AS OF the third quarter of 2019, a total of P4.18 billion worth of investments have entered Davao Region.

Based on the annual preliminary report for 2019 of the Department of Trade and Industry in Davao Region (DTI-Davao), the investments are composed of 12 big-ticket projects registered to the Bureau of Investment in Davao Region (BOI-Davao) as of until October 2019.

The largest projects are in the real estate industry accounted for P1.7 billion, followed by the manufacturing at P1.5 billion; water supply, sewage, and water management at P586.52 million; transportation and storage at P201.61 million; and agriculture, forestry and fishing at P57.43 million.

DTI-Davao regional director Maria Belenda Ambi emphasized these projects are only those approved by the BOI.

“These are all BOI registered companies. There are still investments nga channeled through the local government units (LGUs), so we are not accounting for those,” she said in a press conference, Thursday, December 12.

She said most of the projects are in Davao del Norte getting 31 percent of the total investments. Davao City got 31 percent and Davao del Sur with 12 percent. The remaining went to the other provinces in the region.

The data also showed that these investments will generate 2,526 jobs.

In a previous report, BOI listed two projects in the region for the third quarter of 2019 which are the expansion of the low-cost housing of Filinvest Land’s Spatial Davao and the live broiler production of the Bangy Agri Ventures Corporation in Davao del Norte with a project cost of P270 million.

In 2018, registered investments in the region reached P17.2 million.

BOI-Davao chief investment specialist Gil Dureza clarified in a phone interview with SunStar Davao that the data are based on the date of registration of companies since each project has varying dates of completion. (RAG)