The Philippine Economic Zone Authority (PEZA) has registered a total of P4.036 trillion in investments, generated $933.835 billion in exports, and created 1,782,913 jobs since its inception in 1995.
PEZA Director General Charito B. Plaza reported during its 27TH foundation anniversary on Thursday, Feb. 24, that for the past 27 years, the agency has registered various economic zones on top of the government-owned economic zones and hosting export-oriented manufacturing operations.
From 16 ecozones in 1995, PEZA now has 415 Special Economic Zones (SEZ) managing 4,665 locator companies.
From the time of Plaza’s appointment as PEZA Director General in September 2016, PEZA accumulated a total of P807.831 billion investments with 88 special economic zones proclaimed under the administration of President Rodrigo Roa Duterte (PRRD).
In 2021 alone, PEZA attained a 14.016 percent increase in exports of $63.061 billion from $55.309 billion in 2020 as well as gaining a 13.908 percent increase in employment from more than 1.5 million workers in 2020 to more than 1.7 million current jobs in PEZA-registered ecozones nationwide.
While the pandemic has put our country and the rest of the world to a pause, the PEZA chief said, “PEZA together with the national government, locators, foreign chambers, and partner investors have become more resilient, more innovative, and more flexible in this ‘new normal.”
“On the part of PEZA, as we relentlessly pursue to attract more foreign direct investments to the Philippines, we are also continuously implementing our balancing acts to protect and maintain the jobs of millions of Filipino workers,” added Plaza.
PEZA has also launched its strategic Transformation Road Map (TRM) as a blueprint of furthering its journey and its mission. The TRM has also identified new types of special ecozones to revolutionize the kinds of industries registrable under PEZA.
Some of the new models include the Agro-Forestry Ecozone, Aquamarine Park, Defense Industrial Complex, Halal Hub, Island City Ecozone and KIST Park (Knowledge, Innovation, Science and Technology Park) among others.
In partnership with the National Mapping and Resource Information Agency, PEZA has created a Philippine Economic Zones Map featuring geographic locations of various types of the declared, prospective and candidate reservation sites for special ecozone development.
During the pandemic, Plaza also spearheaded the PEZA Global Biz Forum with the support of Philippine diplomatic, consular and trade missions to foreign states, with the cooperation of the foreign diplomatic, consular and trade missionaries and attaches in the country and chambers of commerce and industries for the conduct of periodic international investment and business forum.
PEZA has also rolled out its PEZA Electronic Payment and Collection System (EPCS). The digitization and digitalization of its Management Information System and its Ecozone Security Monitoring and Control System are two of the priority projects of PEZA.
In addition, PEZA now issues a 2-year visa for foreign investors and workers.