Ayala forges stronger alliance with 250,000 MSME–partners

CITY OF SAN FERNANDO---The captains of three of the country's biggest business groups— Jaime Augusto Zobel de Ayala of Ayala Corporation, Teresita Sy-Coson of SM Investments Corporation, Enrique Razon of International Container Terminal Services, Inc., — together with Tony Fernandes of AirAsia, jointly said at the CEO panel of Go Negosyo’s 15th anniversary conference that large corporations should serve as

“big brothers” to MSMEs that are struggling to recover from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemi c.

According to a DTI report, SMEs and microbusinesses cover 60 percent of the total annual revenues of all Philippine businesses, contribute 35 percent of the country’s GDP, and employ 63 percent of working Filipinos. Globally, these smaller businesses comprise 70 percent of employment and around half of the world’s GDP.

With over 250,000 small businesses within its ecosystem, the Ayala Group of Companies immediately rolled out various programs at the onset of the pandemic to address the different pain points faced by its MSME–partners. The Ayala group also partnered with the government and other likeminded business groups to address the needs of the broader community. The group worked with both the public and the private sectors to boost the country’s testing capacity through Project ARK and T3. It convened the private sector under Project Ugnayan and raised, in a matter of days, over P1.7 billion in donation to give grocery vouchers to over 1.5 million families in the poorest communities of Greater Manila Area.

“This is the moment where we all should be holding hands and riding this together,” Zobel said. “I think what this crisis has shown is that we're all part of a system that is much more integrated than ever before. This is a time when cooperation is far more important than anything else.”

( PR)