Philippines is very rich in natural and human resources. In fact, proof of this is our skilled workforce, which leads in manpower exports, but sadly many of our politicians lack basic common sense.

How come the World Bank on September 10 announced that the Philippines ranked 140th among the world’s easiest places to do business, down from our previous 136th rank? At the bottom, at 181st, is the Democratic Republic of Congo. What drastic reforms can we expect to change this negative perception?

One of the most meaningful centennial events of the University of the Philippines (UP) is the inauguration of the UP-Ayala Land TechnoHub project on Commonwealth Avenue, Diliman, Quezon City at 10 a.m. on Oct. 17. VIP guests will be led by UP alumni President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Quezon City Mayor Feliciano “Sonny” Belmonte Jr., Vice Mayor Herbert Bautista, the brothers Jaime Augusto Zobel de Ayala and Fernando Zobel, among others.

According to an exclusive interview with Ayala Land, Inc. (ALI) officials, their firm invested P4 billion in this project, which is the Philippines’ first IT park located beside a university campus. This 10-building project is expected to generate 35,000 new jobs in mostly high-tech enterprises and research centers. ALI has a 25-year agreement for use of those UP lands.

The head of this project, which is called a “technopod” within ALI, is UP business administration cum laude and MBA graduate Maria Victoria Anonuevo. She is senior vice president of Ayala Land in charge of its “Businessscapes” corporate headquarters and technopods group. She told the Philippine STAR that ALI is grateful to UP leaders for their support, especially Justice Abraham Sarmiento and Nelia T. Gonzalez of the board of regents.

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Why isn’t government taking the lead in multibillion-peso investments in information technology (IT) projects of this kind, instead of wasting taxpayers’ money on allegedly overpriced and harebrained schemes like the National Broadband Network or other idiotic white-elephant projects?

The phenomenal growth of call centers is fine, but those are still essentially like exports of our cheaper labor. I urge government to think bigger and aim higher for the future of Philippine global competitiveness, to uplift the incomes of our workforce with encouragement of high-tech enterprises using tax incentives and by investing heavily in technoparks nationwide.

Years ago, I was awed when I visited the government-initiated Hsinchu Science and Technology Industrial Park of Taiwan, which has since then dramatically catapulted that resource-poor island province from a producer of cheap industrial goods to the world’s biggest exporter of high-value IT products, as well as brand names like Acer and Asus. Government boldness, long-term vision and huge investments made Hsinchu a powerful catalyst of Taiwan’s IT economic miracle.

Like the Philippines, our closest geographical neighbor Taiwan was once also a producer of sugar, pineapple and bananas. There is also lots of political corruption in Taiwan, as evidenced by the numerous scandals of the pro-independence ex-President Chen Shui Bian, but they also have past selfless and incorruptible leaders in the past, like the late President Chiang Ching Kuo.

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Furniture importer and Dr. Jose Rizal kin Leandro “Dinky” Bantug recently partnered with Canadian educator Gerry Morgan to market the latter’s Ink Media laptop computers, to assist non-government organizations (NGOs) and government schools. The 55-year-old Morgan said that his laptop is ROM-based, free from virus and uses all open-source software, because Morgan believes “access to information worldwide is a basic human right.”

Gerry Morgan said that “80 percent of people in the world have never touched a computer and have no access to the wealth of information on the Internet.”

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Gilbert Remulla, the young former broadcaster who is now busy running his family’s Island Cove Resort in Cavite, told this writer he is selling some tigers — one adult male for P 65,000, one adult female for P80,000 and one female tiger cub for P 50,000. These are real, not paper tigers!

If I were to someday become a dictator of this republic, I would buy lots of tigers for the national zoo and use convicted crooked VIP politicians to regularly feed them and at the same time cleanse the international reputation of the Philippines among the world’s investors!

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