More UK trade missions coming

The British Embassy in Manila plans to bring within the year at least three trade and investment delegations from the United Kingdom to take advantage of a continued rise in domestic consumption and the steady growth of the local economy.

These business delegations will focus on ICT, meat and retail and food opportunities in the Philippines, according to British Ambassador to Manila Asif Ahmad.

According to Ahmad, the interest by British brands to have a presence in the Philippines continued to grow across all sectors and brands from cars to clothing, accessories and now even food.

This, he explained, was evident in the Great British Festival held in end-February this year, wherein there were 68 British companies that participated. Of the participants, 11 were food companies. In contrast, the Great British Festival in 2014 drew in only 24 participants, none in the food category.

“So this year we have an ICT (delegation) as well as meat exporters from the UK coming in (separately). We earlier had representatives from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) coming in as we’re trying to clear the way for British beef and other meat products from the UK to be imported here,” Ahmad said.

“We had to address some issues and go through the regular process on meat importation. Admittedly, we didn’t bother a lot before because the British meat industry was quite busy in other places. But now, they’re genuinely interested (in the Philippines), so they’re putting in some focus here,” he explained.

The British envoy added that another trade mission they were looking to bring here was a retail and food mission.

“That’s in the works too for the companies that are not yet here. Every year the number of UK-based retailers here is increasing and this year, we’ll see some dramatic announcements as well. There’s one big British brand coming in,” Ahmad said.

“The food mission will be tagged along with the retail because these two sectors often go hand in hand, like in the case of Marks & Spencer in the UK, which went from being well known for clothing to having a food business that is doing as good as its retail component,” he added.

UK-based companies continued to flock to the Philippines, which was seen to have grown to become “an exciting market” as the country’s “spending population continues to progress.”

Among the recent and expected entrants were Morgan Motor Co., which came in last year, and Aston Martin (Lagonda Ltd.), which will be setting up a presence in the country this year. Costa Coffee will also open this year and will partner with some of the well-known supermarkets and retailers in the country.

The Philippines’ growing attractiveness as an investment destination has lured many British companies to tap potential investment opportunities in the country over the past decade. As it is, there are more than 200 British companies active in the Philippines, several of them have long been operating in the country such as Shell, HSBC, Unilever, Standard Chartered, Marks and Spencer, Pru Life, de La Rue, GSK, AstraZeneca, Arup and Halcrow.