LACK of funds is forcing the government to focus its export-promotions subsidies on emerging economies like the BRIC—Brazil, Russia, India and China—where Filipino exporters have yet to establish their footprints.
Trade delegations to markets that are already producing steady export sales, such as the United States, Europe and Japan, will no longer be subsidized by the Department of Trade and Industry’s promotional arm —Center for International Trade and Exposition Missions (Citem).
“Citem will only go into areas that are being developed for market niche. For other markets, where exporters are already doing business-to-business deals, we don’t need to subsidize them. Citem will continue to support small and medium exporters if their target is a market they are not sure of yet. We will help them penetrate it,” Citem Executive Director Rosvi Gaetos said.
Citem, she said, is looking at China as a huge market rather than a competitor.
Citem is also looking at India, Russia and Brazil, where much work will still be done to penetrate them.
“Those are markets that we have to study very well in terms of market access, characteristics, way of doing business. With them, it’s a little bit different so we need to be sure that exporters are ready for them,” Gaetos said.
Citem will get an P88-million budget for 2012, or 11 percent higher than its allocation for 2011. This, she said, is too small to realistically run an effective international promotions campaign for the export sector.
With this, Gaetos said Citem’s approach should be “precision and not profusion, maybe less promotions but very focused and presented in a much better way.”
The United States, Japan and Europe will continue to be the top markets for Filipino exporters, particularly for food and home products. But while there will still be promotions in these markets, Gaetos said Citem will let the private sector spend for themselves in their missions to these countries.
Citem, she said, will take care of penetrating the markets where exporters are still uncertain of making money and would probably not readily invest in entering them.
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By: Max V. de Leon
Source: Business Mirror, Nov. 7, 2011
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