BAGUIO CITY – Some 50 businessmen from the different parts of Northern Luzon will be coming up to the city to actively participate in the upcoming 1st Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI) North Luzon Strategic Planning Workshop which will be held on 29-30 January 2015 at the Hotel Villa Rosal along Gen. Luna Road here.
Engr. Alfonso T. Lao, Area Vice President of PCCI North Luzon, said the gathering is aimed at crafting the blueprint for the business sector in order to widely promote the different areas in the north as potential investment haven for foreign and local investors wanting to expand their business operations outside Metro Manila.
The conference participants will include PCCI officers and board of directors from the different chamber chapters in Regions I, II, III and the Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR).
“Areas in North Luzon have bright potentials of economic growth, thus, we want to maximize the potentials of these areas to be fully developed through the influx of investors. It will be our humble contribution in spurring the economic growth of our own regions,” Lao stressed.
He pointed out among the issues and concerns to be discussed by the participating businessmen include the current business climate in their respective areas, the existing local policies on business, incentives being provided by local governments to prospective investors, convenience of travel to such localities, promotional and attractive programs to entice businessmen to invest in a certain area among other business-related issues.
According to him, North Luzon can significantly contribute in the country’s economic growth with the expected influx of potential investments in transportation, ecotourism, agriculture, housing, goods and services, real estate because of the luxury of land area that could be utilized for productive purposes and would translate to generating jobs, increasing economic activities and providing adequate sources of livelihood in the countryside.
Dr. Rhodora A. Ngolob, incoming president of the PCCI Baguio-Benguet chapter and Dean of the University of the Cordilleras (UC) College of Business Administration, said local businessmen, especially those in the academe, are eager to welcome the delegates from the different parts of North Luzon so that they will be able to exchange notes on their best practices that keeps the businesses in their respective areas expanding.
“We want to learn from the experiences of our fellow PCCI officers in other regions so that we will be able to help in aiding local governments craft business-friendly policies and provide investors with attractive incentives that will sustain our economic gains,” Ngolob said.
She explained she wants to impart to the participating businessmen from other regions the importance of having the academe, business and the government work in synergy in order to make the business climate in their respective places palatable to the taste of investors and would be the key to a robust economic growth beneficial to the present and future generations.
As a new PCCI official, she said she will try to work on existing programs and projects of the local chapter and will try to infuse new strategies, especially in terms of trainings and seminars that are the expertise of the academe, in order to provide the business sector with advanced and continuous learning for the benefit of their own businesses.