BWorld 34, Solar power and supply instability

* This is my article in BusinessWorld last December 17, 2015.

Solar power, along with wind and small hydro, is among the favored renewable energy sources being pushed worldwide. Rich and poor countries, both in the temperate and the tropics, are pushing for solar, urged especially by the “save the planet” movement led by the United Nations, national governments and the big international nongovernment organizations.

1.5-MegaWatt solar panels atop SM North EDSA

SOLAR AT SM NORTH

Last Dec. 10, this writer attended a seminar on renewable energy organized by the Philippine Electricity Market Corp. (PEMC), the one operating the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market. Lectures in the morning, two field visits in the afternoon, a small solar and small biomass projects in Quezon City. In particular, Solar Philippines’ (SP) project at SM North EDSA.

SP’s Web site says that “SP and SM Prime Holdings, Inc. entered into a Lease Agreement on June 2014 to rent the top floor of the SM North EDSA parking building for a 1.5MW (megawatt) solar plant. The project was fully financed by Solar Philippines. Under the feed-in-tariff-lease model, energy is fed to the grid at the rate of P9.68 per kWh (kilowatt-hour).”

After viewing the whole solar field, SP staff brought us to the control room where actual electricity output is monitored.

Solar power is intermittent and very unstable.

Even during a cloudless afternoon, the most that a 1.5MW plant can produce is 1.2MW, never reaching 100% of its rated capacity. When it is cloudy, output is even smaller. In the pictures above, within two minutes, electricity output declined from 596 watts to only 361 watts, simply because a small band of clouds passed by.

People in the tropics love the clouds because they provide temporary shade from sunlight.

But clouds are the “enemy” of solar power plants. Just a small band of clouds passing by can significantly reduce solar power output.

In the months of December to February -- where the length of day is only around 10.5 to 11.5 hours and the evening is longer, around 12.5 to 13.5 hours -- solar output is even lower. So whether the solar farm is a 1-MW or a 10-MW or a 100-MW or a 1,000-MW, output at night is zero -- when people need lots of electricity for their houses and shops, offices and factories, roads and parks, etc.

SOLAR IN THE PHILIPPINES

Let us now take the national average for the Philippines. Chart 1 is from the PEMC.

From March to September, the length of day is longer, about 12.5 hours on average. So, solar power would produce electricity from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. at 5% to 65% (never reaching 100%) of its rated capacity, average of about 18% capacity factor.

Also in the chart, wind power would give only 8%-17% of rated capacity. So those cute windmills in Bangui, Ilocos; in Pililla, Rizal; in Guimaras, etc., produce zero electricity when winds do not blow.

GLOBAL SOLAR CAPACITY

Around the world, installed capacity of solar energy is rising very fast. From only 1.28 gigawatts (GW) in 2000, it rose to 41.3 GW in 2010 and 180.4 GW in 2014. The biggest investment and installation are in Germany, China, Japan, Italy, and the US. (See Table)

Again, note that installed capacity is not the same as actual production and capacity. Since the average capacity factor of a solar project is only around 18%, then the 180.4 GW could produce only 32.5 GW worldwide in 2014.

GERMANY’S SOLAR PRODUCTION

Since Germany is the “king” of solar capacity in the world, it is a good country to study actual solar electricity production. Chart 2 shows the latest power production for the last 12 months until December 2015.

From January to mid-February 2015, then from 2nd week November to December 2015 or about 3.5 months, solar output (in yellow) was close to zero, or average capacity factor of perhaps only 5% or less. Just when a country needs a lot of electricity for heating due to almost four months of winter, solar electricity output is very low.

Policies that give special and preferential treatment to solar and wind like FIT, renewable portfolio standards, various tax holidays, privileges that are not given to other energy sources that are dispatchable, more stable and more affordable, are wrong. A developing country like the Philippines needs cheap and stable electricity, not expensive and unstable electricity supply.

The planet saviors who went to Paris Conference of Parties meeting and lobbied for more subsidies for intermittent solar and wind, and want to discourage if not kill conventional energy sources like coal and natural gas do not realize the energy poverty of their proposal.

Governments should allow the viable plants to get built fast, reduce the various bureaucracies, permits, taxes and royalties they impose, and not give any subsidy to nonviable ones. Very likely, those nonviable plants will not be built if the various subsidies and other preferential treatment like mandatory or priority dispatch are not given.

