EVAP prepares for 1st Asean electric and hybrid vehicles summit

THE Electric Vehicle Association of the Philippines (EVAP) is prepar Hybrid Vehicles Summit that it organized with the Board of Investments (BoI) and Manila Electric Co. (Meralco).

The EV summit which will be held from June 29 to 30 at the World Trade Center in Pasay City will be part of the Asean National Organizing Committees series of events for 2017 as the country hosts the Asean Summit.

EVAP President Rommel Juan said on Monday that in the Asean region, the Philippines probably has the greatest potential for electric vehicles especially for public transport applications such as jeepneys and tricycles.

“The business opportunities lie in the need to modernize the aging and ailing mass transport system and electric jeepneys and tricycles are the more viable options,” Juan said.

The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) is supporting the event which aims to promote the use of electric and hybrid vehicles in the region. EVAP member companies will be featuring the latest electric vehicles and EV technologies as well as hybrid vehicles from the local automotive manufacturers and assemblers.

“We can see that once electric vehicles move to the mainstream level in the Philippine mass transport system, we will be looking at supplying the replacement vehicles in the large domestic market of 350,000 diesel-fueled jeepneys and 1.2 million gas-fed tricycles,” Juan said.

“And with a large production volume, we can then have the economies of scale to become the manufacturing hub for electric vehicles and parts in the Asean region. This we hope will then open up the Asean region as the staging point for subsequently exporting to the other parts of the globe,” he added.

EVAP Vice President Edmund Araga said that EVAP is now closely coordinating with its Asean counterparts in order to get the key players in the region to participate in the event.

“We are now traveling around the Asean region to invite our Asean counterparts to the summit, for them to exhibit their latest products and technologies and to share their best practices with us. It is the perfect opportunity for us in the Asean to unite and promote EV applications so that together, we can make a better and cleaner world for the next generation,” Araga said.

At the latest organizing committee meeting with BOI Executive Director Corieh Dichosa and the Asean National Organizing Committee in attendance, details were can be synchronized with the other Asean activities for the year.

“We hope that the event will help spread the electric and hybrid vehicles initiative in the Asean region and eventually, the world with the Philippines as the focal point,” she added.

The Asean members countries - sia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines and Vietnam.