DESPITE THE GLOBAL ECONOMIC SLOWdown, the business process outsourcing industry remained optimistic it would post a double-digit growth of as much as 25 percent this year, an industry official said.

Danilo Sebastian L. Reyes, vice chair of the Business Processing Association of the Philippines (BPAP), said the industry was also looking at breaching the 500,000 direct employee threshold ?hopefully within the year with the projected 25-percent growth.?

The BPO sector presently employs 475,000 people.

?The industry continues to grow. I believe this is one of the few industries that will post double-digit growth,? Reyes said in an interview.

He said the Philippines remained very attractive as an investment destination to investors.

Several companies were considering setting up shops here or expand operations of existing facilities.

According to Reyes, India remained a major investor in the Philippine BPO industry. US-based companies which have existing operations in the country, he said, were planning to expand.

In the meantime, Reyes said BPAP had been meeting with several of its counterpart-organizations, including the National Association of Software and Service Companies of India (Nasscom), to ?try to calibrate what?s happening in the global BPO industry.?

BPAP earlier estimated that the local BPO industry would register a growth of as much as 30 percent, with revenue seen hitting $7.8 billion.

The 26-percent growth posted in 2008 was slower than the initial forecast of 30-35 percent. This translated to a revenue of $6.1 billion and 74,000 new jobs.