Bienvenido S. Oplas, Jr. is the head of Minimal Government Thinkers and a Fellow of the Stratbase-Albert del Rosario Institute (ADRi). Views expressed are his own and may not reflect the position of Stratbase-ADRi. minimalgovernment@gmail.com

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See also:

BWorld 25, Feed in tariff means expensive electricity, November 14, 2015 

BWorld 29, Paris COP's emission cut targets vs. energy needs, December 06, 2015 

BWorld 31, Comparative electricity exchange market in Asia-Pacific, December 13, 2015 

BWorld 32, RCEP and TPP for the Philippines, December 16, 2015 

BWorld 33, Computing rise in tax revenues if rates are cut, December 17, 2015

Business 360-31, Energy independence in Asia, December 23, 2015

Business 360-31, SAARC, RCEP and free trade

* This is my article in Business 360 magazine in Kathmandu, Nepal, December 2015 issue.
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SAARC, RCEP and free trade

Free trade is beautiful. A seller decides the price that he/she thinks will optimize the sale of goods and/or services. A buyer comes and if he/she thinks the price is commensurate to the quality, he/she gets it, or walks away to find another seller who will give him/her good value for money. Things happen voluntarily, little or no coercion involved. Trade can happen only if it benefits both parties and hence, public welfare is served.

Elevate the scene at the international or  global level and the same principle happens. Trade can happen only if it benefits both the sellers and consumers overall. Otherwise, there  is temporary “market failure” where supply does not need demand or vice versa, until market solution involving new pricing and product/service quality comes in.

Free trade negotiations at the World Trade Organization (WTO) keep dragging into minor and not-so-significant changes despite years of talks, meetings and what some people say as frequent “junkets”. Thus, bilateral and regional talks and free trade agreements (FTAs) and economic partnership agreements (EPAs) arose.

These FTAs and EPAs are not exactly “free trade” deals because there are still so many preconditions and protectionist measures involved. With human and economic  evolution through time, member-countries of such FTAs are moving towards real free trade in  the future.

One such regional FTA is the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) composed of eight countries – Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. Potential members in the future are China, Myanmar, plus other observers: Iran, Japan, Mauritius, S. Korea, Australia, EU, US.

SAARC was formed to promote peace, stability, progress and economic cooperation in the region. Among the mechanisms to attain this goal is the establishment of the South Asia Free Trade Area (SAFTA) where traded goods among member-countries will have zero customs duties by 2016.

The 5^th column, exports expansion over the past 14 years, is not part of the ADB report and is added only in this paper.

There is a huge disparity in trade performance in the association as two countries have expanded their exports more than six times (6x) while four countries were still unable to  export more than $1 billion in 2014.

Another regional trade agreement is the ASEAN FTA (AFTA) composed of the 10 member-states of the Association of South East Asia Nations (ASEAN): Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam.

The creation of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) by end-December 2015, zero export duties among member-states, will be a huge market market of around 620+ million people, slightly higher than the combined population of the US + EU.

A bigger FTA is the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) composed of all ASEAN countries + 6 partner economies: China, Japan, S. Korea, India, Australia and New Zealand.

Table 3. Merchandise exports of the 6 ASEAN partners in RCEP, in $ Billion

	2000	2005	2010	2014	Expansion, 2000-2014
China	249.20	761.95	1,577.75	2,342.75	9.4x
Japan	479.32	595.70	767.82	689.92	1.4x
S. Korea	172.27	284.42	466.38	572.66	3.3x
India	45.30	103.50	255.09	317.07	7.0x
Australia	63.98	106.21	212.03	239.74	3.7x
New Zealand	13.29	21.70	31.36	39.43 #	3.0x
* Hong Kong	201.86	289.32	390.13	473.65	2.3x
* Taiwan	151.46	198.17	273.59	312.50	2.1x

# New Zealand, 2013 data

RCEP is looking at a semi-FTA among the 16 countries by 2015.

It may sound ironic that socialist governments in China and Vietnam were able to maximize their integration with global capitalism that they experienced exports expansion of 10x and 9x respectively, in just 14 years.

Some national laws and taxes like gross sales tax (GST) or value added tax (VAT) can distort a free trade policy. For instance in the Philippines, while most imported goods are levied with zero to three percent import duties, they are slapped with 12 percent VAT and that immediately raises the price of previously cheap imports. Lots of oil smuggling in the country for instance, is done not so much to avoid the one or three percent import duties for oil products, but to avoid the 12 percent VAT.

