MAP’s first 120 days in 2011

I WOULD like to update our members and readers on the encouraging developments within MAP from January to April this year.

To enhance international networking with our counterparts in the Asia-Pacific region, we are continuing MAP’s membership with the Asian Association of Management Organizations (Aamo).

MAP became a member of Aamo in 1989. We stopped our membership in 1996 due to budget constraints but we reactivated our membership in 2006.

The Aamo is composed of management organizations from other countries like India, Australia, Cambodia, China, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Mongolia, New Zealand, Qatar and Singapore.

In the Aamo Council meeting, Prof. Ryokichi Hirono of Japan shared the experiences and lessons to be learned from the Japan earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster.

He presented a panorama of the world’s top 20 economies by 2025 where the Philippines will be number 19; and by 2050, our country will be 17th top economy worldwide if there will be good governance and no corruption in the country.

I responded that the Philippines can make it to the world’s top 20 economies in the light of the following:

The Philippines is No. 1 in marine biodiversity, sailors and, I like to believe, also in musicians.

No. 2 in BPOs and call centers

No. 3 in the largest coastlines

No. 4 in gold

No. 5 in other mineral resources

No. 12 in human resources as Filipino expatriates are the preferred employees of kings, queens, sheiks, developers, hotels, universities, etc.

The land area of the Philippines is 400 times that of Singapore, 350 times of Hong Kong, eight times of Taiwan, three times of South Korea. The rest of Asia voted Manila as the headquarters of the Asian Development Bank (ADB). Anecdotal research tells me that our country was No. 2 in Asia after Japan from the 1930s to the 1950s. My Korean friends told me in 1956, the Philippines was South Korea’s benchmark. My Vietnamese friends told me most of their bridges were prefabricated in the Philippines.

Pera ng Bayan

MAP fully supported the “Pera ng Bayan” online initiative of the Department of Finance for an improved monitoring and feedback system for its projects and those of its attached agencies.

We have encouraged MAP members to use www.perangbayan.com in reporting their good and bad experiences in dealing with the DoF, the Bureau of Internal Revenue and the Bureau of Customs.

MAP continues to encourage the DoF to aggressively pursue with maximum speed and intensity its campaign to prosecute, convict and jail major tax evaders and smugglers as plugging this continuing plunder would go a long way in addressing our country’s fiscal problems.

BalikProbinsiya

MAP has agreed to be a partner of BalikProbinsiya, a countryside entrepreneurship advocacy for a Public-Private Partnership (PPP) that brings sustainable livelihoods to rural areas.

The Development Bank of the Philippines will be coordinating government participation and the MAP will be promoting private sector involvement.

As MAP encourages private business start-ups in agriculture, agro-livestock, agro-industry, agro-forestry, tourism, logistics and ICT, DBP is providing seed funding and coordinating government agency support to enable venture viability.

The industry priorities of the BP PPP include revitalization of the coconut industry, establishment of a sunrise bamboo industry, rationalization of agro-livestock sectors, industrialization of agro-forestry and intensification of herbal and vegetable production. The sudden return of Filipino expatriates fleeing the Middle East political upheavals and the Japan triple-whammy of earthquake, tsunami and radiation places a greater immediacy for these entrepreneurial efforts.

Agribusiness zones

In 2004, MAP, through its Agribusiness and Countryside Development Committee (ABCD), launched the Farm Business School (FBS) Project.

The first implementor of the project is MFI Foundation. The MFI FBS opened its doors to the first batch of students in June 2009. MFI Foundation, in turn, partnered with the University of Rizal System to grant a Bachelor of Science in Entrepreneurial Management (BSEM) major in Farm Business to those students who may want to pursue a college degree under a ladderized scheme. There are now two batches in the program with 39 students enrolled.

MFI Foundation, in partnership with the Foundation for People Development, offered a Diploma in Agriculture Entrepreneurship (DAE) last year. The 31 students now enrolled in the program were provided scholarship by the Department of Agriculture’s Agriculture Training Institute under the model of a Public-Private Partnership.

Under discussion is the possible replication of these programs (DAE and BSEM) in Palawan with the participation of the Western Philippines University.

Under the circumstances of State Colleges and Universities (SUCs), the big question is how such programs can be made sustainable, especially with the declining budgetary support from the national government.

To address this problem, the ABCD Committee has proposed the establishment of Educational Agribusiness Zones (EAZs) to showcase technologies that can improve the lives of ordinary Filipino farmers and at the same time provide the financial resources to support the operation of the FBS.

The EAZs shall be managed like any other industrial park where common service facilities (i.e. water, electricity, garbage collection, security) are provided to locators. For such services, locators will be charged accordingly in the form of monthly fees or direct service fees.

Income that shall accrue from the operation of the EAZ shall be used to support student scholarships, faculty training, and research/extension activities of the FBS.

Dynamic membership

Average attendance for the monthly GMMs [general membership meetings] in 2011 was 206, higher than last year’s 147. More members and guests have attended MAP meetings as shown by the record-breaking attendance of 343 in the January 25 MAP inaugural meeting and induction of the 2011 MAP board of governors.

Renewed interest in MAP has been manifested by the record 98.7 percent collection rate for the 2011 annual dues as of March 31. In the past five years, our collection rates for the same period averaged 60-70 percent only.

