Aquino administration saves P42B

MANILA, Philippines — The government generated P42 billion in savings during the first three quarters of 2011, President Benigno Aquino III said in an interview with the ABS-CBN News Channel.

Aquino cited the figure when news anchor Lynda Jumilla asked about his administration’s achievements during the year.

He said that P21 billion of the savings resulted from reduced interest payments on government loans as a result of the upgrade in the country credit ratings by various credit rating agencies.

“We’re inching closer and closer to investment grade pero it has impacted already on how much we have to pay for the loans we do have,” the President said.

“We’ve been able to replace the higher interest rate with cheaper interest rates,” he added.

The increase in rice production and the lessened need to import the staple contributed P7.7 billion to the savings, Aquino said.

Tightening procedures in the use of funds for infrastructure resulted in P6 billion in savings from the Department of Public Works and Highways.

In the field of job generation, President Aquino reported that according to the labor force survey as of October, there were  “roughly” 2.1 million new jobs.