Asian people may consider the policy of unilateral trade liberalization over the long-term. Trade with no political preconditions, no prolonged trade negotiations and disputes. Such policy has been practiced by some dynamic economies like Hong Kong and Singapore.

All goods are allowed at zero tariff, except for a few regulated items like guns, bombs, poisonous substances, fake medicines, disease-tainted meat products, and so on.

We are far from that ideal trade policy, so we have to live with the reality of continued intervention by governments in trade like SAFTA, AFTA  and RCEP. These trade alliances are better than economic nationalism and protectionism. 

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See also:

Business 360-27, Public health in Asia, July 18, 2015 

Business 360-28, FDIs in South and East Asia, August 22, 2015 

Business 360-29, Low oil prices and energy development in South Asia, October 25, 2015

Business 360-30, Freedom to trade in South and East Asia, October 29, 2015

Shooting the message vs. shooting the messenger

In my various online exchanges and debates, I always try to be careful to criticize an idea, a comment, a philosophy -- not the commentator, not the person espousing the idea or philosophy. Meaning I try to shoot the message, but not the messenger.

There are two reasons for this. One is that it is not good to engage in ad hominems, personal attacks, and other low-life engagement. And second, a person can change his/her position and advocacy after sometime while an idea or philosophy can last for decades or centuries.

I myself was guilty of doing some personal attacks in my online debates in the past. It was inevitable, I was less mature, less careful, am remorseful of it. As I age, I realize that this is wrong and try to be very careful of this distinction.

Last month, I got engaged in a discussion in a friend's wall, Peter Perfecto's wall I think (Peter is the Exec. Dir. of the Makati Business Club) over the issue of fossil fuel use. I was doing a satire of many anti-fossil fuel activists, them  who hate fossil fuel yet love so much  their cars, love jet-setting to many countries and continents, engines that use fossil fuel 100%. Or they love their 24/7 electricity where more than 2/3 of energy source is from fossil  fuel.

Then one of Peter's friends blurted out this personal attack.

Calling me "silly" and "extolling greed as a writer for BWorld", hehe. I don't reciprocate those low-life comments. I just alerted him and Peter that resorting to personal attacks is a sign of weak arguments. I also told him that I got a screen shot of his outburst and will publicize it.

Then last week, a friend Arcy Garcia, posted my article in BWorld about my critique of solar power in his fb wall. One of his friends criticized my paper, long comments, fine. Then I came to clarify more points, I showed more charts, showed a math calculation of solar power installation vs actual solar power production in Germany. Later he told Arcy that he has other "more important things to do", meaning he chickened out.

So I feature him here. People should learn to have a minimum of etiquete when debating with strangers, like not engaging in personal attacks. If they insist they can only have the "freedom to attack" and no responsibility and accountability to own up to such behavior, they are mistaken.

There, I have publicized these two guys.
Back to the holiday season mood.

BWorld 33, Computing rise in tax revenues if rates are cut

* This is my article in BusinessWorld last Tuesday.

Among the most important liberal economic policies that the Aquino administration should have pursued -- to remain consistent with its party affiliation, the Liberal Party (LP) -- is to cut income tax rates in the Philippines. Unfortunately, the President failed to appreciate the importance of this measure.

  

While some LP leaders pursued this measure, top party officials and the Department of Finance Secretary took the limited view that tax cut means lower tax revenues. Hence, they objected the measure.

Below is a simple model, not an econometric one, to estimate potential higher tax revenues by cutting income tax.

Tax revenues (TR) is a product of tax rate (t) multiplied by the quantity (Q) or number of taxpayers, individuals and corporate.

(1) TR = t x Q.

Assuming that there is only one form of tax, the income tax for individuals and enterprises, then there are two ways to raise TR:

(i) raise t or keep it at a high rate and hope that Q will remain the same or further rise, or

(ii) reduce t and watch Q to expand faster than the decline in t.

Now there are many types of taxes other than direct income tax:

(a) consumption-based taxes, such as value-added tax (VAT), excise tax, travel tax, amusement tax, etc.;

(b) property-based taxes such as real property tax or RPT collected by local government units (LGUs), vehicle registration tax, franchise tax, etc.;

(c) indirect income taxes such as bank interests withholding tax, capital gains tax, estate tax, documentary stamp tax, etc.;

(d) product-based taxes such as royalties and excise tax for extractive industries -- mining, natural gas, geothermal, coal, petroleum, etc.;

(e) LGU taxes such as barangays, business permit taxes, community tax, etc.;

(f) others.

