Members of the National Government’s Career Executive Service Development Program Inter-Agency Steering Committee; staff and alumni of the Public Management Development Program: good morning.

Thank you for inviting me to speak at this very timely conference.

As technological changes happen rapidly, the need for the entire bureaucracy to be exceptionally adaptive has never been more critical.

Digital transformation is key to unlocking greater efficiency, transparency, and productivity. This reality was underscored when the pandemic struck, forcing both private and public sectors to adopt digitalization at an unprecedented rate.

President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. was very clear in his marching orders of the Bagong Pilipinas brand of governance. Government offices must rapidly integrate digital technologies across the bureaucracy to enhance the ease of doing business, streamline processes, expedite responses, and promptly deliver public services to our people

I take pride in affirming that the Department of Finance has not only responded to this call but has made substantial progress in embracing digitalization.

Our commitment is not only to make our services responsive to our people’s needs but also to open the way to a more inclusive economy.

For example, the Bureau of Customs and the Bureau of Internal Revenue have established electronic tax payment and filing channels, along with modernized customs processes. Taxpayers can now conveniently file and settle their taxes anytime and anywhere.

Digitalization has helped enhance tax collection and administration, strengthen trade facilitation, curb corruption, and improve the business climate in the country.

It underpins the government’s assurance of a reliable revenue stream. More significantly, it has been instrumental in delivering on the government’s promise of efficient and excellent taxpayer service, ensuring that the hard-earned contributions of our people translate into tangible value.

The digitalization program of the Securities and Exchange Commission has also led to a notable increase in the number of registered corporations in the country, encouraging the continued growth of businesses.

In addition, the Bureau of the Treasury’s move to facilitate the buying and selling of Philippine retail treasury bonds through smartphones and digital devices has extended the benefits of financial inclusion to ordinary Filipinos.

These examples only represent a fraction of the ongoing digital transformation initiatives within the public sector. The Marcos, Jr. administration is strongly committed to integrating such innovations into the entire government framework to help bring public services closer to the people.

In this regard, the Public Management Development Program is an important addition to our toolkit in developing a unified policy direction for the comprehensive digital transformation of the government.

I encourage our public leaders to be the champions of revolutionary changes within their respective agencies. You must leverage the PMDP as a platform for sharing and learning experiences from each other’s digitalization journeys to help identify and implement best practices in government.

Ultimately, the end goal is to harmonize and streamline public agencies’ digitalization initiatives to ensure that our main clients—the Filipino people—receive the best possible service in the most efficient manner.

I hope today’s event sparks creative solutions and decisive actions leading to the urgent transformation of public service delivery.

I look forward to collaborating with all of you to accelerate our progress towards achieving a digitally-transformed and future-proof Philippine government.

Thank you.