MANILA, Philippines - The Strategic Investor Aftercare Program (SIAP) of the Board of Investments (BOI) leveled up its performance for the first nine months of 2010 as it increased its company visits by 20 percent.
As of the third quarter of 2010, the SIAP team was able to visit 91 companies, an increase from last year’s 61 firms.
A total of 70 BOI-related queries ranging from registration, incentives, supervision and technical assistance were resolved compared with the 58 queries last year. These assistance could easily translate to 34 investments leads, 28 of which are expansion projects, three modernization projects and three new projects. Compared to the same period last year, SIAP almost doubled its investment leads from 18 leads last year as against 34 this year.
The SIAP also received issues and concerns from clients involving other government agencies such as Bureau of Customs (BOC), Bureau of Immigration (BI), Bureau of Internal revenue (BIR), Department of Energy (DOE), Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), Local Government Units (LGUs), Land Transportation Office. Out of the 59 issues raised, 26 or 44 percent were resolved while those unresolved accounted for 56 percent. The BOC received the most number of issues and concerns.
SIAP’s performance for the first 10 months of 2010 is an improvement from the early part of 2007 when SIAP begun its implementation under the BOI One-Stop Action Center (OSAC) as an essential part of the Department of Trade and Industry’s (DTI) function to provide services to investors. It was fully institutionalized in June 2008 when the BOI underwent re-engineering to gear itself to be more promotional and the OSAC passed the baton to the newly organized Investments Aftercare Services Department (IASD) to fully handle the implementation of SIAP.
The SIAP was designed to ensure a smooth and sustained interface between the BOI and existing investors in availing of prompt and adequate services of the government.