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BSP Facility
The Central Bank of the Philippines also known as the “Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas” was established during the regime of Ferdinand E. Marcos. Its main objective is to manage the monetary policy and collect all the important wealth of our country. Our tour was in the Security Plant Complex of the BSP where the production of money and refinery of gold takes place. These two things are the blood of our economy that is important for us to achieve higher standards of competitive advantage over other ASEAN countries.

The Security Plant Complex or SPC of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas was designed generally for the prevention of copying our money supply. The overall structure of the compound is a very unique one, making it a giant fortress inside the city. Security measurements are high like the censored doors, tinted mirrors, hardened walls, and exceptional level of technology enhancement. If we are going to talk about their machineries that they use in manufacturing and producing money, basing it from one to ten, then I think that it is still on 7.5 because even though we have lots of money reserved inside the facility, they still waste a lot of raw money (moneys that aren’t accepted because of some deficiencies). Lastly in terms of structural quality, I can say that it is a solid 10 because they have figure out how to give a pleasant atmosphere from the hallways up to the manufacturing facilities.

Video-Showing
The Video showing we watched was about the History of our money, from the first generation to the modern generation of money and how these things are being created. They also let us watched how to create our money, the security features of each of our money have and the refinery of gold in the Philippines.

History of Money
The whole video was a good reference of the Philippines’ money history. They told us that from coins, they have started creating bills in the Spanish Era to lessen the cost of production. In the American Era they have known our currency as the English Series since the American overtook us that time. That time was a big boom for the Philippine economy that’s why the “English series” was replaced by its new formal name the “Filipino series”. After the People Power Revolution, the establishment of “Bagong Lipunan” banknotes took place and replace the older banknotes.
Lastly, the establishment of the BSP diminished all the remaining banknotes to create a more specific note that the people will accept as a legal tender. Last year they have created new banknote bills that are known as the modern generation of bills. These bills have special security features that prevent other people from copying and creating replicas. Bills that have lower value have lower safety features while bills with higher values have a higher safety features. This way of security is for the stability and safety of our Monetary Policy.
Gold Refinery
The SPC is also responsible for the refining the gold that is being legally sold to our country. They do this process to weld the gold into formal shapes which is stored somewhere in our country.
The first process of refinery is melting the collected gold for it to be malleable and to turn into a formal shape. The next step is for the blacksmith to put the gold in a plate where it can be shaped. The last step is to wait for the gold to be cold enough to be handled by tongs and put it in the reservoir. This process is important to easily count and weigh the gold that is collected. The video also told us that even the dresses they used in the process are filtered because of the gold dusts it contains. The SPC always need to keep in touch with these things to protect our gold reserves.

The Tour
After the video, we then moved on to the tour around the production facility. They showed to us the facilities they used to process the things that we call the legal tender.
The following below are the stages of creating banknotes;

 Simultaneous printing
The first process is simultaneous printing. The paper they used is 80% cotton and 20% abaca. For the ink to permanently stay on the paper, they must wait a week for it to be fully dry.
 Intaglio printing
The second process is called intaglio. This is where they carved ink in the paper to make it look better and more appealing to the user.
 Checking
This process is where they will check whether the money is acceptable in the market or not. This will also tell if the money is ready to be distributed or to be reused.
 Releasing
The last process is the releasing of the money to the economy by distributing into different banks in the Philippines (they just told us this process).

As the day goes by, they produce thousands of bill yet they also waste thousands of it. This is because not every machine produces perfect printed money. During the Printing process, they also apply the intaglio and the serial number of the paper. Even if the money already had a serial number, it is still not acceptable not unless verified by the government. But before the verification, they must still check whether the money is acceptable or not. They have 2 ways of checking bills; automatic and manual. If a checker randomly pick 10 sheets of paper and all of it are in printed perfect, then the whole set where the 10 sheets are taken is sent to automatic checking but if one of them is not in good condition, then the whole set where the sheets is taken will be sent in manual checking. In automatic checking, they directly sent the set of sheets in the intaglio process while in the manual process, each sheet in the set is checked for security measures. After all the acceptable sheet is collected it goes to numbering and then verifying. Lastly, the printed money is reserved for future purposes.

Security documents and Special Medals
While in the middle of the tour, we also saw that bills are not the only thing that they produced but also security documents like passports and land titles. They said that it will be much easier for them to produce it here than any other place for security. We saw how they compile each paper turning it into a new and ready to use passports.
We didn’t saw how they create land titles but our tour guide pointed the papers they use in creating these kinds of titles. It a bright yellow-green paper and has a border.
They also produce special medals like honor medals and presidential medals which is used in special events. This medal is commonly made in gold that came from our gold reserves.

Coins
After touring us in the bills and documents facilities, they then took us in the coins compiling facilities.

Here are the stages of coin processing;
• Production of blank coins
Our tour guide said that the blank coins we used came from South Korea. These coins are made from nickel and silver and as same as the value of what it says. For example, a one peso coin also has a value of one peso in terms of metal value. This is used for the security value of the money and will prevent melting of coins to gain more money.
• Carving of coins
The next process after the shipment of the coins is carving it into money which it will be used as a legal coin. They used a machine to do this process due to the supply.
• Compiling
In this process they used a machine to produce a set of coins which is for the distribution of the coins. The machines cover the set with paper and then sent to another machine which sends the set of coins into a box where it will be distributed.

The end of tour
The tour guide said that the main objective of this Facility is to protect and create the monetary supply. We all know that the BSP’s objective is to stabilize the financial status of the economy. To do this, they must balance the monetary supply to prevent it from being produced by others using its security features. They must realize that they are one of the most important sectors of the government and without them; there will be no balance in the country.

BSP as a whole, our tour guide said, is a foundation of the economies wealth and sustainability. BSP keeps the economy balance by controlling and regulating the monetary policy and managing all the banking and non-banking institutions in the country.
Before we end our tour, our tour guide lets us ask questions about the tour. Most of us ask about the security measures of each bill and how can we really distinguish the real from the fake. The guide tells us that they sell simple machineries to distinguish real from fake like money checkers, light emitters etc.. Before we leave, she asks us if we want to buy some old commemorative bills. These bills have no monetary value but only as a souvenir. Some of bought some of it but I think that they just waste their money because they just used it to buy a non-legal bill.

Recommendation
The Tour
First of all, the tour is very educational but boring. So boring that the only thing that keeps me from sleeping and listening is myself chatting with others. They should have given us good tour guides which have both the skill and the charm. Second, they should only allow the tour if there is an activity in the refinery because it’s so unfair if only others saw it or much better if all the tour schedules is at the same date which the gold will be refined. Lastly, they should also make the tour a happy one that will cheer the student from listening.

The Facilities
Their facilities are good but they should also realize in wasted materials they used in creating bills and other products. As I have said before, they still waste thousands of bills and also thousands of products that should have been already distributed or used as a reservation for the future cases. They should improve their machineries and increase its accuracy to achieve a better potential and maximize our resources.
The Video
The video is also a life learning footage but it’s a little bit boring because all it does is explain and tackle everything about the history of money. They should apply at least some real life footage just to wake us up or boost us. They could also use some games or tricks just to keeps us in touch in them or make them see if we are still listening or not.

The SPC
The Sports complex must add more features in managing the whole process of manufacturing our monetary supply. To sum it up, they still need manage more things to do its duties and obligations in our country.