Group seeks more action from gov’t

Donald Dee. FILE PHOTO

The country’s biggest business organization wants to see more concrete action in the last two years of the Aquino administration in terms of implementing the proposed infrastructure, logistics, power and education measures, deemed critical in making the Philippine business environment more conducive to local and foreign investors alike.

Donald Dee, honorary chair of the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI), explained in a briefing yesterday that the business community wanted to see things moving and for the government to set a clearer timeframe or timetable for all the critical projects and programs.

“These are the things that are critical. These are the things we want to happen in the next two years. We need the government to implement plans. These will not be finished (by the time President Aquino steps down in 2016) but at least we want to see these projects being implemented, and for sure, investments will start coming in,” Dee said.

“The whole idea here is that we want investments to go up. Investors won’t come in unless they are assured that there’s adequate power, that the logistics costs would go down, and that we have skilled labor,” he added.

Such proposals are expected to be consolidated and submitted on the last day of the PCCI’s 40th Philippine Business Conference and Expo to be held in October.

According to Dee, the business community, for instance, wanted to see the more critical infrastructure projects being moved forward such as the connector road between the North Luzon Expressway and the South Luzon Expressway. It was not enough, he added, to say that the two conglomerates have already won the bidding, but there should be a clear timetable as to when this would be in place and how fast this was going to happen.

“We want to see, for example, in the case of the ports, when the President said that Subic and Batangas are now secondary ports, we should go further than that. We should also say what are the maximum load that we will allow in Subic and Batangas, among others, and have a timetable for that as well,” Dee said.

“We want to see these airports. Let’s stop giving out these ideas. Let’s decide: If you want to put it in Clark, let’s put a working plan to put it in Clark. If you want it in Cavite, then lets work on it. Whatever (the decision maybe), we should have a working plan and a time frame,” he further stressed.

Dee likewise stressed how critical it was to effectively implement the K to 12 program, particularly in the inclusion of the vocational-technical courses.

PCCI president Alfredo M. Yao, for his part, noted that this year’s Philippine Business Conference would focus on important issues in the discussions, including economic partnership agreements and free trade agreements; roadmap to competitive electric power industry; liberalization of the economic provisions of the Constitution; trade facilitation, and a legislative agenda, among others.