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Foreign investment pledges totaling around US$88 million brought home by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. from his previous trips and state visits abroad are expected to materialize this year
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Trade Secretary Alfredo Pascual says the $88 million estimate is only as of June 2023 and that more pledges are expected “to ripen and eventually lead to the inflow of investments”
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The $88 million figure comes from six projects already registered with the Board of Investments or other investment promotions agencies
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The Department of Trade and Industry went on a three-week investment roadshow in Europe recently and secured 48 potential investment leads, of which 16 have explicitly indicated investment values totalling more than P73 billion
Around US$88 million worth of investment pledges made during the previous foreign trips and state visits of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. are expected to materialize this year, according to Trade Secretary Alfredo Pascual.
“It’s not so large as yet, but the potential is as we had announced before. We have a pipeline that we were able to build up amounting to around $70 billion,” Pascual said in a press briefing in Malacañang on July 12.
He said the $88 million total was only as of June 2023, and that trade and investment officials “expect some more to ripen and eventually lead to the inflow of investments.”
The $88 million represents pledges for six projects already registered with the Board of Investments (BOI) or other investment promotions agencies.
Since Marcos took office on July 1 last year and until May 2023, the President had already made more than 10 trips abroad. In February, Malacañang said Marcos’ official business trips to seven countries had generated 116 projects worth a total of $62.926 billion or P3.48 trillion in investments.
On speculation regarding investment leads during his previous foreign trips, Pascual gave the assurance that the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) “has mechanisms to monitor and evaluate the progress of investment leads from our previous foreign trips.”
“We ensure transparency and accountability, although we cannot always disclose the names of specific companies that we deal with due to confidentiality demanded by private companies which are subject to competitive pressures,” Pascual added.
DTI, along with private sector representatives, went on a three-week investment roadshow in Europe recently and secured 48 potential investment leads.
Of these, 16 have explicitly indicated investment values totalling more than P73 billion, potentially generating more than 4,300 jobs, Pascual said.
The investment roadshow aimed to gather investment leads for priority sectors such as manufacturing and research & development, higher-value services, and renewable energy. It covered five countries, namely France, the United Kingdom, Brussels, The Netherlands, and Germany.
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Out of the 48 leads, 14 are in manufacturing and related services such as in training and integrated circuit design; 16 are in information technology-business process management (IT-BPM) such as global business services/shared services centers, healthcare information and management services, clinical research/trials, IT solutions for cybersecurity and game development; 15 are in renewable energy, particularly, in onshore/offshore shore wind, solar, and hydrogen; and three in infrastructure and construction-related services.
Pascual said European aircraft manufacturer Airbus and a French hydrogen power generation company are among the 48 leads.
Of the 16 positive leads, six are in the renewable energy sector; six are in the IT-BPM sector, particularly four on the establishment and expansion of global business centers and shared services, one in IT solutions for cybersecurity and one lead in game development; two in manufacturing; one in construction services; and one in acquisitions.
