The Philippine Economic Zone Authority (Peza) saw its investment pledges drop by around 30 percent to P22.49 billion in the first half from P32.06 billion a year ago.
The investments in the first half include 90 projects with projected annual export sales of $747.09 million. These are expected to generate 14,354 direct job opportunities.
The Inquirer reached out to Peza for the reason behind the slowdown in investment approvals but has yet to receive a response as of press time.
Most of the investment pledges came from Japan and Singapore, amounting to P8 billion and P2.17 billion, respectively. These were followed by the United States, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands.
For the second quarter alone, however, ecozone investments more than doubled to P14.35 billion from P6.68 billion from the previous year. These cover 61 projects with projected export sales of $514.64 million and 11,186 direct jobs.
Meanwhile, the regulator of ecozones also reported that its export income grew by 7.68 percent to $32.50 billion in the first half from last year’s $30.18 billion while employment climbed by 10.16 percent to 1.79 million workers from 1.63 million a year ago.
“With the reopening of the Philippine economy and positive outlook under a new [Marcos] administration, we are glad that Peza contributed to job generation and in increasing employment rate in our country,” said Tereso Panga, officer in charge and deputy director general for policy and planning of Peza.
Panga said they would continue to work with the current administration in developing more ecozones in the countryside to generate more job opportunities and rake in revenues.
President Marcos earlier raised the need to support strategic industries, including high-technology manufacturing, emerging technologies and health, through ecozone investments. INQ