Investment commitments hit P151.55 billion in January-April

Manila, Philippines -  Total investment commitments with the Board of Investments (BOI) in the first four months of the year has reached P151.55 billion, up 2.43 percent from P147.96 billion from January to April last year.

The 158 projects approved for the first four months are expected to create 22,114 new jobs once fully operational.

From January to April 2012, Region 3 was top investment destination with approved projects amounting to P56.80 billion, followed by Region 4, P46.50 billion; National Capital Region (NCR), P20.32 billion; Region 6, P16.37 billion; Region 11, P2.87 billion; and Region 7, P2.19 billion.

From January to April, key investments in the following sectors were made: electricity, gas, steam, and air conditioning sector reached P84.25 billion; real estate, P20.63 billion; mining and quarrying, P14.59 billion; accommodation and food service activities, P6.96 billion; manufacturing, P5.31 billion; and water supply and sewerage/waste management, P4.34 billion.

 “We see rising investor interest in strategic sectors such as agribusiness, manufacturing, and tourism,” said Trade Undersecretary and BOI Managing head Adrian Cristobal Jr.

 “Domestic investors’ confidence in the economy continues to rise, and the same goes for foreign investors for the past four months,” he added.

For April 2012 alone, total investment commitments reached P133.18 billion, up 254.59 percent from P37.56 billion in April last year.

“The increase in April approvals was driven by two big-ticket items and the implementation of a streamlined investment approval process the BOI pilot-tested last month,” said Cristobal.

Two key power projects were approved by the BOI in April amounting to P71.23 billion. These were the Masinloc Power Partners Co. (P49.45 billion) and the Southwest Luzon Power Generation Corp. (P21.78 billion).

Investment projects from domestic investors approved for April grew 297.14 percent amounting to P126.72 billion from P31.909 billion during the same month last year.

Approved projects from foreign sources in April grew 14.32 percent to P6.457 billion from P5.649 billion in April last year.

From January to April, approvals grew by 26 percent to P10.191 billion from P8.084 billion in the same period last year. Notable growth in investments came from ASEAN with Thailand as the biggest foreign investor for January to April accounting for P3.62 billion investments approved. This was followed by Japan as the fastest growing investor-country at P1.02 billion.

Meanwhile, BOI is pilot-testing a more business-friendly investment application process on agribusiness, mass housing, and tourism projects.

 “We have received feedback that document requirements were too stringent and time-consuming for investors. We are anticipating that the BOI’s streamlined process will encourage more investors to set up shop or expand in the country,” said Cristobal.

Fifty-one of the 86 approved projects for April, amounting to P21.81 billion used the new form.

Results of the pilot-testing on the three sectors will determine if the streamlined process can be applied to the rest of the sectors under the Investments Priorities Plan (IPP), the county’s blueprint for investment promotions. BOI data show that as of May 9, there are about 83 more project applications in the pipeline, amounting to some P114 billion.

The streamlined process has reduced the number of items in the investment application form as well as the number of pages of the project evaluation report. Processing time or turn-around time is expected to be trimmed down from 20 days to five days.