Then there are many types of mandatory fees and permits:

(a) National: drivers license fees, passport fees, airport terminal fees, NBI clearance fees, police clearance fees, professional clearance fees, etc.

(b) LGUs: residence tax/cedula, barangays, city/municipality/provincial permits and fees.

So there are various types of tax rates, to be noted as

t1 -- direct income taxes

t2 -- consumption based taxes

t3 -- property based taxes

t4 -- indirect income taxes, and so on

So the government’s TR goal can be summarized as:

(2)  TR = ∑ [(t1 x Q1) + (t2 x Q2) + t3 x Q3) + …]

For the income tax cut campaign, it can be shown that reducing t1 from 32% (individual) and 30% (corporate) to only 25%, or 20% or 15%, will result in a higher number of individuals paying their taxes correctly.

The rise in Q1, number of people and companies who will pay individual and corporate income taxes will be expected from the following:

(ET) Existing Taxpayers who underdeclare their real income and report lower income to pay lower taxes;

(NT) Individuals who never declare any income even though they earn;

(FA) Filipino potential taxpayers abroad, professionals and entrepreneurs who work and do business abroad than here, partly due to lower tax rates and higher income opportunities there, and they will return home;

(FT) Foreign Taxpayers, professionals and businessmen abroad especially in high-taxes welfare states of the European Union and North America, who want to leave their country and do business in Asian economies with lower tax rates.

(ET + NT) are local groups surfacing, (FA + FT) are foreign-based groups coming here. Together, they will significantly raise Q1 and hence, TR can increase even if t1 has decreased. Or:

(3) Q1 = ET + NT + FA + FT.

Examples and hypothetical case studies:

At t1 = 32%, if average tax collection is P250,000/person/year and Q1 is at 8 million people, then:

(4) TR1 = t1 x Q1 = P200,000 x 8M = P1.4 trillion

If t1 declines from 32% to 20%, corresponding to average payment of P120,000/person and Q1 rises from 8 million to 14 million people, then:

(5) TR1’ = t1’ x Q1’ = P120,000 x 14M = P1.68 trillion.

Now Q2 should also rise because Q1 (equation 3) has increased.

At 12% VAT, assuming that average VAT payment per person is P20,000/year, and there are 50 million people who pay VAT,

(6) TR2 = t2 x Q2 = P20,000/person/year x 50M = P1 trillion

Assuming that VAT is raised from 12% to 14% and average VAT payment rises from P20,000 to P25,000/person/year, and there are now 53 million VAT taxpayers, then:

(7) TR2’ = t2’ x Q2’ = P25,000 x 53M = P1.23 trillion

So TR collection via status quo, from equations (4) + (6):

(8) TR1 = P1.4T + 1.0T = P2.4 trillion.

Vs. TR collection via income tax cut, from equations (5) + (7):

(9) TR2 = P1.68T + P1.23T = P2.91 trillion.

There is an increase in TR by P510 billion or P0.51 trillion.

Again, the above numbers are hypothetical and made only to illustrate the point that reducing income tax rate can actually increase, not decrease, total TR of the government. The challenge now is to find out what would be the projected:

(i) increase from Q1 (individuals) to Q1’ if individual income tax is cut from 32% to 25% or 20% or other lower rates;

(ii) increase from Q1 (corporations) to Q1’ if corporate income tax is cut from 30% to 20% or other lower rates;

(iii) increase from Q2 to Q2’ if VAT remains at 12%;

(iv) increase in average VAT collection per person if VAT is raised from 12% to 14%, and corresponding change from Q2 to Q2’.

If these numbers are generated and estimated, then the realistic projected increase in TR as a result of income tax cut can be shown and quantified.

Meanwhile, members of the LP can proudly declare that they are consistent in pursuing liberal economic policies -- liberate the individual and private enterprises from overbearing and heavy taxes, fees, royalties, charges and penalties.

