Davao City needs more PEZA-accredited areas

To accommodate the growing number of job opportunities in the business process outsourcing (BPO) industry, ICT players in the city are urging both local and national governments to help in opening more Philippine Economic Zone Authority- Accredited IT facilities.
ICT Davao president Lizabel Holganza told the media during the Club 888 Forum that there are only three PEZA-accredited sites in Davao . This is the reason why BPO companies could not go full blast in hiring manpower to work here.
Holganza said that there are about 6,000 IT-related jobs in the city at the moment. More jobs could have been offered to match Davao ’s excellent workforce, but BPO companies find it difficult to find ready sites for location.
Before establishing an IT park, it has to go through an accreditation through PEZA that ensures the readiness and capability of the site to function as an ecozone IT enterprise.
“There are already companies that had wanted to establish location here. Unfortunately, we usually end up having problems in having them accredited which is why those companies decided to move to another city instead.”, Holganza explained.
The ICT industry in Davao targets to offer at least 30,000 IT-related jobs by 2015. Davao boasts to have the largest talent pool among all of the Philippines’ Nest Wave Cities with more than half of the city’s population under the 17-24 age groups in college education.
It is also host to more than 40 colleges and universities producing graduates between 12,000 to 15,000 each year in the field of ICT.
“There are still so many talents in the city that the industry could accommodate. We just need to position ourselves for more ICT opportunities to come in.”, she added.
Presently, there are now 60 IT-BPO companies offering both voice and non-voice services. Most of these companies are third party service providers. Some of the large BPO operators are Call Box, Concentrix, Cyber City , Sutherland, and Western Wats.
In terms of infrastructure, the city matches top-ranked Next Wave City Metro Laguna and it has more to offer than second and third-ranked Metro Cavite and Iloilo City.