The Philippine Economic Zone Authority reduced its 2020 investment forecast to P58.75 billion from the actual figure of P117.5 billion in 2019 amid the health crisis.
PEZA director-general Charito Plaza said the agency was trying its best to keep investors and attract new ones.
“We are definitely expecting half or 50 percent of what we have achieved last year, especially that we are creating the impression that investing in the Philippines through our economic zones of PEZA will assure our investors that it’s COVID-free, and all of the assistance and reliefs are provided by the Philippine government with the best management. So, these are assurances that we hope to attract more investors and existing investors to expand,” she said.
Data showed investment in the last three years steadily decreased from P237 billion in 2017 to P140.2 billion in 2018 to P117.5 billion in 2019.
PEZA said investments in the first half reached P35.2 billion, as the agency did not register any project in March at the start of the lockdown.
Plaza said the strong economic fundamentals were still in place despite the threat of the COVID-19. She said not a single company had pulled out its investments from the country.
She said PEZA was also quick to provide relief to industries in the economic zones and offered tax deduction on COVID-related expenses such as procurement of personal protective equipment, dormitory expenses, shuttle services and virus-testing of ecozone workers.
“We decided to allow this kind of assistance to all PEZA companies which will be deducted from the taxes that they will pay under the 5 percent GIE [gross income earned] until Dec. 31 [2020],” Plaza said.
She said the agency was worried enterprises might close their operations in the country in search of better incentive packages outside the Philippines.
“Our locator companies actually have many branches around the world. So they might consolidate all their resources and will close their branches in countries where the cost of doing business is high, and the threat of COVID is there. That’s why we are very proud that we were able to get the cooperation and the compliance of our locator companies and our ecozone operators.” she said.
About 84 percent of companies in economic zones nationwide are operating, while 70 percent of the total workforce are actively working. Around 400,000 workers were initially displaced.
Plaza said a hiring program would be launched in the third week of July for 72,000 company vacancies across economic zones.
“We’re expecting 62,000 OFWs coming home jobless. We will launch this job expo where they can apply for jobs. We can include the displaced workers of ABS-CBN and unemployed Filipinos,” she said.