MANILA – The government is eyeing a “less negative” Foreign Investment Negative List (FINL) through legislation that the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) hopes Congress would pass this year.
“The general direction is to liberalize” the FINL, Trade Secretary Gregory L. Domingo told reporters on the sidelines of the second anniversary forum ofArangkada Philippines on Tuesday.
Addressing participants of the forum, Domingo said the government is looking at legislation that would include the review of the FINL, rationalization of incentives, the Mining Act, among others.
“We are targeting to file the draft bills at the start of the new Congress and we hope to pass some of these by the end of this year,” Domingo said.
“If we have a good bill then we can lobby to have it certified” as urgent in the upcoming 16th Congress, he added.
The government earlier said it is conducting a review of the FINL while foreign businessmen had said the list released last year was “too negative.”
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Source: Ben Arnold O. De Vera, InterAksyon, 26 February 2013
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