Continue service during ECQ, DoE tells firms

By Jordeene B. Lagare – August 6, 2021
from The Manila Times

THE Department of Energy (DoE) called on industry stakeholders to ensure unhampered delivery of energy services for the duration of the enhanced community quarantine (ECQ).

“We call on all of the members of the Energy family in ensuring the unhampered delivery of services during the ECQ,” said Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi in a recorded video message.

At the same time, Cusi asked oil companies to provide fuel discounts to frontliners and consumers to alleviate the financial burden brought about by the pandemic.

“The rising prices of oil in the world market is regrettably beyond our control,” he added.

From August 6 to 20, the National Capital Region will return to the stricter ECQ to curb a looming surge in coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) cases triggered by the highly contagious Delta variant.
The DoE then issued an advisory concerning the imposition of ECQ and modified enhanced community quarantine (MECQ) in various areas.

Under ECQ and MECQ, movement of people is not allowed except workers in the government and certain sectors in the industry including the energy sector.
With that, the DoE directive states that workers in the energy sector are allowed to move from one quarantine zone to another, whether from a stringent quarantine to a less strict one or vice-versa, subject to the restrictions imposed by the local government unit.

Such personnel only have to present a company ID as proof of employment to travel. Existing holders of IDs issued by the Interagency Task Force for Managing Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF) may also use it.
“In this light, all businesses are advised to make an inventory of IATF IDs that were previously issued, recall those that are not in use and may request the DoE to issue new IDs to personnel without IATF IDs,” the advisory reads.