SUBIC BAY FREEPORT – Sound economic fundamentals, as well as decisive Covid-19 management, allowed this premier free port to dodge the hard impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and also gain some measure of growth last year, the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) said on Thursday.
SBMA Chairman and Administrator Wilma T. Eisma, in her State of the Freeport Address (SOFA), reported continuing growth in the Subic Bay Freeport Zone in 2020, including P3.2 billion in operating revenue, 69 new investments and expansion projects worth a total of P1.55 billion, and exports of $1.03 billion.
Eisma said “Subic survived for the most part” because of its strong economic performance in 2019 and the previous years, as well as SBMA’s strict adherence to government health protocols.
The SOFA presentation, an annual project of the Subic Bay Freeport Chamber of Commerce (SBFCC), was held virtually this year and broadcast over social media—the first time in 14 years of the group’s existence.
In her message, Eisma said the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic “did not completely erode the solid business foundation we built over the years.”
“Our sound policies gave us the toughness to weather the storm, while proactive measures to fight Covid-19 gave us the resilience to be able to bounce back after some beatings,” the SBMA chief asserted.
Eisma then proudly ticked off positive figures recorded by SBMA last year. These included P3.2 billion in operating revenue and P1.51 billion in operating expense; P9.2 billion in cash and investments; P6.3 billion in other assets; P30.73 million in contribution to the National Treasury; P278 million in remittances to local government units (LGU’s); P131 million in income tax remittance; and P990 million in dividends.
She also noted that the Port of Subic still recorded stellar numbers with $1.03 billion in exports and $1.12 billion in imports after posting 226,000 twenty-footer equivalent units (TEUs) of containerized cargo volume and 7.09 million metric tons of non-containerized cargo last year.
With these, the Port of Subic generated a total of $1.2 billion in revenues last year, while the Subic Bay International Airport earned a total of P62.9 million, Eisma said.
Meanwhile, even as access to Subic was somewhat restricted by lockdowns, the Freeport’s tourism sector still recorded 5.19 million in visitor arrivals and .29 million in tourist arrivals last year. These generated P8.48 million in actual tourism receipts for the SBMA.
“And even as a lot of sectors were ravaged by the economic downturn, the Subic Bay Freeport welcomed a total of 69 new investment projects,” Eisma also reported during the SOFA.
She said the new projects mostly in the fields of construction, health and wellness, logistics, and information and communication technology yielded total committed investments of P1.39 billion and 682 new jobs.
On the other hand, existing Subic locator-firms implemented a total of 11 expansion projects in construction, leisure, real estate, logistics, and petroleum trading. These generated a total of P163 million in new investments, as well as 264 additional employment in 2020.
Eisma added that despite job losses when some firms closed or cut back manpower during the pandemic, the new projects, particularly in manufacturing, still brought the total Subic Freeport workforce to 138,966 workers, the highest level since Subic Freeport was established in 1992.
“Our experience in the past months of the Covid-19 pandemic tells us that it really pays to keep safe, and that there’s a reason for following rules—not only for our personal physical health, not only for the protection of our loved ones and our community, but also for economic reasons,” Eisma also pointed out in her message to business locators.
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