Department of Finance Building. | PHOTO: DOF Facebook
MANILA, Philippines—Over a year after the Corporate Recovery and Tax Incentives for Enterprises (CREATE) Act became law in March 2021, the interagency, Cabinet-level Fiscal Incentives Review Board (FIRB) so far approved tax perks for 11 projects worth a total of P368 billion.
In a statement on Monday (May 23), the Department of Finance (DOF) said the P151-billion high-speed broadband services connectivity facilities project of Converge ICT Solutions Inc. was the biggest of the 11 big-ticket projects approved by the FIRB to date, which will enjoy fiscal and other incentives. Converge is owned by Pampanga’s Dennis Anthony H. Uy.
The DOF also noted that the FIRB had granted tax-free perks for the P81-billion Makati subway project, which will start operations in 2026.
Besides these two infrastructure projects, the other sectors where the FIRB approved fiscal incentives for firms included cement production, mass housing construction, as well as shipbuilding.
The FIRB recently approved the registration of Trans-Asia Shipping Lines Inc. for its forthcoming P1.5-billion shipping vessel that will sail the Cebu City-Cagayan de Oro City route. Davao businessman Dennis A. Uy owns Cebu-based Trans-Asia Shipping Lines Inc., which will roll out this roll-on, roll-off (RoRo) passenger and cargo operations.
This month, the FIRB approved the P17-billion Project Agila project taking over the massive Subic facility left behind by South Korean shipbuilding giant Hanjin in 2019. US-based private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management to redevelop and operate the former shipyard at the Subic Bay Freeport Zone.
“Most of these incentivized investments are located outside the National Capital Region (NCR), thereby energizing rural development and generating more jobs in the countryside,” Assistant Finance Secretary Juvy Danofrata, FIRB secretariat head, said.
Under the CREATE Act, the FIRB oversees incentives-giving to investments worth over P1 billion.
The law signed last year empowered the President, upon the FIRB’s recommendation, to give away hefty tax breaks to entice elephant-sized investments. CREATE also rationalized the previously wide array of fiscal perks being offered by investment promotion agencies (IPAs), which costs the government billions of pesos in foregone revenues.