TRANSPORTATION network company (TNC) Uber advised the member-countries of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) to follow the lead of the Philippines in adjusting transport regulations to accommodate emerging modes of travel.
Uber Southeast Asia General Manager Michael Brown called the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) and the Land Transportation and Franchising Regulatory Board (LTFRB) progressive for coordinating with Uber and other mobile app-based ride-booking service providers in updating the country’s transport regulations.
“We laud the Philippines for being so technology-forward and sophisticated in recognizing that we’re here to stay,” Brown said in his plenary speech at Slingshot MNL, the official start-up event of the Apec Philippines, held on Monday at the Philippine International Convention Center.
“The Philippine government, the LTFRB, and the [DOTC] engaged with Uber and several of Uber’s competitors to understand what’s coming next and to evaluate regulation to catch up with innovation,” he said.
Brown encouraged the foreign delegates to tell their government to follow suit, after the DOTC created a new category to regulate private vehicle service providers, making the Philippines the first country to authorize their operation.
Classified as Transportation Network Vehicle Services, they are required to have young fleets not older than seven years, global positioning system, and a Certificate of Public Convenience to ensure passenger safety and convenience.
However, governments in other countries, such as China, India, Mexico and France, tagged Uber’s services illegal and unsafe because they are not covered in their transport regulations.
Brown responded to these allegations saying, “Innovation will always happen faster than regulation. What other governments can learn from the Philippines is if something doesn’t exist in your regulation, that doesn’t mean it’s bad. It means you need to evaluate whether the regulation needs to be updated to embrace new innovation that creates positive social outcomes, or in our case, providing technology for better, cheaper, safer transport.” Operating in 57 countries and 300 cities worldwide, the San Francisco-based TNC promotes a “shared economy,” where underutilized private vehicles will be used for shared public transport.
“We want to fundamentally change the value proposition of private vehicle ownership,” Brown said. “The net result is our cities get less congested, less traffic on the road, transport becomes cheaper, and you create millions and millions of jobs in the process.”
The private hire service also faced opposition in the country from the House Committee on Transportation’s technical working group and the traditional taxi operators, tagging Uber as an unregulated and unfair competitor.
Uber has yet to complete the requirements and receive the full accreditation of the LTFRB as a TNC.