Foreign investment pledges jump four-fold in Q3 — PSA

MANILA, Philippines — Foreign investment pledges jumped four-fold to P182.4 billion in the third quarter of the year, driven by commitments in the information and communications technology (ICT) industry, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported yesterday.

Commitments cleared by the country’s seven investment promotion agencies (IPAs) increased from P42.6 billion in the third quarter of 2018.

The projects were lodged at the Board of Investments, Clark Development Corp., Philippine Economic Zone Authority (PEZA), and Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority, Authority of the Freeport Area of Bataan, BOI-Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao and Cagayan Economic Zone Authority.

“The growth in investment pledges were mainly driven by investments in the information and communication industry, which grew to P134.6 billion in the third quarter,” the PSA said.

Most of the investment commitments during the third quarter were made by companies from Singapore, South Korea and Japan.

Singapore committed P135.0 billion or 74.0 percent share of the total investments during the quarter. South Korea and Japan pledged P34.3 billion and P3.9 billion, or 18.8 percent and 2.1 percent  of the total approved commitments, respectively.

Investments of foreign and Filipino investors approved by the seven IPAs for the third quarter of 2019 are expected to generate 50,575 jobs.

Out of these anticipated jobs, 54.3 percent would come from projects with foreign interest.