MAP now has 730 members, and we hope to end the year with a strong membership base of at least 900.

Enhanced benefits

We have offered three learning sessions on the following topics: (1) “Executive Remuneration Schemes and Their Alignment with Business Sustainability” with UK-based Prof. Robert Jelly, executive director of The Chartered Institute of Management Accountants, (2) “MAP Economic Briefing” with Dr. Ciel Habito and BSP Governor Say Tetangco, and (3) “The ADB-AIM Knowledge Hub for Trade and Investment’s The AIM Distinguished Lecture Series” featuring the work of Dr. Jeffrey Williamson, Laird Bell Professor of Economics, Emeritus, Harvard University, and Honorary Fellow, Department of Economics, University of Wisconsin. For the continuing education of our members, we will continue lining up good learning sessions through our MAP Executive Academy.

We have activated the MAP Speakers Bureau in order to propagate best management practices and to give MAP members a chance to share their wisdom and expertise with their fellow MAP members and with other business/professional organizations, schools, students and other management practitioners and educators.

More engaged membership

Many members have become more engaged after we created 25 MAP PPP (Public-Private Partnership) Task Forces, which are mandated to enable MAP to be more proactive in putting forward reforms and recommendations, instead of just reacting to issues. The present committees will also serve as task forces to help selected government agencies pursue their mission and achieve their goals in order to sustain a culture of integrity.

The task forces are expected to generate the interim recommendations by June 30 in time for the July 25 State of the Nation Address of President Aquino, and the final recommendations by September 30 in time for the national budget preparation.

Good governance

1.) INTEGRITY PLEDGE: Four hundred seventy-five companies have signed the INTEGRITY PLEDGE for a clear demonstration of members’ commitment to “walk the talk” and implement policies and procedures that will support the initiative. The “Integrity Initiative” is an advocacy for improved integrity standards that was officially launched in December 2010 by the European Chamber of Commerce, MBC, AmCham, AIM and MAP.

2.) CSR FOR TRUTH-TELLERS AND WHISTLE-BLOWERS: Our MAP Fund Drive to help fight corruption in general, and assist Truth-tellers and Whistle-blowers in particular, has enabled us to turn over financial contribution to now CA Commissioner HEIDI MENDOZA and whistle-blower Col. GEORGE RABUSA.

3. FUND DRIVE FOR ANTI-CORRUPTION PROGRAMS: MAP initiated a MAP Fund Drive to help fight corruption in general, and assist Truth-tellers and Whistle-blowers in particular. Many thanks for the members who contributed to the Fund Drive. So far we have generated about P160,000.

CSR

We will soon be launching the MAP CSR Leadership Challenge, which aims to promote CSR as important and integral part of good management practice, inspire MAP members and other top executives to improve their practice and set the bar for the practice of CSR in the country, and recognize companies that exemplify what it means to be a true corporate citizen through their CSR programs.

Criminality

In line with our partnership with the Armed Forces of the Philippines, we have sponsored a 7 Habits for Highly Effective People workshop for tactical officers and other high level officers of the PMA in order to enhance the leadership skills of the tactical officers so that they are ’whole persons’ in their dealings with the cadets.

On disaster preparedness, we have recommended the active promotion of studies and researches aimed at prediction of earthquakes. We have urged citizens, the national government, the local government units, and private enterprises to fulfill their responsibilities and join efforts in creating cities, towns, communities, and neighborhoods which are less vulnerable to disasters and are safe to live in, work, shop, dine, worship and learn. We have requested our authorities to look upon disaster prevention as a basic tenet in urban planning, urban development and construction.

Meetings

At our March 29 GMM, we allowed five committee chairs to present their respective committees programs and projects for the year. We got good feedback that it surely improved internal communications within MAP so we have agreed to institutionalize it as a regular part of our program for our monthly GMMs.

Many thanks to our general membership, specially our 2011 MAP board members—Vice President Beth Lee, Treasurer Ed Francisco, Secretary Chit Juan, Governors Popoy del Rosario, Frankie Eizmendi, Greg Navarro, Lydia Sarmiento and James Velasquez—for their generous support and active participation in MAP’s programs and projects for 2011.

Thanks to our committee chairs: (1) Dave Balangue—MMY Judging, (2) Junie del Mundo—CSR, (3) Ed Francisco—Finance/Ways and Means, (4) Mar Gatus—Corporate Governance, (5) Rene Huergas—Sports and Fellowship, (6) Beth Lee—Programs, (7) Donald Lim—CEO Conference, (8) Tammy Lipana— Environment and Sustainable Development, (9) Francis Monera—Chapters, (10) Fred Parungao—Nomination and Election, (11) Nena Alcuaz Reyes—Management Development, (12) Tony Samson—Communications, (13) Evelyn Singson—National Issues, (14) Oscar Torralba—AgriBusiness and Countryside Development, (15) Charlie Villaseñor—Trade, Industry and ICT, (16) Ebot Tan—MMY Search, and (17) Lino Zapanta—Membership.

(The author is president of the Management Association of the Philippines and principal architect – urban planner/founder of Palafox Associates. Feedback at [email protected]. For more details about MAP, visit .)