Philippine Senator Proposes Integrating National Budget into Blockchain System

Senator Bam Aquino is proposing that the national budget of the Philippines be managed on a blockchain platform, aiming for complete traceability of every peso spent by citizens.

“No one would dare put their transactions on a blockchain, where every detail is recorded and visible to all citizens. Yet, we want to begin,” Aquino expressed in a statement made during the Manila Tech Summit on Wednesday.

“If we can achieve this, we would be the first nation with a budget on the blockchain,” Aquino stated, though he expressed uncertainty about the support he might receive.

As of now, there is no official proposal for a blockchain-based budget management system suitable for the entire national budget. Senator Aquino’s representatives have not responded to Decrypt’s request for comments.

If formalized, Aquino’s initiative would expand on the existing blockchain platform from the Department of Budget and Management, which currently records selected financial documents and is Asia’s first live on-chain budget platform.

BayaniChain, a local blockchain infrastructure provider behind the DBM’s platform, welcomed Aquino’s proposal but clarified that it is not directly working with the senator.

“His vision aligns with ours: fostering more transparent and accountable systems for the Philippines,” said Paul Soliman, co-founder and CEO of BayaniChain, in a statement to Decrypt. “While blockchain is not a complete solution for corruption, it creates immutable records that promote accountability among government officials.”

Soliman noted that BayaniChain’s role involves facilitating the connection between the DBM’s internal system and a public blockchain.

This integration enables essential budget documents, such as Special Allotment Release Orders (SAROs) and Notices of Cash Allocation (NCAs), to be published and verified online, with the records secured on-chain.

Prismo, an orchestration layer, oversees data handling, encryption, and validation. The budget platform of the DBM utilizes Polygon’s Proof-of-Stake network, an Ethereum scaling solution that is fully compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine, serving as its consensus and transparency layer.