Philippine President signs 2012 budget

Philippine President Benigno S. Aquino III signed Thursday into law the 1.816 trillion pesos (41. 17 billion U.S. dollars) budget for 2012. Aquino said that the passage of Republic Act No. 10155 or the General Appropriations Act (GAA) of 2012 was the fastest so far since the country restored democracy in 1986. He assured that the budget will be spent wisely and the fund will be used to improve the economy amid the global economic slowdown.The budget for next year was 10.4 percent higher than this year 's. With the economic woes in other countries, the president said, "our economic growth should come from our country." He said as early as January next year, about 140 billion pesos (3.17 billion U.S. dollars) worth of infrastructure projects would immediately be implemented. Aquino also ordered the budget department to find out what causes the slow processing in the implementation of the projects. He also tasked the economic development cluster of his Cabinet how to fast-track quality disbursements, while warning those agencies which will spend the budget unwisely. The Department of Education received the highest allocation worth 238.8 billion pesos (5.41 billion U.S. dollars), followed by the Department of Public Works and Highways with 125.7 billion pesos (2.85 billion U.S. dollars), the Department of National Defense with 108.1 billion pesos (2.45 billion U.S. dollars), the Department of Interior and Local Government with 99.8 billion pesos (2.26 billion U.S. dollars), the Department of Agriculture with 3.3 billion pesos (74.81 million U.S. dollars).