RP proposes anti-poverty fund

RP proposes anti-poverty fund

Manila: The Philippines has proposed the creation of a US$100- million anti-poverty fund by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the country's finance chief said on Friday.

Finance Secretary Jose Isidro Camacho said he took up the proposal with his ASEAN counterparts on the sidelines of a ministers' meeting in Manila last week.

"The idea is to complement the existing anti-poverty programs of each ASEAN country," he said. "So what we propose is to focus the fund on microfinance and make it available only to ASEAN members."

ASEAN groups Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Burma (Myanmar).

Camacho said each ASEAN member would be asked to contribute 10 million dollars over a five-year period to the fund.

Such international agencies as the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and the Japan Bank for International Cooperation would also be asked to help build up the fund, he said.

Camacho said each agency would be asked to pool twice the amount to be contributed by each ASEAN member "so we could put up a good-sized fund".--dpa