THE government of the Philippines received on June 8 the ¥20-billion budgetary support pledged by the government of Japan through the Japan International Cooperation Agency, or Jica—less than a month after Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga greenlighted another tranche of the Post-Disaster Standby Loan Phase 2 (PDSL 2) during a summit teleconference with President Duterte on May 19.
According to the Embassy of Japan, the latest disbursement under PDSL 2 is intended to further augment the Philippines’s pandemic “war chest, especially now that [it] continues to show signs of recovery, following the lifting of the enhanced community quarantine in the NCR Plus…”
Signed on September 15, 2020, PDSL 2 is a contingency fund entitling the Philippines to withdraw up to ¥50 billion worth of loans to help finance its response measures in the aftermath of natural and health-related disasters.
To date, Japan has infused a total of ¥40 billion into the recipient’s coffers. The first tranche, which amounted to ¥10 billion disbursed in October 2020 to boost the recipient’s pandemic response. The second tranche, which was of the same amount released in January 2021, was earmarked to facilitate a faster recovery from the effects of the series of supertyphoons last year.
PDSL 2 forms part of the Japanese government’s comprehensive assistance to its counterpart in this time of the pandemic. Other than the PDSL 2, the former provided the Philippines a ¥50-billion financing under the Covid-19 Crisis Response Emergency Support Loan, or CRESL, in July last year.
Along with these two loan accords, Japan has further expressed its solidarity with the Philippines through a ¥2-billion grant aid for the procurement of medical equipment and establishment of laboratory-surveillance sites, as well as the recently announced ¥1-billion grant assistance for local cold-chain development.