Manila, Feb. 24 -- President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. on Tuesday acknowledged there is still "much to unravel and there is much to undo" within government bureaucracy to significantly improve the country's ease of doing business and align it with regional peers.

Speaking at the ASEAN Editors and Economic Opinion Leaders Forum in Makati City, Marcos identified red tape and overlapping regulations as major obstacles to faster and simpler government transactions.

"Really, the bureaucracy... has been one of the main, shall we say, roadblocks to quicker processing and simple things," he said.

Marcos cited as example the lengthy process of securing basic civil documents.

"We were in a meeting the other day... things like getting a new copy o...