P 15.00 • 20 PAGES
EDGEDAVAO
VOL. 6 ISSUE 126 • SUNDAY - MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 8-9, 2013
www.edgedavao.net
Serving a seamless society
There’s no resting and no reaching the tip of the curve yet By NEILWIN JOSEPH L. BRAVO njb@edgedavao.net
T
HERE’S construction going on everywhere and it looks like the trend is not about to come to rest.
Morris Agoncillo, chairman of the country’s biggest construction show dubbed as Philconstruct, believes the huge construction boom sweeping the entire country has been going on for ten years—unprecedented in the history of the Philippine construction industry—and yes, he does not see it having reached the top of the curve. “It’s been ten years and going strong. We cannot say if this is going to stop anytime soon because we are hoping this goes on,” said Agoncillo during the opening of the Philconstruct Mindanao at the SMX Convention Center in Davao City. Engr. Ramon Allado, the organizing chair of Philconstruct Mindanao, echoed Agoncillo’s observations.
“You look around and there’s construction, big and small, going on. And this is true to both private and government projects,” said Allado. Allado thinks the uptrend could still go up in the next two or three years. “We are not yet in the tip of the curve.” Allado said 32 percent of the country’s GDP growth is attributed to construction with its chief market belonging to the rich P17 billion Overseas Filipino Workers annual remittances. According to Allado, the main target of property development is the OFW market which usually invests hard-earned money on real property. Allado said Davao City alone has around 10,000 OFWs contributing to a chunk of that P17B annual remittances. “There is good market for property development and that explain why there’s construction everywhere,” he said. Mindanao Business Council president Vicente Lao also shared the observations
FCONSTRUCTION,10
CONSTRUCTION BOOM ENGR. RAMON ALLADO, Philconstruct Mindanao 2013 organizing chair
Photos by LEAN DAVAL JR.