This priority under the strategic theme of Shared Values gives due emphasis to ethical and professional standards that the different professions should actually observe. It puts forward the ideal that our professions should align their standards of ethics and professional practice with global standards: We can not afford to have them lower; they need to be at least at par with generally and globally accepted principles and best practices.

The measure to use in tracking progress towards achieving this priority is the number of professions that would review their standards of ethics and professional practice, and ensure that these are fully aligned with global standards. It is our good fortune that we have in our country the Professional Regulation Commission (PRC), which oversees entry requirements into some 40 duly recognized and accredited professions. It also works closely with the various professional organizations, which count as its members all the duly qualified and registered professionals in any given profession.

The target, using such a measure, is for two professional groups in 2010 to be actively adopting the Performance Governance System as a tool for aligning their ethical and professional standards with global standards. By 2020, the number of such professional groups should rise to 10; and by 2030, the corresponding number targeted is 30. The ideal, of course, is to have all 40 duly recognized professional groups, under the aegis of the PRC, engaged in this alignment process; but some allowance has to be made for a few to opt out of the process.

The initiative called for is for the PRC to be actively engaged in the alignment process, and to use its powers to persuade the different professional groups it oversees and regulates to go through and complete such a process. Moreover, the PRC must help ensure that the ethical and professional standards set are actually observed through mechanisms available to it as well as to the different professional organizations. It is essential to recognize that it is not enough to set standards; it is also necessary to ensure full compliance with those standards, in actual practice.

Indeed, we should count it as one of our blessings that we have institutions within government such as the PRC, and within civil society the different professional organizations. The PRC and these organizations have their mandate; moreover, they are charged with the responsibility of setting standards of ethics and professional practice in the different professions. They also oversee arrangements, which promote continuing professional education for the members of the different professional organizations, so that these professionals are able to keep up with the latest standards and best practices that should be considered for adoption in our local circumstances. The challenge before us is simply to work through PRC and these organizations so they are brought fully on board the governance train, as we move forward using our Road Map for Philippines 2030. They have a distinctive and very important contribution to make; and they have to be asked to actually put that contribution in, for the common good of all Filipinos in the Philippines.