Exploring Philippines from various angles
– Pradeep Naik
Mr. pradeep Naik has more than 30 yrs of professional experience in international companies.
Presently based in Philippines in export import advisers role.
How would you define Phillippines based on social, cultural, political and economic diemensions ?
Philippines is a developing country with unlimited business opportunities. Worth visiting for adventure, cross country rides, undersea nature & beautiful beaches, once in a life time experience.
Philippines are 7107 islands, you can just imagine cross island fun you plan as you want. Many tour operators from many countries worldwide give you good options.
This country is dominated by American culture. Spanish ruled tem for very long time, and then Japanese controlled many islands during the world war.
Politically steady but one of the highly corrupt earlier government policies, which current President Rodrigo Duterte is trying his level best to fight against drug dealers & stop corruption in many Government departments.
Chinese dominate the business & economy of the country. You just name the industry which Chinese has not taken over here in Philippines.
Treasure hunters just use latest technology & explore the possibilities of finding the hidden wealth from world war. Gold, diamonds, platinum, Palladium & many more are easily available. You can do it with central Government or local government approval.
Many people do speak English, so it is easy to communicate with them even for foreigners. Due to poverty & lack of infrastructure on certain islands, certain cities are flooded with entertainment & other tourist attraction business, in fact Philippines comes third in the world after Bangkok for night life activities.
Higher education is cheaper than Europe & America. All most all trade colleges are packed with Indian students. Medical, Aeronautical, Hotel Management, Agriculture, Science, Engineering, Business Management, you name it you will find Indian students here.
What is the approximate percentage of indian population of the Indians in this country ?
During the world war many Indian Sardar or Punjabi soldiers who fought war from Germany side or Japanese side or at times from Spain side, they stayed back in Philippines, worked initially with military, police & got married with Philippine’s ladies. So many generations they are here with mixed culture. The best part many Governors & Mayors of many cities are Indo - Phil origin & carry name Singh. These Punjabis are known as Bombay because those years only Bombay port was known to the world not Bharat or India. At present the main business of these Punjabi is called 5-6, they give loan to anyone from 500 peso to millions, with or without guarantee. They have a practice of collecting back the loan amount on daily basis, at time they charge nearly 20% interest per month to the clients. They run a very high risk of unpaid loans & fighting to killing for recovery.
In Philippines cloths market, garments, household utensils & electronics business is controlled by Indian Sindhi people.
How welcoming is there economic sector for forigen investors ?
Call centers are like mushrooms in many cities. Due to cheap & English speaking staff available & flexible government policies many youngsters make good money in this line of work, of course with no future. Indian motorcycles really dominate the roads of Philippines. Brands like Bajaj, TVS. Latest trend is Bajaj RE Rickshaws. Cars & trucks Mahindra, TATA are very new in market. Mahindra supplied nearly 2000 jeeps for police, they are all having very bad performance (reason only company knows) one of the corruption scandal of police about the pricing & quality of Mahindra vehicles.
This country is wide open for foreign investment on port development, dredging projects & inters island transport system & passenger boats & small cruise liners.
Most interesting is agriculture & animal growing for milk & meat business. There is no wheat cultivation at all, they produce only rice in Philippines. Weather conditions & water availability is same like India but very much underutilized. Fertilizers & animal feed is also mainly imported from many counties. Government can easily provide thousands of acres land for agriculture or animal business.
Build Buid is President’s policy, so many new roads, buildings, tourist locations, hotels, hospitals , are being developed throughout the country.
Many Indian from gulf countries & Arabic business men are finding it profitable to invest in this country. They are developing shopping malls, buildings & mostly in agriculture business, they grow required food item & do the export to their country. New high tech agriculture equipment & easily available labor is the key for success for your investment here.
Media is very much biased like every other country & always at war with competitors. Christian religion & media has very close link to take their own market share.
Film & music industry is very much European dominated, but beauty & talent is very wide spread. It would be a best location for Indian film shootings. Talent clash, dancing competitions, laughter shows could be a very good business as well.
Indian pharmaceutical companies supply a whole lot of medicines which are sold almost 200% more value than Indian price. There is complete awareness about good herbal medicines but not even one herbal company is establishing their root her.
There are no spices, herbs, daal, vegetable, fruits variety cultivated here, only very few to nil spices are known to the people. What is available in Indian groceries are branded & too costly for normal people. The main reason behind high cost is some government policies, misinterpreted by the port & customs departments.
