Adding its voice for clean air, environmental group Pollution Control Association of the Philippines (PCAPI) has said that the shift to electric vehicles will push forward the country’s efforts toward decarbonization.
PCAPI’s statement was in response to National Economic Development Authority (NEDA) Secretary Arsenio Balisacan’s earlier announcement that Executive Order No. 12 series of 2023 will be up for review by February 2024, after several stakeholders of the EV industry voiced their concerns with the exclusion of e-motorcycles in the tax break.
According to PCAPI, the tax incentives for e-motorcycles will allow the majority of the Filipino population to shift to affordable and eco-friendly transportation.
“This will allow more of the majority of the public access to affordable transportation… Also this can minimize what I believe [is] a major issue of pollution in highly urbanized [communities], idling in traffic,” PCAPI Vice President for External Affairs Jeremiah Dwight Sebastian said in an interview.
The organization also pointed out that unless there are still data to be gathered and issues to be identified, policies to improve the country’s air quality, such as the EO12, needs to be implemented.
“The point here is there is a need for stakeholders and [implementers] to communicate and also capacitate enforcers to avoid miscommunication and implement this properly,” Sebastian added.
Motorcycles hold the majority among motorists in the country. According to the Statista Research Department, there are more than 7.81 million registered motorcycles in the Philippines as of 2022.
The Department of Energy targets to roll out 2,454, 200 EVs by 2028, comprising cars, tricycles, motorcycles and buses. The agency also aims to set up 65,000 charging stations nationwide.
Philippine Business for Environmental Stewardship Secretary General Felix Jose Vitangcol previously said the EO should be revised to make it more inclusive by including motorcycles and other 2-wheeled vehicles so Filipinos from different social classes can afford to shift to green technology amid the soaring prices of gasoline.
“Only more affluent Filipinos – indeed a limited segment of the population – can afford to buy four-wheel vehicles and hence enjoy these incentives… This is why the government must make these tax incentives more inclusive,” Vitangcol said.
The shift to EVs is one of the government’s ways to help decarbonize the Philippines and stop its reliance on fossil fuels for power generation.
Better air quality for the country cannot wait, says pollution control group
