Peza to deliver P250-B minimum investment target this year
With two weeks left in 2025, the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (Peza) is counting on last-minute investment applications to meet its full-year target of P250 billion.
Peza Director General Tereso Panga said the goal was still within reach as approvals had climbed to P238 billion after a Dec. 12 meeting, leaving the agency just P12 billion short of its lower-end target.
With the new approvals, Peza has also topped the full-year total in 2024 of P214.18 billion.
Panga said the final investment tally would come after Peza’s Dec. 22 board meeting, its last for 2025, where the agency was expected to consider at least four more projects.
These include big-ticket investments and new ventures in the manufacturing and development sectors. One project is from the United States, while some are from Japan.
While acknowledging the political headwinds that weigh on investor sentiment, Panga said Peza remained focused on achieving a steady upward trend in approvals.
“These investors are investing in the future more than the present. That means they have huge trust and confidence in the current leadership, and that eventually we will surpass all these troubles besetting us now,” he told reporters on Monday.
Peza has not ruled out reaching its higher-end target of P300 billion this year, but Panga said the agency would “for sure” hit that level in 2026.
Return to ‘heydays’
Reaching P300 billion would mark a return to Peza’s “heydays,” which peaked in 2011 when approvals reached P319 billion.
“It is our aspiration that, if not this year, we will breach the P300-billion mark by 2026—bringing us back to the heydays of Peza when we were approving an average of P290 billion in annual investments during the 2011 to 2015 period,” Panga told attendees of Peza Investors’ Recognition Night 2025.
Panga also expressed optimism about the ecozone industry, which has recorded 35 new and expanded ecozones since 2022.
More ecozones are in the pipeline, particularly in the Bicol Region and in Palawan, he said.
“Peza has not only recovered from the downward spiral in ecozone investments recorded from 2016 to 2021 but has also achieved its highest investment approvals in the past seven years,” Panga said.
Peza, which marked its 30th anniversary this year, has generated over P4.5 trillion in cumulative investments. It has created more than 1.81 million direct and quality jobs and contributed more than $1.12 trillion in export receipts since its establishment in 1995.
