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DAVAO CITY—Australia
put up a new fund for enterprises in Mindanao to help
increase economic activity in a region where
Australia
has also actively helped the Philippine government
contain its security threat.
Australia
has allotted A$16 million (P634.24 million) to the
Enterprise Challenge Fund (ECF) that would be granted to
any enterprise based on or operating in
Mindanao.
John
Hardin, the fund director for the ECF’s Pacific and
Southeast Asia, said similar fund provision would be
operated in other countries in the
Pacific Rim which needed financial assistance from developed
countries like
Australia.
Fund
assistance would be in the form of a grant, but Hardin
said that the ECF would be looking at the performance of
the grantee, releasing the grant in installment to
ensure the proper management of the business.
There
would be no discrimination as to the grantee, said Jason
Magnaye, the ECF country director. The grantee would be
determined by the viability of the project as contained
in the project proposal or a project feasibility study.
Although
the ECF was also intended to help put up economic and
social opportunity in areas affected by the armed
conflict, Magnaye said that business applications for
funding would neither carry advantage of being in an
area of conflict.
An ECF
panel would determine the approval of a grant of a
business enterprise and would likely be evaluated on the
impact of the project to the community.
“There
would be projects that need a bigger amount and there
would be projects that need little fund, but if a
particular project that needs little fund would benefit
a lot of people, I think that would be likely
considered,” Hardin said.
As a new
fund, the ECF has eyed the private sector as its client
“because it is our belief that for the economy to
progress, it needs to have economic growth”.
“Where
there is growth, there would be economic stability and
the private sector should be the engine of the economy
in its growth direction,” said Mofe Ogisi, project
manager of the Coffey International Development Pty.
Ltd., which manages the ECF program for the Australian
government. The agency is a specialist in developing
communities worldwide.
Sam
Zappia, counselor for development cooperation of the
Australian Assistance for International Development (AusAid),
said the ECF was part of the Australian government
commitment to the call of the United Nations to the
economically advance countries to give more than to
their usual level of international financial assistance
to the poor nations.
He said
that Australian Prime Minister, John Howard, made the
commitment last year that it would double its aid to
developing countries by the fiscal year 2010-2011.
Australia would see its aid kitty to reach A$4 billion,
from the current level of A$2 billion.
“The
Philippines would be one of the countries that would
benefit from the increased assistance,” Zappia said.
With
assistance at already A$72 million, he said it would
reach A$102 million by 2007-2008.
“The
level of assistance would still reach as much as A$150
million by 2010-2011,” he added.
The bulk
of the assistance would still go the basic education
thrust of the Department of Education, along with its
own project of Basic Education Assistance in Mindanao
(Beam).
The
other funding would be funneled to the Philippine
government programs on infrastructure support to rural
development and other public infrastructure spending.
“We
would go around the provinces to talk to the provincial
governors on what infrastructure are needed in their
locality,” Zappia said, and disclosed that the projects
would likely go to constructing secondary and access
roads.
“These
are roads that would link the other areas of the
province to the national highway,” he said, citing the
limitation of the Department of Public Works and
Highways (DPWH) to constructing only the national
highways. |
