Nearly 900,000 jobs created through microfinance

Nearly 900,000jobs were created in the first nine months of the year due to intensified efforts of the government to support small businesses in the country, Malacanang said yesterday.
Presidential Management Staff chief Secretary Cerge Remonde said efforts to provide frinancial support to micro-ennterprises, or micro-finance for short, presently cover all 82 provinces of the country as well as all its 131 cities.
Citing a report by People's Credit and Finance Corp. (PCFC) president Edgardo generoso before the Inter-Agency Coordinating Council for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises last week at the Palace, Remonde said only 43 towms in the country remain to be reached by the country remain to be reached by the government's micro-finance programs.
"A total of 859,569 jobs were created fro these micro-finance efforts over the nine-month period beginning January 2008, surpassing last year's accomplishment over the same period by 289,449 jobs," he said.
"The amount of loand extended, mean while, more than doubled from January to September 2008 as compared to last year, from P25.945 billion in 2007 to P53.634 billion this year'" he added.
Remonde said the Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) should "be commendid for leading government instrumentalities in the micro-finance component of the Arroyo administration's job generation effort."

This is a good news for the peole who got employed. They already have something to get money from. This brings not only higher number of employment but also faster production specially to the labor intensive jobs. This would help the poor to have a better life. One of the government's main problem had given a solution, though not 100 percent, it is alredy a big help. However, there is a down side for this news. There will be greater number of non tax payers because for sure some of them will be a minimum wage earners. This is a down side because less will pay tax, government will not get as much funds for the country. I hope the government will continue helping the people who are now employed and they should still continue creating jobs for the others who are still employed.