DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 1 Dec) – This city lacks international grade warehousing facilities to house the supply of goods for the consumption industry to take advantage of Davao’s strategic location, being the transit point in Mindanao to other countries in Asia.
During the Asia CEO Forum at the Marco Polo Hotel Davao on Tuesday, Claro Cordero Jr., head of the research, consulting, and valuation of the Jones Lang LaSalle Philippines, Inc., told reporters that the presence of such facilities will further the growth of the local economy.
“What limits the investors is lack of supply. Majority of those who will come are not heavy (manufacturing) but the logistics and warehouse,” he said.
Cordero said there’s a market for international grade warehouses, considering that Davao is a high-evolving city and companies will need more of those for safekeeping of their goods.
“More companies are coming here. Those are the infrastructures that we should be looking at,” he said.
The executive also mentioned about the city’s advantage in the upcoming Asean Economic Community (AEC), discussing that for the local economy to catch up with the possible influx of workforce, it has to improve the number of houses and other infrastructures to catch up with the growing demand.
In his presentation, Cordero said the city has reached around 191,600 square meters of existing office supply, but an additional of 57,400 sq. m. is expected between the last quarter of 2015 and 2017, with the construction of new infrastructures.
He added that the peace and order situation in the city is attractive to the new investors that makes Davao an ideal area for the expansion plans of foreign and national investors outside of Metro Manila next to Cebu City.
Cordero added that putting up more business process outsourcing (BPO) spaces in the city will also help drive the growth, as the city has been “very much in the radar of the investors” being the repository of the big BPO companies expanding their operations outside of Manila.
From the financial crisis in 1997 until 2003, he said the Philippines, particularly Manila, recovered because of the BPO investors who filled in the vacant office spaces since 2004.
