P25.4B investments poured in Cebu from January to June 2016

Aerial view of the Mactan-Cebu International Airport.
(Source: GMR-Megawide Cebu Airport Corp. website).

Investments in Cebu for the first half of this year has reached P25.4 billion, already close to exceeding the total for the whole of 2015, despite a marked reduction in mass housing projects.

The Bureau of Investments (BOI) reported that while the number and total cost of housing projects in the third quarter of 2016 is less compared to that of the same period in 2015, investments in Cebu from January to June 2016 were only some P200 million shy of the P25.6 billion in total investments in 2015.

The bulk of the P25.4-billion investments was attributed to the P16.8-billion transportation and storage project of GMR-Megawide Cebu Airport Corp., the private operator of the Mactan-Cebu International Airport, explained BOI-Cebu officer in charge Ellorence Cruz told Cebu Daily News in a phone interview.

“Not only did this project have the biggest cost, it also has the biggest impact since it is related to addressing transportation and mobility,” she added.

Manufacturing, agribusiness and fishery, services, economic and low-cost housing, hospital, energy, public infrastructure and logistics and public-private partnership projects are the eight preferred investment activities listed in the BOI’s Investments Priorities Plan 2014–2016.

The BOI, an attached office of the Department of Trade and Industry, is the government’s main investment arm that registers projects qualified for fiscal and non-fiscal incentives such as tax holidays, duty-free importation of capital equipment, and employment of foreign nationals, among others.

Less housing projects were meanwhile registered by BOI in Cebu for the third quarter of 2016 compared to the same period last year.

According to data obtained by CDN, BOI-Cebu logged a total of three mass housing projects, all by Cebu Landmasters Inc. (CLI), worth P1.39 billion from July to September this year.

In 2015, there were seven projects worth P5.3 billion that were registered with the BOI office over the same period.

“If the projects registered during the two compared periods are both in mass housing, there’s not much of an implication,” Cruz told CDN.

CLI’s projects registered with the BOI this year include the P555.8-million Casa Mira Towers 1 & 2 and the P257-million expansion of Mivesa Garden Residences, both in Cebu City, and the P574-million Casa Mira Subdivision in the town of Minglanilla in northern Cebu.

Together, these projects would generate 582 jobs.

For the fourth quarter of 2016, BOI-Cebu has so far registered two mass housing projects worth P1.13 billion by 8990 Housing Dev’t Corp. in the cities of Cebu and Talisay.

Cruz believed mass housing would still dominate the type of projects to be registered with the BOI this year especially with the thrust of the government to cut down on housing backlog.

According to the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council, the country faces a 5.5-million housing backlog by end-2016, 1.9 million of which are in the Visayas area alone.

“It’s good that the need for housing is really being addressed, and Cebu is performing quite well,” said Cruz.