Non-financial govt assets about P1.3T – BTr

The national government’s non-financial assets are estimated to be worth about P1.3 trillion as of December last year, according to the Department of Finance (DoF).

“The Bureau of the Treasury (BTr) has covered as of December last year an estimated P1.3 trillion-worth of non-financial government assets such as roads, school buildings and power plants for inclusion in the National Asset Registry System (NARS),” it said in a statement on Monday.

It quoted National Treasurer Rosalia de Leon as reported to Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez 3rd that NARS, which provides the government with a consolidated database of its non-financial, strategically important assets, has an initial 533,925 asset data count in its system.

These include 348,938 school buildings under the Department of Education; 8,337 bridges and 33,119 kilometers of roads under the Department of Public Works and Highways; and 247 irrigation facilities and dams maintained by the National Irrigation Administration, she continued.

De Leon said this NARS database also lists 122 social welfare centers of the Department of Social Welfare and Development; 1,580 towers of the Department of Information and Communications Technology; 15 power plants under the Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp.; and 268 government hospitals and 68 rehabilitation centers under the Department of Health.

“In 2017, the BTr launched the NARS to maintain a reliable inventory of the national government’s non-financial assets and help in the monitoring, inspection and validation and management of assets under custody by the national government,” the Finance department emphasized.

“The NARS provides the government a consolidated database of its strategically important non-financial assets, thus enabling more efficient financial risk management, enhance service delivery, and improve risk reduction for sustainable asset management in the long term,” de Leon, for her part, explained.

She added the Treasury is currently working on enhancing the NARS to a web-based portal and with more functionalities with the help of development partners such as the World Bank and Japan International Cooperation Agency.