MANILA — The Department of Trade and Industry’s proposed P10.6-billion budget for 2025 has been approved on the committee level in the Senate on Tuesday.

Of the DTI’s P10.6-billion proposed fund, P6.4 billion aims to sustain the operations and programs of the Office of the Secretary, Assistant Secretary Kristian Ablan told the Senate Finance Committee.

Nearly P2 billion will be used for its attached corporations, particularly the Aurora Pacific and Economic Zone Authority (APECO), the Center for International Trade Expositions and Missions (CITEM), and the Small Business Corporation (SBC), he said.

“The DTI has a 91 percent budget utilization for 2023… and as of June 30 [2024], we are already at 79 percent [utilization],” he said.

“With our catch-up plans, we will be able to utilize the budget that the Senate and the House have given us first the fiscal year 2024,” he said.

The DTI hopes to secure funding for the implementation of the Internet Transactions Act, said Mary Jean Pacheco, DTI’s undersecretary for e-commerce.

The agency has requested for a P347.4 million budget to establish the E-Commerce Bureau, she said.

“This would fund specific provisions in the law necessarily relative to the development of systems, and for the consumer complaints this would be very helpful,” she said.

The fund will also be used to hire 80 staff members for the E-Commerce Bureau, she said.

Sen. Mark Villar, who authored the Internet Transactions Act (ITA), said he would help the DTI secure funding for its E-Commerce Bureau.

“Alam naman natin na napakahalaga  ng ITA dahil halos lahat ng transactions ngayon ay ginagawa online,” Villar said.

“Tutulong kami sa budget pero sana ifast track ninyo yung implementation para maprotreksyunan natin ang consumers,” he said.

(We know how important the ITA is because almost all transactions these days are done online. We will help with the budget but we hope you can help with the budget so we can fast-track the implementation.)

Internet Transactions Act to protect consumers, businesses: DTI

Villar also urged the DTI to require online platforms to disclose the information of sellers.

“The implementation of this will be very critical to our consumer protection dahil palaki nang palaki yung mga transactions online, palaki nang palaki yung internet economy, (the number of internet transactions is growing, the internet economy is growing)” he said.

“Kailangan talaga natin protektahan yung mga consumers na bumibili online. Kailangan natin magkaroon ng database ng mga sellers,” he said.

(We need to protect the consumers who buy online. We need to have a database of sellers.)

The DTI said it is working to “populate” its current system through a “data mining project.”