The effort to pursue tax reforms and accelerate infrastructure spending by the Duterte administration to achieve inclusive growth has earned the support of other countries, most recently with the government of Spain.

In a meeting with Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III on Tuesday, Spanish Ambassador to Manila Luis Antonio Calvo Castaño, congratulated the Philippines for its “progressive” and “on point” tax-reform program that aims to reduce personal- and corporate-income tax rates while raising fresh revenues to bankroll social-protection programs for society’s most vulnerable sectors.

Castaño said the Spanish government supports without reservation the 10-point socioeconomic agenda that President Duterte is moving to achieve.

“[The Spanish government is] very encouraged by the 10-point socioeconomic agenda of President Duterte. The promotion of social rights is key to the development of the country,” Castaño said in a statement.

He also said Spanish companies are interested in investing in the Philippines’s infrastructure buildup program, particularly in rail projects, pointing out that Spain has the second-largest high-speed railway network in the world, next only to China.

During the meeting, Dominguez and Castaño discussed the proposed signing of the memorandum of understanding on economic and financial cooperation between the Philippine government and the Kingdom of Spain, which aims to explore cooperation between the two countries in various fields, such as agriculture, industry, energy and services, water infrastructure, climate finance, environmental economics

and disaster-risk finance.

Dominguez expressed his appreciation for Spain’s disaster-preparedness and -response project in Albay, which involves the rehabilitation of hospitals and setting up a well-equipped disaster preparedness and evacuation center in the province, and broached the possibility that this initiative could be replicated nationwide.

A proposed project to be funded by the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID), through a combination of grants and loans, aims to replicate the Albay initiative in at least 14 provinces.

The initial list includes Cagayan, Isabela, Pangasinan, Quezon, Zambales, Camarines Sur, Benguet, Abra, Iloilo, Capiz, Southern Leyte, Davao Oriental, Surigao del Sur, Lanao del Sur and Maguindanao.

The finance chief also expressed his appreciation for Spain’s grant of official development assistance (ODA) to the Philippines and ongoing projects in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).

According to data from the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda), as of April 2016, the total ODA grants from Spain amounted to $27.23 million.

The cooperation framework between the two countries aims to expand this ODA grant with focus on the Bicol region and Mindanao.

Also during the meeting, the finance chief informed the Ambassador that one of the priority goals of the administration is to reduce poverty rates in the country, from last year’s 26 percent, to 17 percent by the time President Duterte steps aside in 2022.

He further noted that programs to attain such a goal is by increasing infrastructure spending outside Metro Manila that would not only connect communities, but also create meaningful jobs, by vigorously implementing the reproductive-health law, and by boosting agricultural productivity, among others.

The Philippine government’s plan to raise infrastructure spending from 3 percent to 5 percent of the GDP would be complemented by efforts urging Congress to propose amendments that would lift the Constitution’s economic restrictions, Dominguez also said.

In explaining the proposed tax-reform program, he told the Spanish ambassador that the primary goal is to cut personal- and corporate-income tax, while, at the same time, simplifying and improving tax administration, adjusting fuel excise taxes, imposing a sugar tax as a health measure and plugging leakages in the value-added tax exemptions.

Castaño, for his part, said the Department of Finance tax plan is “on point, progressive and would help ease the burden of the middle class and vulnerable sectors.”