By Joanne Santiago, PNA and U.S. News Agency / Asian

Subsidies to government-owned and controlled corporation (GOCC) contracted by 10.04 percent to P 11.41 billion as of last May against year-ago’s P12.67 billion.

Department of Finance (DOF) data show that bulk of the subsidies in the first five months was given to the National Food Authority (NFA) at P 2 billion followed by the P 2.07 billion given to the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PHIC) or PhilHealth.

The government now shoulders the full amount of PhilHealth premiums of the 3.41 million indigent-beneficiaries under its universal health care program for the poor after the Department of Justice (DOJ) authorized the government to use P 8.3 billion for this purpose.

The budget is part of NHIP’s P 12 billion allocation for indigents for this year.

Relatively, a total of P 1.56 billion was extended to the National Electrification Administration (NEA) as of last May while the National Housing Authority (NHA) received P 1.2 billion and the Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA), P 656 million.

For last May alone, subsidies totalled to P 3.52 billion, 35 percent lower than the P 5.49 billion in the same period last year.

The number one beneficiary of the subsidies is the NFA at P 2 billion followed by the NEA at P 1 billion and PCA at P 180 million.

The NHA received P 100 million and the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) P 49 million during the same period.