Chamber of commerce votes Iloilo Philippines’ most business-friendly city
Iloilo has been recognized as the Philippines’ most business-friendly, highly-urbanized city outside the Metro Manila region by the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI). Welcoming the accolade, Jerry Treñas, the city’s mayor, said the award would only serve to further boost the confidence of local investors, with Iloilo’s business-friendly environment already apparent from its many active and vibrant public-private partnership arrangements that have delivered huge progress in the case of several priority programs and projects. Treñas also highlighted the fact that the city had already welcomed a considerable number of business process outsourcing firms, with the municipal government keen to open up further tranches of industrial and mixed-use land for prospective and relocating businesses.
Endorsement for the city has also come from the country’s Department of Tourism, which singled it out as a prime destination for the meetings, incentive travels, conventions and exhibitions (MICE) industry, with the city hall also now boasting a dedicated MICE Center. To date, investors in the city include the SM Group, which is committed to constructing an SMX Convention Center, scheduled to open in 2021, and the Gaisano Capital Group, which has signed a deal to construct the five-floor Iloilo City Action and Response Command Center. In addition, the Megaworld Corporation, the Taguig City-headquartered property developer, has granted the city PHP8 million in resiliency undertaking funding.
