President-elect Ferdinand Marcos Jr. ordered the use of digitalization to improve revenue generation, improve how government is run and connect far-flung regions.

"Technology will be one of the crucial factors to improve revenue generation. We know that because of the manual system especially in the government agencies, we are losing huge funds," said Information and Communications Technology Secretary - designate Ivan John Uy said during the "Laging Handa" public briefing on Friday.

"With automation, it would minimal human intervention. We expect to lower the government funds that we lost due to corruption. And instead of raising the taxes to increase government funds, we can impose minimal tax increases to generate government revenue," he added.

Uy said the development of digital infrastructure is one of the marching orders given to him by Marcos.

"We were instructed to see how the digital connectivity will reach the far flung areas... The Philippines is an archipelago, and it has many islands that do not have access to the worldwide web, and we have to prioritize this, so that is one of the marching orders," he said.

"Second is to address e-governance. This is to simplify the transaction and the access of the public to the government services. So we are looking at streamlining, reducing red tape and minimizing the queue in different government offices. These are some of the priorities, instructions of President BBM ( Bongbong Marcos)," he added.

Uy stressed the importance of the Philippine Digital Workforce Competitiveness Act in the government's effort to increase revenue.

"We know that the Business Process Outsourcing is second largest source of income of our country, the largest are the OFW remittances. So this is the second largest, so we need to help the BPO sector to give enough workforce because this area is getting bigger and there is no enough properly skilled labor force," he said.

Just last month, Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III said expanding "fiscal space through new taxes and improve tax administration and enforcement" is the best option for the next administration to generate government revenue.

"Raise revenues, improve tax administration and cut unnecessary spending with fiscal reforms," he said during a press briefing last May 25, 2022. Robina Asido/DMS