Magandang araw po sa inyong lahat.

As you know, the Department of Finance is the government’s primary fundraiser for its priorities that aim to uplift the lives of Filipinos.

In 2024 alone, the DOF must collect 11.7 billion pesos daily and borrow about 4 billion pesos every 24 hours to fund our average daily spending of 15.8 billion pesos.

The priorities are encapsulated in our nation’s HEARTS: Health; Education; Agriculture; Roads and Infrastructure; Technology; and Security and Social Protection.

And so I end and start my day with the same question: have we collected enough for our HEARTS?

For the first half of the year, revenue collections have reached 2.15 trillion pesos—already half of our total collection target of 4.27 trillion pesos for 2024.

And over the medium term, we anticipate a 10.3 percent average annual growth in total revenues to support our people’s growing needs.

In fact for 2025, we expect double-digit collection growth from the Bureau of Internal Revenue and the Bureau of Customs as we enhance their administrative efficiency through digitalization and address leakages in the tax system, especially from e-commerce.

The digitalization efforts of both revenue agencies are in high gear to improve our tax administration and simplify processes for taxpayers in line with the Ease of Paying Taxes Law.

On top of these, we are strategically tapping non-tax revenues to increase collections without putting additional burden to our people. This includes higher dividends from GOCCs and privatization of more government assets.

And while there are no new tax proposals on the table, we have refined revenue measures pending before Congress—the majority of which are expected to be passed before the year ends. They could additionally inject an average of 42 billion pesos annually into our coffers beginning in 2025.

Meanwhile, we have already raised 1.42 trillion pesos as of May, or around 55 percent of our 2.57 trillion peso financing program for 2024.

Our financing performance indicates an 82:18 split between domestic and external financing, allowing us to mitigate foreign exchange risk while supporting domestic capital market development.

We are very prudent and transparent in our borrowings, only tapping very concessional official development assistance and very cheap rates from the commercial market. This principle has earned us the top spot in a recent global ranking on debt transparency out of 50 countries.

Our medium-term fiscal consolidation plan ensures that the economy will continue to outgrow the country’s debt, ensuring our ability to pay our obligations.

Meanwhile, we will continue to boost investments in high-impact sectors by easing the doing of business, improving the regulatory regime, and reducing barriers to trade, such as through the CREATE MORE bill.

More priority reforms by the DOF–which had been on the drawing board for years–have recently been enacted to support our bid for investments-led growth including the Real Property Valuation Act and the Public-Private Partnership Code.

There’s plenty more to share, but due to time constraints, I will keep this short.

We have made solid progress and kept our promise to the Filipino people. We can chew gum and walk across the room at the same time, and we will continue to do so until the very last minute of this administration’s term.

Maraming salamat po at mabuhay ang Bagong Pilipinas.