The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) on Friday encouraged local businesses affected by the recent storm to avail of the agency’s financing program.
In a Palace briefing, DTI Acting Secretary Cristina Aldeguer-Roque said the DTI is “aggressively” calling on for micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) to take advantage of Small Business Corporation’s (SBCorp) loan programs to help them recover.
“Let’s take advantage of this para makausad tayo,” Roque said.
“Of course, this situation is not a good situation, but we can always move forward and achieve better heights if we just take advantage of the programs and ‘yung mga possibilities na binibigay sa atin ng ating gobyerno, under President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos and ng Bagong Pilipinas,” she added.
Roque said the government has allotted PhP2 billion for its Enterprise Rehabilitation Financing (ERF) under SBCorp, which is available to all MSMEs operating in areas under the State of Calamity.
The ERF program provides an emergency working capital to help MSMEs address financial impacts from disasters, including typhoons. The Program covers losses in inventory, operational disruptions, revenue decline and damages to fixed assets.
New and existing SBCorp borrowers can access loans of up to PhP300,000, repayable monthly for over three years and with no collateral required.
“Now that SBCorp is really aggressively loaning out money, whether nasalanta o hindi nasalanta, especially to the small and medium enterprises, we make the requirements not difficult,” Roque said.
“Actually, wala na ‘tong mga collateral, eh. You just have to prove that you have a business that’s ongoing,” she added.
The program also offers zero-interest rate for the first year and a 1% monthly interest rate for the remaining two years. | PND
