Cyber-services corridor needs billions of pesos

The Philippines needs hundreds of billion of pesos to establish a cyber-services corridor in the next five years to decentralize development and create jobs outside Metro Manila, an official of the Commission on Information Communications and Technology (CICT).

On the sideline of the 31st Philippine Business Conference, Damian Domingo O. Mapa of the Strategic Business Dev’t Group of the Commission on Information and Technology said the country needs at least P210 billion to establish a cyber-services corridor.

Putting up an information communications technology-related company requires an investment of P5 million to P50 million.

Mapa said the Philippine cyber-service corridor (PCC) is a corridor that stretches 600 miles from Baguio in Luzon to Zamboanga in Mindanao.

He said the envisioned PCC would be home to thousands of cyber-service professionals who speak English, Japanese, Spanish, Chinese or Arabic, and who also provides services such as software development, business process outsourcing, customer care/contact, digital animation and visualization, medical transcription, engineering and design.

"It’s a five year program . . . this year alone, we are already looking at 14 cities to be part of the corridor or every year maybe we will add another 5 or 10. By 2010 maybe we have more than 50 cities in the corridor," Mapa said.

Potential revenues from ICT-related businesses could reach $26 billion by 2010.

From January to June this year the ICT sector generated 41,000 jobs. By 2010 total demand for ICT workers is expected to grow to about a million from 120,000 last year.

By 2010 the industry will absorb 230,000 new workers—more than 40 percent of the new entries into the workforce.

"This is a major demographic shift which will impact on other industries like banking, insurance, etcetera," the CICT said, adding that new job opportunities will encourage college students to shift to courses catering to this demand.

Darwin G. Amojelar