Philippine senator proposes moving national budget to blockchain

Key points:

• Senator Bam Aquino is preparing a bill to transfer the Philippine state budget to blockchain
• The project should ensure complete transparency of spending and control of every peso
• The proposal is part of a series of initiatives to apply blockchain technology in the public sector

Philippine Senator Bam Aquino has announced his intention to introduce a bill to transfer the national budget and all related transactions to blockchain. According to him, this will make government spending completely transparent and accountable to the public.

Aquino spoke about his plans at the Manila Tech Summit. He noted that the initiative will be submitted to parliament in the coming weeks.

“No one is crazy enough to put their transactions on blockchain, where every single step of the way will be logged and transparent to every single citizen. But we want to start,” the senator said at the conference.

Source: x.com

What will the initiative be based on?

The bill has not yet been submitted, but it is expected to be based on the existing blockchain platform of the Ministry of Budget and Management, built on Polygon. The system is already being used to verify financial documents: orders for the allocation of funds and notifications about the distribution of budget money are published online.

Paul Soliman, the CEO of BayaniChain, emphasized that the senator’s vision is consistent with the company’s commitment to developing transparent digital solutions. According to him, blockchain does not completely solve the problem of corruption, but it creates immutable records that increase the accountability of officials.

BayaniChain currently provides a technological link between the department’s internal system and the public blockchain.

Blockchain in politics in the Philippines and other countries

Aquino’s statement came shortly after the launch of the country’s first blockchain platform to protect government documents from forgery and deepfakes. The system was developed by Deputy Minister Maria Francesca Del Rosario and became the first initiative of its kind in Asia.

At the same time, another bill was introduced in the Philippine Congress. Congressman Miguel Luis Villafuerte proposed creating a strategic reserve of 10 000 BTC. According to the initiative, the central bank will purchase 2000 BTC annually for five years and then lock them up for 20 years. The reserve can only be used to pay off the national debt.

Philippines proposes creating a strategic reserve of 10 000 BTC

The bill states that the reserve should not be sold or exchanged for any purpose other than to pay off public debt

Read more

By the end of 2024, the Philippines’ national debt had grown to 16,09 trillion pesos ($285 billion), of which nearly 68% was domestic borrowing.

Global trend

The Philippines is not the only country implementing blockchain in public administration. This week, US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick announced that the department will begin publishing economic statistics, including GDP data, on the blockchain.