SUAREZ
Adouble-digit decrease in export sales from Central Visayas was possible in 2015, given that global demand continued to be weak and major export markets have been reeling from external headwinds as well.
Cebu exporters, however, remained “cautiously optimistic” for this year, although they remain wary of global developments that could adversely affect their sales performance this year.
“(There are) factors outside our control such as the refugee issue in the EU (European Union), slowdown in China, tension in the South China Sea and the presidential elections in the US,” Philexport Cebu chairman Apolinar “Allan” Suarez, Jr. told Cebu Daily News.
Central Visayas exports increased to $5.4 billion in 2014 from $3.9 billion in 2013.
Last year, however, export sales in the country stayed in negative territory except in March, when it increased by a measly 2.1 percent.
“My gut feel is that our export figures are bad for 2015, maybe a double-digit drop compared to 2014,” Suarez said.
Total Philippine exports last year went down by 5.6 percent to $58.648 billion from $62.102 billion in 2014.
Central Visayas contributed about $8 for every $100 that the Philippines earned in exports in 2014.
PREPARATIONS
Suarez said Philexport Cebu has been preparing its members for adverse global developments.
“We were ahead of everybody in preparing our members for economic downturns. However, industries under our umbrella are the SMEs (small and medium enterprises),” he said.
He said they have been conducting seminars on how to do business with the rest of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) Economic Community as well as with the European Economic Community.
The Philippines has been granted by the EU a Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) Plus status, which allows the duty-free export of more than 6,000 products.
“We started training our members in 2010 on market and product diversification resulting in the drafting of sector export marketing plans for our member associations,” he said.
The National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) earlier urged exporters to expand export market destinations and diversify products because global demand was expected to remain weak this year.
Japan, the biggest export market of the Philippines, contracted by 0.4 percent in the last quarter of 2015 because of weak consumer demand.
About 20 percent of Philippine exports in December last year went to Japan, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported earlier.
Other top export destinations were US, Hong Kong, China, Singapore, Germany, Korea, Thailand, Taiwan, and Malaysia.
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