11 July 2014 - The Philippine Embassy in Beijing, in partnership with the China Overseas Investment Exchange Center (COI), held an investment forum entitled “Invest Philippines – Asia’s New Economic Tiger and China’s Partner Overseas” on June 26 at the Embassy’s social hall.

Fifty-eight (58) representatives of companies from the energy, technology, agriculture, trading, financial and export insurance, construction, legal services, media and entertainment, garments, mining, and cultural arts industries participated in the forum. This is the third investment forum that the Embassy has organized since the start of this year.

During her opening remarks, Philippine Ambassador to China Erlinda Basilio encouraged Chinese enterprises going overseas to take a closer look at the Philippines since its economy has been experiencing stellar growth in the recent years as a result of good governance, prudent fiscal management and business-friendly economic policies.

Ambassador Basilio shared experts’projection that the Philippines would continue to reap in the coming decades economic dividends arising from favorable demographics because of the positive impact of a growing and more productive labor force.

She encouraged Chinese enterprises to avail themselves of the large pool of labor talent in the Philippines, partly since the demographics in China has reached its inflection point which has resulted in higher wages.   

At the same time, Ambassador Basilio pointed out potential complementarities between the Philippine and Chinese economies, with the latter having world class industries and the latter having gained international recognition for the quality and professionalism of its services sector.

Therefore, Philippine enterprises are ideal partners to Chinese enterprises aspiring to be regional and global players.

COI Chief Executive Officer Zheng Shuai acknowledged the strong economic performance of the Philippines vis a vis the other economies in the region. He concurred with Ambassador Basilio on the need to further explore complementarities between Philippine and Chinese enterprises and encouraged the participants to have their respective companies send representatives to the Philippines to explore business prospects. END