(January 30, 2012) - Butuan City Mayor Ferdinand M. Amante, Jr. recently presented the city’s streamlined Business Permits and Licensing System (BPLS) to more than 500 city and municipal mayors from all over the country during the Forum on Building Sustainable Competitive Local Governments. The gathering of Local Chief Executives was held last Friday, January 27, 2012 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, Ortigas Center, Pasig City. DILG Sec. Jesse M. Robredo was the guest of honor during the said activity which was also attended by foreign guests from USA, India and Indonesia. Representatives from foreign organizations such as World Bank, USAID, AECID, and GIZ also participated in the forum.

The national forum was held to showcase the best practices from different LGUs which aid in building sustainable and competitive local governments. It was jointly sponsored by DILG and the Local Government Academy (LGA). Other LGUs which were invited to present during the said forum include Mandaluyong, Valenzuela, Mandaue, and the Isalnd Garden City of Samal.

Butuan City’s streamlined BPLS was launched on October 20, 2010. The improved system significantly shortened the business registration processing time from 10 days to 30 minutes. The faster processing time encouraged more business owners to register their businesses and translated to an increase in new business registrants from 1,064 in 2010 to 2,386 in 2011, or an increase of 124%. Business tax collection rose from Php94.36-M in 2010 to Php115.42-M in 2011. Just recently, the City Government already collected Php60-M for the Business Fastlane registration period from January 2-20, 2012.