(Eagle News)–The Philippine Ports Authority has reported a 79 percent dip in its March income due to the coronavirus disease 2019 crisis.
The PPA said from the registered P1.401 billion in the same period of last year, the PPA’s income went down to a meager P300.93 million this year, approximately 16 days after the imposition of the community quarantine in Luzon.
“Unaudited net income for the first three months of the year also decreased by 25% from P3.337 billion posted in 2019 to P2.538 billion this year as all revenue sources of the agency registered negative performances for the period,” the PPA added.
According to the PPA, in its regulatory income, only Manila North Harbour Port Inc. registered a positive deviation of 3.75% while the fees coming from International Container Terminal Services, Inc., and Asian Terminals, Inc. went down by 8% and 15%, respectively.
PPA General Manager Jay Santiago said that the low net income registered in March and subsequently the first quarter of the year was because of the effects of the COVID-19 when China first imposed a lockdown on January 23 and the Philippine government’s imposition of the Luzon-wide enhanced community quarantine from March 15 up to the present.
“As early as January, there has been a slowdown in the movement of cargo as China, being the location of several transshipment hubs and a number of large manufacturing firms, has imposed necessary restrictions to control the spread of the dreaded disease,” Santiago said.
He said other countries, including the Philippines, followed suit “thus, justifying the negative effect of the same in almost all areas of our revenue sources.”
“Hopefully, with the relaxation of some restrictions on trade, we will be able to arrest the downward trend in the next couple of months particularly when the country is already able to lift its restrictions on some trade and commercial processes,” Santiago said.
According to the PPA, total revenues, meanwhile, decreased by 17% to P3.753 billion from P4.509 billion registered in the same period last year.
According to the PPA, from the PPA’s revenue sources, the hardest hit were the fees coming from its vessel Lay-up operations, which went down by 71%, followed by Storage that decreased by 57.42% and arrastre and stevedoring down by 41%.
Total expenses went up by 7.32% to P1.215 billion from P1.132 billion in the same period last year.
Of this, bulk of the expenses went to Personnel Services which increased by almost 11%.
Late last month, the PPA remitted at least P5 billion in dividends to the National Government to help in the country’s fight against COVID-19.
The PPA is now in the process of retrofitting the Eva Macapagal Super Terminal located inside Pier 15 of the Manila South Harbor for it to become a COVID-19 treatment facility.
“This is such a trying moment for all of us as we continue with our battle against COVID-19. If we are united and everyone will be strictly following orders and measures, I believe, we will be able to beat this disease and be back to our normal ways again in no time,” Santiago said.
“Hopefully, when this is all over, we should not take for granted the lessons we learned from this pandemic but instead we should use these lessons to make ourselves better and stronger as we continue to sail to a better tomorrow,” Santiago added.
