Banatao: Displacement of BPO jobs inevitable

CEBU, Philippines - Filipino tech innovator Diosdado Banatao said the foreseen displacement of a large number of workers in the business process outsourcing (BPO) sector is "inevitable," raising the need for the workforce to be retrained.

In a recent interview in Manila, Banatao said the projected displacement can also enable the country to triple its BPO revenues, that if the country "does it right."

 "It's going to come. It's inevitable," he said.

Banatao shared they were able to displace agents in the US, something the Philippines can also do.

"Because we don’t want to get attacked by outside countries with same expertise. We would rather have Filipinos do that displacement because it is inevitable," he said.

But he explained that there has to be IA (information architecture) to help AI prosper, which will help generate data science-related jobs for those who will be displaced.

He said: "All that means is that there has to be an organization of data. The meaning of data is very important. Data science will help address those things to help AI."

Banatao believes there will be jobs AI will generate and that data science is very critical in this aspect.

In the same interview, Asian Institute of Management (AIM) President and Dean Jikyeong Kang echoed Banatao's statement.

"Yes there will be plenty of jobs that will disappear but then there will be new kind of jobs that will be created,” she said.

She said AIM as an educational institution would also have to adapt to the changing needs in the industry "so we will not be looking at a time when the BPO industry is no longer viable in this country."

She said there's a need to provide these people with new skill sets to enable them to bring the industry to the next level.

Banatao said BPO workers need to be retrained, citing that in most cases, they will have to take at least first two years of engineering that covers the "plain and simple calculus and statistics" as they go to more higher-level data science.

The IT-BPO industry in the Philippines expects to hit $40 billion in annual revenues by 2022 and achieve its employment target of 1.8 million people by that time.

The industry remains one of the biggest job suppliers in the country today. (FREEMAN)