President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr.'s foreign trips this year yielded $23.6 billion of investment pledges, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) said.
According to DTI’s year-end report, Marcos’ visits to Indonesia, Singapore, the United States, Cambodia, and Thailand brought billions of pesos in investments as the administration gears toward aggressively attracting more foreign businesses to come to the Philippines.
The trade department also included in its report the recent government export registered and generated investment leads, particularly with the DTI Board of Investments (BOI).
The DTI’s performance report said the BOI and the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (PEZA) had a combined approved investment of P402 billion, which could generate some 54,217 local jobs.
Under the Corporate Recovery and Tax Incentives for Enterprises (CREATE) Act, the BOI’s approved projects as of August this year stand at P46.7 billion, with the investment board also assisting 1,994 investors wanting to do business in the country.
The BOI also generated 90 foreign investment leads with an estimated value of P204.9 billion which could entail 98,393 local jobs.
With the administration's active export recovery efforts, the DTI reported $17.7 billion worth of exports in services, up by 13.5 percent from the previous record.
The country also posted $58.3 billion exports in goods, which grew by 4.7 percent.
The DTI said it assisted 3,922 exporters.
The department indicated that the country’s investment and exports are expected to rebound next year as a result of the passage of the Public Service Act (PSA) and CREATE Act.
The President recently made a trip to Belgium to participate in the Association of Southeast Asian Nation-European Union (ASEAN-EU). He will start the year next year with a visit to China.