JV

Solon says big push needed to modernize ‘lagging’ PH transport infra

January 10, 2023 PS Jun M. Sarmiento 254 views

EFFORTS to modernize the transportation system in the Philippines need to be expedited as the country’s mobility infrastructure is lagging by “decades” behind its Southeast Asian neighbors, Senator Joseph Victor “JV” Ejercito stressed on Tuesday.

“My estimate is that we’re about thirty, thirty-five years behind in terms of infrastructure development and transportation modernization compared to our neighbors,” he said in an interview on ANC’s “Headstart.”

Ejercito, who currently serves as vice chair of the Senate Committee on Public Services, explained that the country’s current investments in infrastructure development and transportation modernization are still far from the ideal.

“For several decades, we have not really invested much [in] transport the way our ASEAN neighbors did. We are only investing about two percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). It’s supposed to be five percent for infrastructure development,” the senator said.

The lawmaker from San Juan said improving the country’s transportation systems, especially its railways will boost ongoing efforts to revive the economy after being battered by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“With transportation, with railway systems, more than airports, movement of people, movement of goods will be easier. That will attract, of course, foreign investments. That will make doing business easy and more convenient,” Ejercito said.

“Transportation modernization and infrastructure development will cost a lot, but I think the returns to the economy will be enormous,” he added.

On Monday, Ejercito joined President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., officials from the Department of Transportation (DOTr), and representatives from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) in launching the tunnel boring machine for the Metro Manila Subway System project.

The senator was the staunchest defender of the subway’s proposed funding during the Senate’s deliberations on the 2023 national budget.

“With the launching of the subway’s tunnel boring machine, which will be used for excavating along the project’s route from Valenzuela to the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA), we are now one step closer to making the country’s first-ever subway system a reality,” he said in a Facebook post.

“With the poor state of our country’s transportation system, the railway is the only way,” he added.