PNoy admin raised SUCs budget to P26B – Abad

The Aquino administration has increased the 2012 budget of State Universities and Colleges (SUCs) by 10.1 percent to P26.1 billion, from P23.7 billion in 2011, Budget Secretary Florencio Abad said Friday. The Department of Budget and Management issued the statement, citing Abad, following a spate of protests by students from SUCs against what they claimed were cuts in the budget of SUCs. Banners protesting the budget cut in the education and health sectors were prominently displayed in the campus of the University of the Philippines in Quezon City. The 2012 budget for the SUCs is P23.6 billion, including automatic appropriations, which are itemized for each school, Abad said. Also parts of the proposed 2012 allocation are a standby fund of more than P2 billion under the Miscellaneous and Personnel Benefit Funds (MPBF) for unfilled positions in SUCs, and an additional P500 million under the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) for SUC development. “Clearly, the state subsidy for SUCs is higher next year. But more important than the increase, this proposed budget supports the development of SUCs as responsive to the government’s five priority areas for growth and employment, which are agriculture and fisheries, tourism, general infrastructure, semiconductor and electronics, and business process outsourcing (BPO)," he said. President Aquino has ordered CHED to work together with SUCs and with the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA), the Labor Department, and industry leaders to align their curricula with the priority areas. The additional P500 million under CHED — P250 million for Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses and P250 million for Capital Outlay — will be given as additional funding for activities in line with the government’s priority areas for growth. Abad said in the BPO industry the Business Processing Association of the Philippines is proposing to train 58,000 potential BPO applicants, of which the association has committed to employ 37,000. TESDA will train the applicants from SUCs on what the industry needs for its expansion areas. Government is being asked to shoulder P500 million — P350 million for student training and P150 million for hiring and training teachers. — VS, GMA News