Popularizing PPPs: PPP Menu by Casa Agra and PPP 101 AVP

Should a handful of experts, lawyers and consultants have monopoly over knowledge about public-private partnerships (PPPs)? What constitutes the PPP learning ecology? Why is learning critical for success of the PPP program and projects?

We are all stakeholders. Parties to a PPP arrangement—a government agencies and private proponents—are not the only stakeholders of PPPs. We are all stakeholders. “We” here means the whole government bureaucracy, regulatory agencies, courts, legislators, civil-society organizations, church, academe, taxpayers, consumers and ordinary citizens. Whatever the government does, fails to do or improperly does affect all of us.

Monkey wrenches to fast-tracking PPPs

(1) Turf clashes. A lot of projects can be implemented by more than one government agency. For example, the Department of Transportation, the Light Rail Transit Authority and a provincial government can implement a monorail project in a province. If they do not come to terms, all these three will assert their respective mandates. When jurisdictional issues are not resolved, either there is no project or there are redundant projects or white elephants.

(2) Paralysis-by-analysis. While master plans must come ahead of projects to ensure integrated development, master plans take time to prepare and not all aspects, arguably, are doable. There are some agencies that may have several plans and some features of macro plans are off tangent from micro or local plans. The obvious result is inaction or conflict.

(3) Layers upon layers of pre-award approvals. Depending on the PPP modality, governing law, project cost or amount of government contribution, there are levels of approval. Aside from the implementing agency, the go signal from the National Economic and Development Authority may be required. There could also be instances when positions of implementing agencies do not jive with those of the PPP Center and regulatory agencies. Without these approvals, there is no PPP contract.

Legislation in the world of PPPs

Changing the rules of the concession game – the 3 kinds (conclusion)

Changing the rules of the concession game (1st of 2 Parts)

Are concessions public-private partnership (PPP) arrangements? What is a concession? What are examples of concession agreements? What are the harmful effects of changing the rules of the concession game during the life of the contract?

• Concession broadly speaking. Broadly, a concession is a license, franchise or grant of authority. Without a concession, a proprietary function or the “business” aspect of government cannot be “shared” or entrusted to a private-sector proponent (PSP) or concessionaire.
• Concessions as PPPs. A concession is either a distinct type of a PPP embodied in a separate contract or is integrated into other PPP modalities. The transmission concession awarded to the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines and the two water concessions granted to Manila Water and Maynilad belong to the first type. These concessions were made by government corporations.

For the second type, all operate under the BOT law and its variants, i.e., build-operate-transfer, build-transfer-operate, build-own-operate, rehabilitate-operate-transfer (ROT) and rehabilitate-own-operate (ROO), and joint-venture arrangements carry with them concession provisions.

Sports PPPs are more than sports