THE national government has secured a 30-billion yen (about P12.3 billion) loan from Japan to help the Philippines recover quickly from the Covid-19 pandemic and fully return to a path of high and inclusive growth, the Department of Finance announced on Tuesday.

In a statement, it said Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez 3rd and Akihiko Tanaka, the new president of the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), signed the agreement on behalf of the Philippine and Japanese governments for the second phase of the Covid-19 Crisis Response Emergency Support Loan (CCRESL2).