The government extended loans worth P126 billion to some 80,779 shopkeepers, grocers, food processors and other small and medium-scale business owners between 2004 and March 2008 as part of President Arroyo's continuing commitment to create 6 million new jobs by 2010, the National Anti-Poverty Commission (NAPC) announced recently.

NAPC Secretary Domingo F. Panganiban said the government granted the loans through the Small and Medium Enterprises Unified Lending Opportunities for National Growth (SULONG) Program, which is led by the state-run Small Business Corporation (SBC).

The NAPC Secretary said the loans granted to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) under the SULONG Program over the past four years have allowed small and medium-scale Filipino entrepreneurs to provide employment for nearly 2 million poor folk throughout the nation.

Panganiban made the announcement during a briefing organized by the Committee on Oversight of the House of Representatives to assess the progress of the new jobs component of the Arroyo administration's 10-point agenda.

NAPC is the lead monitoring and oversight agency for the government's poverty reduction efforts.

"The government had afforded loans amounting to nearly P120 billion to 58,694 small and medium-scale Filipino entrepreneurs between 2004 and 2007 under the SULONG Program alone," Panganiban said, adding that the loans had generated 1.8 million new jobs for poor and low-income workers during the same timeframe.

He said government had released an additional P6.2 billion in loans to some 22,085 Filipino entrepreneurs through the program during the first quarter of 2008, creating another 103,120 new jobs nationwide.

A report issued by SBC Chairman and CEO Mr. Virgilio R. Angelo to NAPC indicates that the SULONG loans were granted to SMEs through the SBC, the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP), the Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP), the Quedan Rural Credit and Finance Corporation (QUEDANCOR), the Philippine Export Import Credit Agency (PHILEXIM), the National Livelihood Support Fund (NLSF) and the Social Security System (SSS).