European investors getting keen on Philippines

The Philippines has strengthened its presence on the radar screens of European investors, who do not usually consider the country as an investment location, prompting the Philippine Economic Zone Authority to raise its investments, exports and employment growth targets for the year.

PEZA Director General Lilia de Lima said even Scandinavian countries were keen on investing in the country, due mainly to the improvements they had seen on the first year of the new administration.

“In Asia, we’re now very competitive. Other countries that used to have low wages now have higher wages than ours. Also, the Philippines has a highly trainable workforce. While it may take around three months to train workers in other countries, it takes only two months to do the same for Filipino workers. This is mainly because of our English-language skills,” Ms. De Lima explained in an interview Tuesday.

“It’s true that we still have relatively high power rates, but we haven’t had a serious blackout in years. Our power supply is still very reliable, which is important for investors,” De Lima added.

Next month, De Lima will be visiting five to six countries in Europe—including Austria, Czech Republic, Germany, Sweden, and Switzerland—to “sell” the Philippines as an investment destination.

“They invited us to go there. They really want to know what the Philippines has to offer,” she said.

De Lima will also be visiting Nagoya and Osaka at around the same time President Aquino visits Japan, also in an effort to encourage more Japanese investors to come to the country.

Manufacturing and information technology would continue to be the PEZA’s key targets, she said, due to the number of jobs that these industries could generate.

Right now, De Lima said some locators and developers were on the verge of finalizing plans to invest in the country. She declined to reveal the exact identities of these entities, however.

“We don’t want to give away our leads because we have a lot of competition,” De Lima said.

The PEZA board recently decided to raise its 10-10-10 investments, exports and employment growth targets for the year to 11-11-11. This meant a projected 11-percent growth in all the three key indicators of PEZA.