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Philippines
Thursday, March 28, 2024

Retirement haven

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Taiwan, through its Ministry of Foreign Affairs, has announced Wednesday last week that starting June 1 this year, visitors from the Philippines, Brunei and Malaysia need not secure a visa to gain entry. This will be for temporary stays in Taiwan not exceeding 30 days.

The lifting of the visa requirement is yet on a trial basis, so that within one year, the Taiwan government will assess the impact of such lifting upon the number of visitor arrivals to the island.

It is expected that many Filipinos will travel to Taiwan, where the food is good, shopping is a bargain, and the sceneries naturally preserved and beautiful.

The visa-free travel will likewise be extended to other Asean countries, in pursuit of the Tsai administration’s “New Southbound Policy” which aims to link Taiwan closer to Asean and its other neighbors to the south, such as the Indian sub-continent, Australia and New Zealand.

Both the Philippine and Taiwanese side, meanwhile, are promoting closer bilateral ties in the fields of education, culture, tourism and sharing of technologies.

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One sunrise industry for the Philippines is promoting the country as a retirement haven for senior citizens particularly from Japan and Taiwan.

Both have ageing populations due to years of zero population growth.  Thus, their pension system is hard-pressed to support millions of their citizens whose life expectancy has gone beyond previous actuarial estimates.  And because their young generation eschews having so many children, or shuns getting married at all, the amount of contributions received by their pension systems is also on the decline.

The Philippines is one neighbor which should put up retirement havens for senior citizens coming from these two countries, who share a cultural predilection for banding together communally, unlike Western citizens who find it easy to adopt to new communities in an individualistic manner.

Aside from  proximity, climate is ideal, as warmer temperatures are precisely what senior citizens prefer.  We have an abundance of sun and sea, with water temperatures ideal for year-round swimming and water activities such as fishing.  Japan and Taiwan, both farther from the equator, have colder waters and except in in  summer, are insufferably chilling to the bones of senior people.

President Duterte previously mentioned that he is seriously thinking about leasing some of our smaller islands to foreigners for them to develop, which in turn would create work and livelihood opportunities for our marginalized people.  This concept, if turned into workable policy, could spur the establishment of retirement havens.

Not only islands, but upland areas such as those in Northern Luzon, or Bukidnon in Mindanao, would be ideal.  Much work has to be done though.

For starters, we should upgrade our hospitals in the areas where the retirement havens are to be established.  Older people need good medical facilities.

Medical professionals have to start learning Nihonggo or Mandarin, because most senior citizens from both Taiwan and Japan cannot communicate in English.

But Filipinos are generally not averse to learning second or third languages, and their innate friendliness and caring attitudes are major considerations for foreign senior citizens.

Retirement communities must be well-planned and holistically developed.  There should be adequate sports and fitness facilities.  Small agricultural plots where retirees can indulge in vegetable farming or backyard gardening, organic poultry raising, even aquaculture, can be integrated into these planned communities.  Needless to say, there must be adequate and comfortable housing.

There are so many idle lands in the country that can be put to better use through retirement communities.

Our economic managers could negotiate with the pension fund managers of these two countries after identifying possible sites for such planned communities.  The concept would ease the burdens imposed by long-life expectancies on the pension fund systems of these countries, a problem which will not disappear in the next two generations.

In Greece and the southern parts of the Iberian peninsula, there are thriving economies based largely on tourism and retirement havens, whether in the coastal towns and cities or islands in the Mediterranean.  Hawaii and islands in the Carribean are favorite retirement destinations of American and Canadian retirees.

This is again one of the reasons why President Duterte’s tireless pursuit of peace with Muslim secessionists and the communist insurgents must succeed.  Peace and order are conditio sine qua non.

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