JBIC undertakes extensive review of ODA program for RP

The Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC), one of the country’s biggest multilateral creditors, is conducting a massive review of its official development assistance (ODA) to the Philippines, a ranking bank official said.

JBIC deputy director for international finance Takayuki Sato told The STAR that the review aims to identify the country’s priority projects that could be financed through the ODA of the Japanese government, which is coursed through JBIC.

He said they expect "this kind of extensive procedure to be completed within the year."

Sato said they have been regularly reviewing the ODA disbursement and loan performances of JBIC’s financial assistance to the Philippines. "We always review it in the previous days but this time it’s a very big review," the JBIC official said.

He pointed out that the review will allow the Philippine government to identify projects which can be provided a counterpart fund.

"We need to study the timing of the projects and which of these projects would be given priority and should be fasttracked," he said.

It is relevant, he added, for the (Philippine) government to be able to produce the counterpart fund before the JBIC could release the loan. "At least 15 percent should come from the government. We understand that there is some difficulty for the Philippine government to allocate the counterpart fund due to its financial condition. Therefore, there is really a need for the government to decide which projects should be prioritized," he said.

It was noted that the Philippines’ availment rate dropped from a high of 62 percent in 2001 to a low of 58 percent in 2004. The availment rate is the cumulative rate disbursement as a percentage of cumulative scheduled disbursement from the start of all projects.

Sato stressed that this massive review of the JBIC’s ODA program to the Philippines would also allow to "see more good progress between the two governments".

JBIC accounts for 61 percent of all the ODA funds and is still the single biggest funding source for the country.

Aside from JBIC, the other leading funding sources of the Philippines are the World Bank (13 percent), Asian Development Bank (11 percent) and smaller agencies from European nations (15 percent).

There was a noted decline in ODA disbursements to the Philippines in 2004 to $1.095 billion, from $1.408 billion, in 2003.

Sato admitted that there have been concerns regarding the disbursements of JBIC’s ODA to the Philippines.

"There are many issues to discuss for the smooth implementation and effective usage of the ODA. We understand that the Philippine and the Japanese governments are discussing the portfolio and now reviewing the committed amount and how to smoothly implement the outstanding loans," he said.

The Philippines is the fourth largest beneficiary of ODA, next to Indonesia, China and Thailand.

"In our point of view, the Philippine still remains the most important customer of JBIC," he said.

The National Economic and Development Authority earlier admitted that there was a contraction of ODA loan commitments and actual disbursements.

ODA commitments have shrunked to $10.7 billion in end-2004 from 2001’s $13.2 billion.