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The DPWH said procurement activities for this year's projects had been done as early as during the fourth quarter of 2011.

 

“The early procurement, short of award, shall facilitate the start of project implementation during the first quarter of 2012,” DPWH Secretary Rogelio Singson said in a news release posted on the Official Gazette website.

 

Singson ordered DPWH field officials to fast-track the bidding of projects in their areas of responsibilities.

 

He said that with the Department of Budget and Management’s plan to comprehensively release project funds by January 2012, the DPWH should be ready to implement these projects early while the weather is good.

 

Also, the DPWH said the 2012 budget implementation will be very different from 2011: most of the projects will be awarded early in the first quarter of 2012.

 

P125.5-B budget

 

Singson said the DPWH is allotted a total of P125.5 billion under the 2012 budget – a 13.5-percent increase from its 2011 budget of P110.6 billion.

 

The DPWH remains second in terms of budgetary allocation behind the Department of Education.

 

“We shall be focusing on the upgrading of the national roads in terms of quality and safety,” Singson said.

 

Of the 2012 DPWH budget, P29.7 billion will be spent for the rehabilitation and maintenance of national roads and bridges; P15.9 billion for the upgrading and paving of 809 km of national roads; and P38.5 billion to construct 6,229 km of new roads and 15,292 linear meters of new bridges. — LBG, GMA News