By Neil Jerome C. Morales (The
Philippine Star) | Updated May 26, 2014 - 12:00am
MANILA, Philippines - Major property
developers will likely start laying the groundwork for the Philippines’ first
smart and totally environment-friendly metropolis next year, a government
official said.
State-run Bases Conversion and
Development Authority (BCDA) will start bidding out this year a 1,300-hectare
portion of the 36,000-hectare Clark Green City project in Pampanga, a
government official said.
“We will parcelize the lot into six.
We want different developers to come in,” BCDA president and chief executive
officer Arnel Paciano Casanova said on the sidelines of the World Economic
Forum (WEF) welcome reception.
Major listed property firms, which
approached the BCDA for the 1,300-hectare portion of the urban project, will
likely start construction of mixed-use developments as early as 2015 as bidding
is seen to be conducted this year, Casanova said.
While the master development plan for
the Clark Green City has already been approved by the National Economic and
Development Authority, the state-run agency is still waiting for President
Aquino’s go signal before the contract for the development could be offered for
bidding.
“It’s about time, we have a lot of
opportunities and we are riding on the optimism of the market,” Casanova said.
The country’s property sector is on a
boom for the past few years on the back of strong end-user demand, large
housing backlog, investor optimism and the increasing middle class capable of
buying properties.
BCDA said the Clark Green City project
is a $5-billion development that will transform a sizeable chunk of the Clark
reservation into a fully automated, state-of-the-art metropolis. It is a little
more than half of Metro Manila’s 63,000 hectares.
Once operational, Clark Green City is
expected to generate approximately P1.57 trillion per year to the economy and
create 925,000 jobs.
_______________________________________________________________
