Foreign businesses have asked National Economic Development Authority to recommend to President Duterte the certification as priority of four legislative reforms that they said would ease restrictions on foreign investments in the country.
In a letter dated June 16, 2020, the Joint Foreign Chambers (JFC) asked Secretary Karl Kendrick of the National Economic Development Authority to recommend to the President the inclusion in the legislative agenda of the four measures — amendments to the Foreign Investment Act, thePublic Services Act and the Retail Trade Act as well as the Open Access in Data Transmission bill — in his State of the Nation Address on July 26.
JFC said the address will provide a very important opportunity to highlight concrete reforms that prove the Philippines is serious at becoming one of the most attractive countries for foreign investment in the fast-growing Southeast Asian region.
“In the absence of amendments to the foreign equity restrictions in the Constitution, the above reforms would substantially demonstrate to the foreign investment community a Philippine commitment to structural reform in the country’s foreign investment regime,” the JFC said.
The Chambers lament that among 69 countries included in the OECD FDI Regulatory Restrictiveness
Index, the Philippines is rated last and most restrictive at 69th.
The business group said the enactment of these bills would relax the 11th Foreign Investment Negative List of 2018 which contained very limited “tweaks.” The list contains sectors where foreign investments are not allowed or are limited.
“With the world economy in depression this year, enactment of these reforms and
passage of the CREATE (Corporate Recovery and Tax Incentives for Enterprises Act)
will assuredly reinforce our efforts to revive foreign investor interest in the
Philippines,” JFC said.
These four bills failed to pass the Senate in the 17th Congress for lack of time.
