The Philippine Economic Zone Authority (PEZA) Board is set to approve on July 10 a total of 27 new projects worth P2 billion with a potential to employ 3,694, according to director general Charito Plaza in a July 7 online press conference.
In its last Board meeting in May, PEZA green lit 26 new projects—10 export manufacturing, nine IT projects, two facilities providers, one logistics service provider, and four economic zone developers—which brought in investments of P13.1 billion and are estimated to employ 19,894 workers.
PEZA also has 12 newly-proclaimed economic zones, comprising nine IT centers, manufacturing ecozones, and one IT park, with a total project cost of P6.4 billion. Majority of the new ecozones (67%) will be located in Luzon and the rest in Visayas and Mindanao.
Plaza said majority of companies under PEZA are continuously operating amid the coronavirus disease pandemic. A total of 2,517 locator companies or 78% of the total are operational, with 1.181 million employees reporting for work, including those working from home and part of the skeletal workforce. About 700 companies have no production or are non-operational.
Approved investments for the first five months of 2020 dropped 31% to P29.5 billion from P43.2 billion in the same period last year.
Some service providers have recently canceled their PEZA registration, Plaza noted. “These are minor industries but the very reason they are cancelling their registration with PEZA is because they lost their buyers,” she said, noting that lack of raw materials were another factor for cancellation.
“…ang kinakatakutan ko (My fear) is that with the world recession, there might be export companies that will consolidate their resources so that they have to stop or close their other branches and concentrate their resources in countries which are investor-friendly, where the cost of doing business is low,” Plaza said.
“In this pandemic, in a world in recession, it’s difficult to look for new investors. We must create an impression that investing in the Philippines will cost them less,” she said. She cited the high cost of doing business in the country, red tape and the proposed rationalization of tax incentives as major factors that have discouraged investors.
The PEZA chief, however, remains optimistic: “In fact, we will be doing continuous virtual investor forums. We have now arranged for investor forums in various countries with the help of our commercial attachés.”
As part of its new 10-point agenda and in support of Administrative Order (AO) No. 18 series of 2019 to accelerate rural progress through ecozone development in the countryside, PEZA on July 13 will launch its Development Outreach for Labor, Livelihood, and Advancement of Resources (DOLLAR) program.
The sub-programs under DOLLAR are a job expo; innovation and livelihood expo; online special economic zone (SEZ) training; import and export expo; and logistics, transportation, utilities and supply chain expo.
The job expo aims to provide job opportunities to repatriated overseas Filipino workers in support of Executive Order No. 114, or the “Balik-Probinsya, Bagong Pag-Asa” program of the administration.
The innovation and livelihood expo will allow locators and other PEZA-registered enterprises that need project-based suppliers to outsource from entrepreneurs and small and single proprietor business owners.
Online SEZ training provides skills training while the import and export expo will match exporters with local produce and raw materials suppliers.
Lastly, the logistics, transportation, utilities and supply chain expo aims to find investors who can help PEZA and the government build logistics and transportation hubs, mega economic zones, utilities and food terminals in every region and provide efficient infrastructure and logistics and transportation hubs.
