Trucks Oust Buffaloes as Aquino $6.5 Billion Adds Roads: Freight

Farmer Rene Ravalo loads coconuts onto a truck in the Philippines for the 30-minute trip to market on a road built last year. It previously took half a day for a water buffalo to inch the goods down a mountain track.

“Selling our produce is much easier now,” Ravalo said in Magsaysay, his village 1,570 kilometers (975 miles) south of Manila. He’s gaining from record spending on roads, ports and airports, set by the government at 268 billion pesos ($6.5 billion) in 2013 to boost a transport network the World Economic Forum ranks the second worst in major Southeast Asian nations.