UNDERSTANDING CULTURE, SOCIETY, AND POLITICS

ACTIVITY #3 By Ma. Rosalinda S. Artocillo

Estrada Administration
Education
1. Estrada gave the pledge after the inauguration of the P10.5 million Division Office of the
Department of Education, Culture and Sports (DECS) in San Jose, Antique. The pledge was
part of the P16.9 billion Third Elementary Education Project (TEEEP). He vowed to give his
unwavering support for major education project that seeks to elevate the country’s public
education system into a more competitive world-class standard.
2. Estrada increased budget for basic education and planned to achieve universal Primary
education by 2015.
Health
1. Estrada promotes primary health centers which are well-quipped and provide free services.
2. Provided supplementary feeding to some 759,800 preschoolers and schoolchildren and
87,500 pregnant women.
3. Pursued various measures to provide effective and efficient health services to Filipinos,
which include the upgrading of health facilities and the construction of new ones.
4. Implemented Philippine Plan of Action for Nutrition that provided vitamin A, iodine, and
iron supplements to some 9.i million preschoolers and 1.4 million schoolchildren.
Agriculture
1. He contributed lands to the landless farmers and increased the CARP coverage for the
landless farmers.
2. He had contributed his role in many fields, in agriculture after 20 years about, the country
received the highest growth of crops in the field.
Finance
1. He built economic reforms to support the finance department of Philippines.
2. Signed the New General Banking Act (Republic Act No. 8791). It was implemented to open
up the local banking industry to foreign players after almost 50 years of having it exclusively
reserved and protected for Filipino nationals. With the industry's liberalization, at least 10
foreign banks have already established their presence in the Philippines.
Environment

1. Signed the Philippine Clean Air Act of 1999 (Republic Act No. 8749). It is designed to protect
and preserve the environment and ensure the sustainable development of its natural
resources.

Labor and Employment

1. Retail Trade Liberalization Act (Republic Act No. 8762) – The bill dismantles 40 years of state
protectionism over the country's retail trade industry and opens the sector to big foreign
players. With the retail trade liberalization, well-known foreign players like France's
Carrefour and Casino Group as well as the U.S.' Wal-Mart and JC Penney are already in the
process of negotiating with local partners.
2. He provided the job to poor students in the summer. He gave the masa format know radio
changing the language from English to Filipino language which changed a lot in economy
field.

3. Increase the employment of many Filipino people who were unemployed then. People were
able to secure jobs in the country itself rather than considering job markets of other
countries.
Arroyo Administration
Education
1. Launching of the internet-based Education Program
2. Easing the Textbook Backlog which is the printing of 10 million copies of textbooks for
19,000 public schools to ensure that every student specifically does in Grade I to Grade IV
would have textbooks for the priority subjects.
3. The constructing of more school buildings with an allotted budget of 40 million pesos
4. Restoring English as medium of instruction
5. Implementing the Basic Education Curriculum (BEC)
6. Improving Teacher Welfare by cleaning up its automatic payroll deduction systems (APDS)
for teachers with loans and by hiring an additional of 15,000 new teachers
7. Mainstreaming Distance Learning
Health

1. Launching of 3-billion universal health insurance coverage that provides free hospitalization
and other medical assistance.
Agriculture

1. Implemented various projects and policies towards the attainment of food security and self-
sufficiency, particularly the FIELDS program.

2. Massive agri-fishery infrastructure projects were established, as the DA's budget greatly
increased.
3. Creating the Philippine Economic Zone Authority

Finance

1. Created several jobs which resulted to an increase of 23% in the rate of new investments in
the Philippines.

2. Formulated laws that redounded to the benefit of the workers. Through this, the creation of
jobs has helped the country elevate its financial condition and economy.

3. Implementation of eVat law and peso became the most performing currency.

4. Annual economic growth in the Philippines averaged 4.5% during the Arroyo administration,
expanding every quarter of her presidency.

Environment

1. Implemented policies that opened up the Philippines forests, mountains and seas to foreign
and private corporations for the reckless extraction and plunder of mineral, timber, oil and
marine resources.

Labor and Employment

1. Implement policies and programs which provided benefits for Filipino workers and their
families and the country as a whole under her nine-year regime.

2. Launched the NARS or Nurses Assigned in Rural Services program early last year to equip
unemployed registered nurses in the country with training and work experience necessary
for them to land a job in the same profession here and possibly abroad.

3. Labor groups also cited other measures under Arroyo administration that benefited the
workers such as the Salary Standardization law for public sector workers, Special program
for Employment of Students, Comprehensive Livelihood and Emergency Employment
Program (CLEEP), and other employment generation programs.
4. Initiated the CLEEP to cushion the impact of the global crisis on the workers in 2009. It
served as a bridging employment program that provided the beneficiaries not only income
sources but also the skills and necessary experience they need in order to compete in the
job market.

5. Aquino Administration

Education

1. Aquino introduced reforms on the Philippine education program by introducing the K-12
curriculum by signing into law the Enhanced Basic Education Act in 2013. This added two
years to the basic education system; which became known as the Senior High School stage.

Health

1. Signed the Reproductive Health Bill

2. Aquino signed RA 10606 (An Act Amending the National Health Insurance Act of 1995),
which mandates the provision of comprehensive health care services to all Filipinos,
through a socialized health insurance program that will prioritize the health care needs of
the underprivileged, sick, elderly, persons with disabilities, women and children; free health
care services are provided to indigents.

Agriculture

1. Increased in agriculture budget: between 2011 to 2015, the agriculture budget increased to
P339 billion.

2. Construction of Agri-Pinoy Trading Centers and farm-to-market roads.

3. Improvement in Rice production

4. Enhance fishery export, with a value of more than 1 billion dollars.

5. More strict measure on rice smugglers

6. Prohibition of illegal fishing, and improvements in strategy to curb it.

7. Amendment of fisheries law.

1. Signed into law the creation of a committee that will monitor the delivery of financial
services to low-income households in the Philippines.
2. Signed the Executive Order No. 208 last June 2 to institutionalize the Financial Inclusion
Steering Committee (FISC).

Environment

1. Signed Proclamation 760, which declared January as “Zero Waste Month.” This led to
the annual conduct of activities celebrating the benefits of the zero wastes approach
over polluting and unsustainable “burn or bury” disposal methods.
2. Aquino administration actively participated in the mercury treaty negotiations leading
to the government’s signing of the historic Minamata Convention on Mercury in
October 2013.
3. Issued the Executive Order (EO) in 2012 to prohibited the use of mercury in small-scale
mining.
4. Signed EO No 193 on November 12 creating the Expanded National Greening Program, that
aims to reforest “all remaining unproductive, denuded, and degraded forestlands” from
2016 to 2028.

Labor and Employments

1. Ratified ILO Convention 189, or the Domestic Workers Convention 2011 (No. 189) on
September 5, 2012. It contains principles promoting the rights and protection of domestic
workers based on the decent work framework.
2. the Congress of the Philippines enacted R.A. 8759, otherwise known as the PESO Act of
1999, President Aquino signed into law the legislative measures amending the same, thus
paving the way for Filipino jobseekers, especially those in the rural areas, to find better
employment opportunities in the country.