Marcos trips can account for 43% of investments goal

THE state visits of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. can generate over 40 percent of the country’s total investment target this year, the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (PEZA) said.

“If we base it on the President’s visits to different countries, we can say in PEZA that it easily constitutes 43 percent of our total investments [target] in the country,” PEZA General Director Tereso Panga said in a public briefing on Monday.

Panga earlier announced that they target to approve P250 billion in investments in 2024. He added that the country’s new reforms are solid economic fundamentals that are able to attract more investments.

“In fact, all of our approvals in PEZA through the Investment Promotion Agency, can be very well attributed to the incumbent President. I believe he’s the salesman, the best salesman for the people,” said Panga.

Last week, PEZA reported that investment approvals have hit P12.096 billion barely two months into the current year. This was 18.66 percent higher compared to the P10.19 billion recorded a year earlier.

Panga said that the investment approval covers 28 projects. And this includes 16 export manufacturing companies, seven economic zones (ecozones) for information technology (IT) locator companies, two logistics companies, one domestic market-oriented enterprise, one ecozone developer, and another facility that the official did not elaborate on.

“Our performance indicators are jobs and exports. So, we are looking at close to 4,000 new jobs and close to $700 million in annual exports,” said Panga.

“These are the additions to our economy once the 28 projects newly approved by PEZA start operations,” he added.

Through the new projects and the continued operation of exportoriented industries, Panga said that the Philippines may be able to reach the $65-billion target in export sales.

The official said that the electronics sector remains as the Philippines’ biggest industry in the ecozones.

“So, we have electronics as the biggest sector in the ecozones together with the IT investments,” said Panga.

There are also metals and transport-related investments that have significant potential with the expected rise in the adoption of electric vehicles in the country.