THE Contact Center Association of the Philippines (CCAP) is encouraging companies to take advantage of the government-backed Enterprise-Based Education and Training (Ebet) program, which has secured a substantial P740 million in government funding.
The invitation aims to boost skill development and workforce readiness within the business process management (BPM) and contact center sectors. This investment kicks off in the second half of 2025, aiming to equip thousands of Filipinos with digital and artificial intelligence skills, contributing to the goal of 340,000 scholars over three years.
“We are in the process of getting commitments (from companies),” said CCAP president Haidee Enriquez, during her recent visit to Cebu. “A lot of resources being currently deployed in the industry are for upskilling the current workforce.”
Of the P740 million pledge, the industry just received a P500 million upskilling funding from the government through Technical Education and Skills Development Authority. The IT & Business Process Association of the Philippines (Ibpap) on Monday, June 9, 2025, thanked the Department of Information and Communications Technology for the “swift and strategic implementation of the Ebet program.”
The Ibpap said the Ebet funding gives Filipino workers and enterprises “the opportunity to acquire essential digital and tech skills, unlocking doors to higher-value jobs, career growth and long-term competitiveness.”
Enriquez added that additional budget allocations will be set for 2026.
The upskilling programs are designed to primarily target digital skills. Enriquez also disclosed that the government support will also target new technologies that the sector is currently lacking or are not yet existent in the country to bolster productivity of industry workers.
“However, our sector’s advantage as a workforce is that we’ve been doing this (upskilling) for a long time now. While technology is there, we need the expertise in using it. Technology is only as good as the person using it. We are finding ways to make it easier for our agents to navigate the new technologies,” she said.
Mindset change
Enriquez also reiterated that technology adoption reminds a mindset change.
“This is where the battle begins: to make our employees understand that technology is not a threat. There is a path to using new technology to everybody’s advantage. We’ve been emphasizing, it is humans plus AI, instead of humans versus AI,” she said.
Moreover, Enriquez added that despite the changes in leadership, the government remains supportive of the IT-BPM industry. She described the government for being “receptive and agile.”
“We were having a completely different conversation three years ago. But now, the collaboration between the industry and the government is very important. We now have representation of the government within our sector, willing to listen, take action, and put support whenever we need backing,” Enriquez said.
Steady growth
Amid global challenges, Enriquez is confident that the local contact center and business process sector would remain on track to steadily grow annually and hit the US$49 billion annual revenue target by the year 2028.
In 2024, the sector generated a $31.6 billion yearly revenue, up by 7.1 percent from $29.5 billion in 2023. The figure came despite the renewed protectionism approach of U.S. President Donald Trump in November 2024.
Historically, President Trump is a major factor that disrupts and slows down growth of the entire Philippine IT-BPM industry. During his first term, the industry’s growth decelerated to 2.5 percent in 2017 and to 3.9 percent in 2018. Those were steep declines compared to the 12.3 percent growth posted in 2016, prior President Trump’s installation into office. / KOC