MANILA, Philippines - The Land Transportation Office (LTO) plans to make new license plates for vehicles which will be issued to new vehicles by 2013.

It also plans to standardize the license plate design of all motor vehicles in the country.

Since 1981, license plates for vehicles have had nine designs. Through its standardization program, the LTO aims to reduce the number of fake license plates.



The new design will have a new font and a barcode, which will contain information about the vehicle and its owner.

The new license plates will be able to inform authorities where the vehicle was registered.

It also features a one-way screw so that if someone tries to remove the license plate, it will be damaged and cannot be used again.

Effective 2013, new vehicles purchased will have license plates that have four numbers.

License plates for public vehicles, meanwhile, will indicate the vehicle's route to solve the so-called "colorum" problem.

Motorcycles will also have new license plates which will be bigger and should be placed at the front and rear end of the motorcycles. The new plates will also have five numeric digits instead of four.

The LTO will conduct a public bidding for the new license plates. It plans to implement the project by January next year. - ANC