PEZA at 8

The Philippine Economic Zone Authority (PEZA) turned eight years old Wednesday, and at the celebratory dinner program, Director General Lilia B. de Lima gave a rundown on the gains made in the zone. She said by way of starters that the impetus for the zone’s growth started with President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s "vision of a country rid of poverty". Among others, she was the principal author of the Senate Bill that later became R.A. No. 7916, otherwise known as The Special Economic Zone Act of 1995 by President Fidel V. Ramos.

In her performance report, Ms. De Lima said that the PEZA echoes President Arroyo’s "rallying cry for jobs and livelihood for every Filipino", and is committed to respond to the President’s challenge to create one million jobs annually. The PEZA, she said, has from last year’s figures, shown a 19.655 percent increase in employment, and that the first quarter exports from the PEZA economic zones likewise show an encouraging increase of 9.268 over last year.

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The cumulative economic zone investments from 1987 to 1994, the last eight years of EPZA (Economic Processing Zone Authority), PEZA’s predecessor, was registered at P22.2 billion. During the first eight years of PEZA’s operations, however, from 1995 to 2002, economic zone investments soared to a total P806.3 billion, or 36 times the cumulative level of the last eight years preceding the creation of the authority.

As of last year, the country had 87 proclaimed economic zones, 56 of them locator enterprises operating inside them. What have been added to these are 72 more to the four public and 12 private economic zones existing at the end of 1994.

Included among the proclaimed and operating economic zones are 11 IT parks and buildings which are now hosting a rapidly increasing number of IT enterprises.

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Ms. De Lima reported that from January to April this year, the PEZA Board approved 67 export companies with total investments of P6.44 billion. This is 28.2 percent greater than investments of P5.005 billion of 65 locator enterprises approved during the first four months in 2002.

Economic zone enterprises, as of end of 2002, employed a total of 820,960 direct and indirect employees, or 112,303 more than the number as of the end of 2001’s 708,657.

Under the leadership of Trade and Industry Secretary Mar Roxas, the contribution of economic zone export producers to the total manufactured export revenues increased from 68 percent in 2001 to 72 percent in 2002. Said Ms. De Lima: "The demonstrated resiliency of economic zone export-producers confirms that government support for the development and operation of economic zones has, indeed, been yielding the desired socio-economic returns."

Three major reforms have helped in the growth of the Authority industries. One is the Automated Import Cargo Transfer System to semiconductor and electronic zone enterprises in economic zones in Luzon, Cebu, and Mactan. Another is the implementation of the Automated export Documentation System in four economic zones, which significantly reduces the processing time and reduces the cost of import and export documentation and clearing procedures and render transactions completely transparent, and with greater accountability for all parties concerned.

The third, with the cooperation of the Bureau of Internal Revenue, the pilot implementation of the E-Substituted Filing system, which involved the electronic submission of the Alphalist of the employees of the enterprises, thereby eliminating the need for their workers to file individual income tax returns.

Finally, the establishments of the PEZA-Customs Documentation Unit at the Port of Batangas has provided one-stop-shop facilitation services for import shipments landed at the Port of Batangas and Bauan International Port.

Indeed, if PEZA, at its eighth year, has yielded significant gains, Ms. De Lima has to be congratulated. Someone has said Ms. De Lima allows no hanky-panky, no corruption at PEZA. Congratulations, Ms. De Lima.

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Zorayda Amelia C. Alonzo, chairperson and CEO of the Small Business Guarantee and Finance Corporation, will lead the panelists in the third "Something’s Brewing" kapihan-cum-roundtable discussion sponsored by the Women’s Business Council Philippines on May 8 at the Wack Wack Golf and Country Club. The topic of the kapihan will be "SME Unified Lending Opportunities for National Growth". Other panelists will be Vitaliano Nanagas, chairperson, Development Bank of the Philippines; Gary B. Teves, president and CEO, Land Bank of the Philippines, and Andy Ferreria, dean, Asian Institute for Entrepreneurship, Asian Institute of Management.

Topic of the kapihan was decided upon in recognition of SME being a vital engine of the Philippine economy as they constitute 99.6 percent of total firms, employ 69.9 percent of the labor force, and contribute 32 1/2 percent of value-added to the economy.

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On another front, the National Commission on the Role of Filipino Women (NCRFW) is conducting a national summit on local chief executives and legislators May 13-15 at the Manila Pavilion Hotel (formerly Holiday Inn). The summit is co-sponsored by the UNESCAP, UNDP, and CIDA as well as by the Lady Local Legislators League and the Lady Municipal Mayors League of the Philippines.

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