President Marcos is hoping that a conglomerate company in the Philippines would continue to contribute to employment which will eventually enrich the country's economy.
Marcos stated this as he led the inauguration of the expanded Petrochemicals Manufacturing Complex of JG Summit Olefins Corporation (JGSOC), the country’s leading petrochemical company and the largest polyolefin manufacturer in the Philippines.
"What it produces ends up in the packaging of the food we eat, in the clothes we wear, in the appliances in our homes, in that cars we drive, and in the electronic gadgets that we use to chronicle our daily lives," Marcos said in his speech at the event held in Batangas on Friday, Jan. 19.
The President said it is an "upstream industry that feeds many enterprises and supplies many other manufacturing concerns."
"It is among the lynchpins of our industrialization, a vital link in moving up the value chain, and guarantees the supply of a critical production ingredient," he further said.
"It is directly and indirectly employing 6,200 individuals. You are a major contributor to an industry that is forecasted to enrich our economy by 215 billion pesos next year," he added.
In his speech, the Chief Executive affirmed the country's economic team will continue to create a climate that propels economic growth, boosts incentives, promotes ease of doing business, and funds high-impact infrastructure.
He reiterated that the bottom line of their assigned mission is to reduce red tape "that chokes industry and innovation" and replace it with "a red carpet" that ushers in capital, foreign and domestic, and provides the path towards progress.
It is my firm belief that the government should not be a yoke on the back of business, like taxing them heavily, and tightly regulating their growth, making the ease of doing business a sticking point for possible investors.
"This complex is more than an engineering marvel but is one imbued with a national mission" he said referring to the expanded petrochemicals manufacturing complex of the JG Summit.
"It is a key plank in the manufacturing renaissance that will revitalize domestic industry and scale up competitiveness– as what our Philippine Development Plan envisions," he added.
JGSOC operates the only facility in the Philippines that processes naphtha into ethylene and propylene, key ingredients used for the production of common plastics.
In 2023, JGSOC commenced commercial operations of its $1.3 billion expansion project, which boosted the overall site capacity to over one million metric tons of petrochemical products annually.