Bienvenido S. Oplas, Jr. is the head of Minimal Government Thinkers, and an economic consultant at the Alas, Oplas and Co. CPAs. minimalgovernment@gmail.com

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See also:

BWorld 29, Paris COP's emission cut targets vs. energy needs, December 06, 2015 

BWorld 30, Tourism and airport transfer at NAIA, December 09, 2015 

BWorld 31, Comparative electricity exchange market in Asia-Pacific, December 13, 2015 

BWorld 32, RCEP and TPP for the Philippines, December 16, 2015

Abolish Income Tax 10: Presentation in March 2007, May 04, 2015 

Tax Cut 23: Tax Competition in Asia, Hikes in Europe, May 10, 2015

EFN Asia 54, Sethaput Narueput on economic freedom and poverty

Reposting a good article here by Sethaput, posted in EFN Asia website last week. My short comments about his paper:

1. The World Bank (WB), along with the Asian Development Bank (ADB), IMF, OECD, UN, etc. are government clubs and associations, NOT clubs of corporations (big or small) or NGOs or other civil society organizations. Its funding come from governments, its leadership is nominated and approved by governments, its programs and lending are for governments. Thus, words like "government", "state", "tax", "regulation" are expected to dominate its literatures. It should not be a surprising finding.

2. Sethaput's observation here is spot on, bulls-eye. The UN, WB, all other multilaterals are institutions of global central planning. People and officials there think they know a lot, they have lots of numbers, they can plan and control things. I think the top officials there have messianic and megalomaniac views of themselves.

"... international experts to be experts in any country they work on, armed with examples of “international best practice” and able to ignore local history and conditions. Unfortunately this problem is by no means limited to the World Bank. Probably the most egregious example of the technocratic illusion of supply-driven solutions to poverty is the United Nations Millennium Development Goals or MDGs. Soviet-style central planning may be dead even in Russia today, but its ethos still lives on in the international development community."
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ECONOMIC FREEDOM AND POVERTY: REFRAMING THE DEBATE

Wednesday, 9 December 2015

Sethaput Suthiwart-Narueput, Thailand Future Foundation[1]

In the 352 pages and over 250,000 words in its flagship 2001 World Development Report (WDR), Attacking Poverty, the World Bank mentions the word “freedom” 12 times. By contrast, the words “government” and “state” are mentioned about 450 and 350 times, respectively. Such an omission and imbalance is particularly surprising in light of some of the Bank’s own findings. Stating at the outset that “the poor are the true poverty experts,” the Bank conducted many interviews of the poor as background for the WDR and found that the poor repeatedly described their well-being in terms of five related dimensions, one of which was “freedom of choice and action.”[2]

Why isn’t economic freedom–or its core elements of personal choice; security of person and property; voluntary exchange; freedom to enter markets and compete–at center stage in policy discussions given its critical and empirically documented role in fostering growth and reducing poverty? Why isn’t it given greater attention in policy discussions by governments, international organizations, and even civil society at large?

While the omission by governments is understandable but regrettable, the omission by international organizations tasked with poverty reduction such as the World Bank is less so. In his thought-provoking book The Tyranny of Experts, Bill Easterly states that

The conventional approach to economic development, to making poor countries rich, is based on a technocratic illusion: the belief that poverty is a purely technical problem amenable to such technical solutions as fertilizers, antibiotics, or nutritional supplements…The technocratic illusion is that poverty results from a shortage of expertise, whereas poverty is really about a shortage of rights. The technical problems of the poor…are a symptom of poverty, not a cause of poverty…[the] cause of poverty is the absence of political and economic rights, the absence of a free political and economic system that would find technical solutions to the poor’s problems.[3]

Having previously worked at the World Bank myself for close to a decade, I can readily testify to the enormous appeal that such a technocratic illusion has for a large international bureaucracy. It allows for vast amounts of resources to be deployed towards producing more outputs which can be centrally monitored and verified (e.g., more schools and hospitals regardless of whether they are wanted or really result in improved educational and health outcomes). It allows for international experts to be experts in any country they work on, armed with examples of “international best practice” and able to ignore local history and conditions. Unfortunately this problem is by no means limited to the World Bank. Probably the most egregious example of the technocratic illusion of supply-driven solutions to poverty is the United Nations Millennium Development Goals or MDGs. Soviet-style central planning may be dead even in Russia today, but its ethos still lives on in the international development community.

More puzzling is why discussions of economic freedom aren’t more center stage for civil society and the public at large. Or to put it more starkly and specifically, why is there such a distrust of free markets in Asia even though they have delivered such prosperity to the region?

