The Fiscal Incentives Review Board (FIRB) has enjoined the Board of Investments (BOI) to finalize the Strategic Investment Priorities Plan (SIPP) by this month, the Department of Finance (DOF) said yesterday.
The SIPP will determine the priority industries, projects and activities that can be granted fiscal incentives by the government under the Corporate Recovery and Tax Incentives for Enterprises Act.
In the meeting of the cabinet-level interagency board on December 15, DOF Secretary and FIRB Chairman Carlos Dominguez emphasized that the release and publication of the SIPP will serve only as the first step in attracting potential investors.
“As I have said before, once the categories are identified, the next step is for each of the investment promotion agencies to identify the specific companies they want to invite, and then discuss with them what it would take for them to invest in the country,” Dominguez said.
The DOF said Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez, who co-chairs the FIRB, agreed with Dominguez.
He also emphasized that the current SIPP is effective but a transitional one, based on the 2020 Investment Priorities Plan of the BOI.
Thus, he directed the BOI to finalize the SIPP for presentation to the Board this month, considering that a number of industry studies and parameters have already been considered in the drafting.
Meanwhile, in a briefing last month, Dominguez said there may be a need to reorient export strategies amid the pandemic.
“COVID-19 heavily disrupted supply chains, causing sizeable decline in world trade during its peak. So we may have to reorient our export strategies towards crisis-proof industries,” Dominguez said.
“The SIPP must reflect this crisis-proofing direction. I don’t know exactly which products have to be redirected, but essentially, industry and government have to sit down and look at what the future is telling, what the future is emerging. So we may have to really change our strategies,” he added. – Angela Celis
