Walmart supplier hiring over 1,000 PH factory workers

MANILA, Philippines — Garment firm Welively Inc. is looking to hire at least a thousand workers for its factories in the Philippines, expanding its workforce by almost 50 percent, according to a local trade association of apparel exporters.

Foreign Buyers Association of the Philippines (Fobap) president Robert Young said that the company, which supplies garment goods to American retail chain Walmart Inc., is hiring for its factories in Clark, Pampanga, Cabuyao, Laguna, and Batangas.

“They are expanding and orders are coming in due to the United States and China conflict. Walmart is getting away from China and shifting its orders to other countries,” Young said in a phone interview with the Inquirer.

Young, whose trade group is buyers and exporters of garment and textile products, said that the company currently has 2,000 local employees.

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The company also exports about $200 million to $300 million worth of garment products annually to the United States.

The Fobap official said this would hopefully offset job cuts at other local garment makers, citing the loss of thousands of jobs at Luenthai Philippines, which manufactures apparel and other wearables for well-known international brands such as Ralph Lauren, Dillard’s, Adidas, Uniqlo, Victoria’s Secret, Coach and Michael Kors.

Absorbing the displaced

“[Welively] will now have the chance to hire all the displaced workers for the plants in Clark and Cabuyao,” Young said.

Young hopes that this positive development will allay concerns from overseas buyers that the garment sector will soon disappear.

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He also appealed to the government to ensure that its incentives scheme, particularly the provision of tax holidays for registered exporting companies, would be made clear for both local and foreign investors.

The Fobap official said some of their members were experiencing unwarranted audits from the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR), noting that some interactions were “bordering on extortion.”

“Our factory owners have told them that they are eligible for tax holidays. So why are these BIR officials persisting to bother us and [asking] us to pay back taxes?” he asked. INQ