Aquino to pitch $20-B infra projects to European investors

MANILA, Philippines – President Benigno Aquino III will present an estimated $20 billion worth of public-private partnership (PPP) projects to investors in his official visit to different countries in Europe this week.

Among the biggest PPP projects in the Aquino administration’s pipeline – the $2.273-billion Laguna Lakeshore Expressway Dike Project – will be featured in Brussels, Belgium on Tuesday, September 16. (Editor’s note: We earlier reported that the project was featured in Brussels on Monday, September 15. We regret the error.)

Aside from the expressway dike project, Aquino also pitched the $542.22-million Bulacan Bulk Water Supply Project in a PPP conference in the Belgian capital. 

“This is a huge opportunity for the Philippines to pitch our PPP infra projects and let European investors know that we have built up a major deal flow in which they can participate in,” PPP center executive director Cosette Canilao said in a statement.

Aquino left for Europe late Saturday, September 13. Accompanied by a delegation that included several Cabinet officials, he boarded a chartered Philippine Airlines flight to Spain. From Spain, he went to Belgium, and is set to go to France and Germany next.

In Spain, Aquino was witness to the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between the Department of Tourism and Instituto Español de Comercio Exterior (ICEX, or the Spanish Institute of Foreign Trade) for the hosting of the Madrid Fusión in Manila in April 2015. The event will help establish the country as a focal point of gastronomic interest worldwide, said the Palace’s deputy spokesperson Abigail Valte in an interview with state-run Radyo ng Bayan on Sunday, September 14.

After Europe, Aquino will head to the United States to attend the United Nations Global Climate Change Summit. He is scheduled to return to Manila on September 25.

Since Aquino assumed office in 2010, he has visited US, Vietnam, Japan, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, Brunei, Japan, China, Cambodia, UK, Russia, New Zealand, Australia, Switzerland, Myanmar, South Korea, and Malaysia.

Aquino has made 33 international trips, far lower than former president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s 127 foreign travels. – Rappler.com

*(USD 1 = PHP 43.95)