BAGUIO CITY – The city government is setting aside some P100 million as part of its stimulus package for existing micro-small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) once the extended Luzonwide enhanced community quarantine will be lifted to allow the revitalization of the city economy.
City Budget Officer Leticia O. Clemente said the amount is from realigned funds from previous unimplemented projects as interest free loans for MSMEs needing funds to help in bringing back their robust operations after the quarantine.
She said the city’s finance committee will craft the guidelines for the stimulus package for MSMEs in consultation with the sector to ready the funds for possible availment once the quarantine has been lifted to allow them to re-open their businesses and regain their market thus helping bring back employment and spur the vibrance of the city’s economy.
Under the initial proposal of the city’s city finance committee, MSMEs can avail of soft loans from the city government to be repaid over a period of 24 months and allow the city to extend assistance to more enterprises contributing to the city’s efforts to generate more jobs and livelihoods.
According to her, the city government will ensure that the funds released as soft loans to the MSMEs will be returned to the coffers of the city to avoid a repeat of previous experiences that financial assistance to cooperatives and associations for them to recover from natural and man-made calamities never came back to the city.
The city government’s stimulus package is in addition to that which will be made available by other government agencies pursuant to the mandate of the inter-agency task force on emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases tasked by President Rodrigo R. Duterte to craft the guidelines on the prevailing Luzonwide enhanced community quarantine and the gradual lifting of the same.
Mayor Benjamin B. Magalong directed the different departments to engage the different sectors in the city to get their inputs on the city’s proposed transition plan once there will be a gradual lifting of the enhanced community quarantine to ensure the city government is ready to implement agreed rules governing the resumption of operation of certain sectors.
Clemente stated the stimulus package for the city’s MSMEs will be made available once the Luzonwide enhanced community quarantine is lifted by the inter-agency task force.
By Dexter A. See