CLARK FREEPORT, Pampanga—Employment inside the Freeport increased by 12 percent for the first 11 months of 2017 with 107,694 persons now working in the former military airbase, the Clark Development Corp. reported.
The total employed workers topped the 2016 tally for the same period of 93,467, owing to the strategic location of the Freeport that continues to attract locators and investors and the sound management of the CDC under president and CEO Noel Manankil, the government-controlled firm said in a statement.
“The workers are employed by 943 registered enterprises, majority of whom are engaged in export of quality products, supplying the world market. Electronics is the bulk of their products,” Noel Tulabut, CDC communication manager, added.
CDC, together with its mother government agency, the Bases Conversion Development Authority, remitted P4.5 billion to the National Treasury as provided for under Republic Act No. 7917 and Executive Order 309.
The remittance comes from sales, joint venture income and leases of the former military camp’s facilities, including dividends declared out of its net income.
More workers are in the Freeport’s future with President Rodrigo R. Duterte announcing that Clark is now the new frontier of trade and commerce, to replace or equal “decaying” Metro Manila.
Tulabut said the current total number of employees is the biggest in the history of the Freeport—not even during the time of the Americans, who employed 20,000 local and foreign civilian employees.
The increase was also due to the registrations of new enterprises and expansions of the existing ones.
“The largest employer is Nanox Phil. with 7,926 employees, followed by Sutherland Global Services Phil. (6,071), iQors Phil. Inc. (5,857), garment manufacturer L and T International (5,340); and tiremaker Yokohama Tires Phil., Inc. (2,875),” Tulabut added.
To qualify the President’s vision, the Duterte administration through the Department of Transportation broke ground on the expansion of the Clark International Airport worth P9.36 billion last Dec. 20.
The project involves the expansion of the passenger terminal building measuring about 82,600 meters that will increase its capacity to eight million a year, and is expected to be finished in year 2020.
Other government projects that would increase employment in the former US Air Force base are the P1.2-trillion New Clark Green City in Capas, Tarlac, and the P105.31-billion Tutuban-Malolos-Clark Rapid Railway project, expected to start in the first quarter of 2018 under the Ambisyon Natin 2040 program of the National Economic Development Authority.
The three projects under the “Build, Build, Build” program of the present administration aim to accelerate the development of Clark and Subic Freeports as a logistics corridor.