MANILA: Mindanao will play a vital role in achieving the Export Development Council (EDC) target of over $100 billion in total exports by 2017 under the Philippine Export Development Plan (PEDP) 2015-2017 as most of the key and emerging export products are produced on the island, an official said.
Senen M. Perlada, director of Department of Trade and Industry (DTI)-Export Marketing Bureau in an interview at the sidelines of the Regionalization Forum on PEDP 2015-2017 Tuesday, said Mindanao is among the big contributor of the country’s export performance next to National Capital Region and Cebu (Central Visayas).
The forum was led by European Union-funded Trade Related Technical Assistance (Tria) Project 3 at the Microtel Hotel in Lanang, Davao City.
“Mindanao is a strong export contributor because almost all of the 10 identified key and emerging export products are sourced in Mindanao most especially agri-based products,” he said.
These key products are fresh and processed food and beverages, electronics, coconut oil, Business Process Management and other business services, motor vehicle parts and computer information services.
While the emerging export products are chemicals, activated carbon, fresh and preserved fish and metal components. The key and emerging products are based on the size of the export, employment contribution, its growth and potential and competitive positive factor.
According to PEDP data, Philippines’ export performance last year declined by -0.9 percent as compared to 2014 data. For 2015, export was down to US$86.8 billion as against US$87.5 billion in 2014.
The decline is attributed to the weak China demand on Philippine products. However, Perlada cited that the services sector pulled up the performance of the country’s total export.
“We target to increase the export performance by 8 to 9 percent,” Perlada said.
Perlada emphasized that they are laying down the comprehensive three-year plan to boost the country’s exports with interventions and strategies to every region “to enable each players to be on the same page with all the elements, components and programs of the plan.”
Ferdinand Y. Marañon, Philippine Exporters Confederation Inc. (Philexport)-Davao president in a separate interview told reporters that to fully improve the country’s export performance he underscored that we should focused on the champion products such as agri-based banana and pineapple products.
The US and Europe are cited as the only export market which did not posted any decline while countries like Thailand, Japan and China, among others posted a decrease in importation from Philippines.
Meanwhile, some 200 export stakeholders, government officials participated yesterday’s forum.
Among the deterrents to export growth, said Perlada, are the concentration of revenues in fewer goods and markets, slow or declining demand for local exports globally, reduced competitiveness of exports, and fewer exports where the Philippines has both comparative and competitive advantage.