BWorld 32, RCEP and TPP for the Philippines

* This is my article in BusinessWorld last December 10, 2015.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Economic Community (AEC) will take shape by Dec. 31, or just three weeks from now. The 10 ASEAN member states will be more integrated regionally to become one single production base, movement of most goods will become unhampered with zero tariff, except for a few goods that are subject to some tariffs and import quotas, and various nontariff barriers.

Professionals and highly-skilled individuals will also be able to move more freely. Some people fear that this will mean “invasion” by other professionals of their generally niche markets reserved generally for the locals (aka local monopolies). But they should also look it as an opportunity for them to reach out and expand their businesses, services, and consultancies to our neighbors in the region.

Now there are two “mega” free trade agreements or areas (FTAs) that are being prepared for the Philippines and few other countries in the region. They are called “mega” because of the hugeness in both consumers or population size, and economic or gross domestic product (GDP) size.

One is the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and it is composed of 16 countries: the ASEAN-10 plus six partner economies that regularly attend the annual ASEAN Summit. The six partners are the giant economies of North and South Asia, China, Japan, South Korea, and India. Plus Australia and New Zealand.

RCEP is not a new initiative, it has been planned since about a decade ago but we do not hear or read it often because the AEC and Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) tend to dominate the news. It is supposed to materialize this month too, but some hurdles have come in, but it is expected to become a reality within the next two years.

The other mega FTA is the TPP and it is composed of 12 countries: five from North and South America (US, Canada, Mexico, Peru and Chile), four from ASEAN (Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, Brunei) and Japan, Australia and New Zealand.

From the original four members (Brunei, Singapore, New Zealand, and Chile) that constituted the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement, it was joined by eight other countries, later expanded to 12, and the group started to be called TPP in 2008. The TPP Agreement was signed only last month, and each member country must ratify it before it will be implemented. This will take about two years or by 2017.

Here are the relevant data on population and economic size of the two mega FTAs. (See Table)

The four biggest economies in the planet in PPP values -- China, USA, India and Japan -- are in both RCEP and TPP. RCEP is smaller than TPP in GDP nominal values but larger than TPP in PPP values. RCEP is said to be China-led while TPP is US-led.

In population size, RCEP is really huge with a combined population of some 3.45 billion people in 2014, almost half of the global population of 7.1 billion. TPP group has a combined population of only 0.8 billion.

People are not only consumers, they are also producers, as entrepreneurs and workers; as manufacturers and sellers. So a bigger population is a bigger consumer and production base especially if the population’s skills keep improving.

And in terms of merchandise exports, RCEP is larger than TPP. Note that China’s exports are larger than the combined exports of US and Canada.

Taking the three factors together -- GDP size, population and exports -- membership in both is better than membership in “either” or just one. Thus, the four ASEAN economies are lucky to belong to both RCEP and TPP. Various NTBs, hidden from the public but are felt by exporters and traders are imposed by many countries, developed and developing. By being a member of either or both mega FTAs, these NTBs are significantly relaxed and hence, there is greater market access for these four ASEAN countries to those giant economies in North Asia and North America.

The decision of the Philippine government to join the TPP in the next round of membership expansion is wise and correct.

The US will remain to be the most innovative huge economy in the planet for the next decade or two. It is important that the Philippines can gain greater market access to it. Fears of the application of strict intellectual property rights in copyright and patents of newly-invented medicines and vaccines are based more on alarmism than reality as reflected in the actual texts of the TPP Agreement. This will be tackled in a future paper of this column.

Regardless of the rhetorics against free trade, many people and consumers in the planet want more choices, more options, more freedom in choosing where they want to buy and sell various products and services. Governments, in turn, are swayed by the preferences of their citizens.

Bienvenido S. Oplas, Jr. is a Fellow of the South East Asia Network for Development (SEANET) and President of Minimal Government Thinkers. Both are members of the Economic Freedom Network (EFN) Asia. minimalgovernment@gmail.com

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See also:

BWorld 28, Economic freedom in Asia, November 28, 2015 

BWorld 29, Paris COP's emission cut targets vs. energy needs, December 06, 2015 

BWorld 30, Tourism and airport transfer at NAIA, December 09, 2015 

BWorld 31, Comparative electricity exchange market in Asia-Pacific, December 13, 2015

Free Trade 56, Trade, investments and taxes in APEC countries, November 08, 2015 

Free Trade 57, Growth, IPRI 2015 and the TPP, November 28, 2015 

Free Trade 58, TPP and its rabid critics, December 10, 2015.