The Philippine Freight Rail project may very well be built with support from the United States and Japan, an official in charge said, as Manila seeks alternative financing offers after financial talks with China broke down.
“I hope they take it and invest here,” Delfin Lorenzana, chairman of the Bases Conversion and Development Authority, said in an interview Friday, referring to the United States and Japan. The agency supervises the event of former military bases.
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US President Joe Biden, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr launched the Luzon Economic Corridor during their April 11 meeting, and a trilateral event to advertise investment within the Manila project is planned on the US-led Indo-Pacific Business Forum in May.
The Philippines has said it hopes to generate around $100 billion in investments in the following five to 10 years after the Washington summit.
The project goals to enhance connections between Subic Bay and Clark, Manila and Batangas province on the country’s primary island of Luzon and speed up investment in infrastructure projects including rail, ports, clean energy, semiconductor supply chains and agribusiness.
“We have not abandoned the Subic-Clark rail project,” Lorenzana said. Former Defense Secretary Lorenzana said he felt “more comfortable” if the United States and Japan took over the project.
“If not them, then maybe South Korea or other countries that are friendly to us,” he said. He added that the federal government can also be considering applying for financing from the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank.
Lorenzana said BCDA projects which may be included within the Luzon Economic Corridor include the development of a second runway at Clark International Airport, estimated to cost roughly $174 million, and the 64-hectare Clark National Food Terminal (158 acres), which goals to make sure this Southeast Asian country is the region’s leading agricultural resource center. The cost of the food terminal is estimated at $152 million.
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Subic and Clark are “very strategic” locations that might host quite a lot of industries, from logistics to manufacturing, he said.
“Subic is one of the few deep-water ports that can accommodate ships of any size and is safe from a typhoon, and Clark has enormous space,” Lorenzana said. “We also have a ready workforce that can be trained to do the job.”
