John Hay, Poro Point Eco Zones seek BOT partners

The John Hay Poro Point Development Corporation (JPDC), estate manager and implementing arm of Bases Conversion Development Authority’s (BCDA) John Hay and Poro Point Economic Zones, envisions to solicit private sector participation in its infrastructure and development undertakings.

Through the various contractual arrangements spelled out under Republic Act 7718, otherwise known as the Amended Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) Law, JPDC expects the private sector to finance, develop, manage, operate, and maintain its infrastructure facilities and services. To date, major investors have expressed interest in JPDC’s properties such as the San Fernando Airport. Following the government’s cornerstone policy of extensively mobilizing private sector participation in infrastructure development, JPDC looks forward to developing these facilities and improving services by capitalizing on private sector resources and expertise.

To help them structure this vision into concrete BOT partnerships with the private sector, Gen. Fortunato U. Abat, president and CEO of JPDC, sought technical assistance from the Coordinating Council for Private Sector Participation – BOT Center (CCPSP-BOT Center). As the agency mandated to coordinate and monitor the country’s BOT Program, the CCPSP-BOT Center took JPDC’s challenge in providing them the critical technical, financial, legal and contractual solutions that will make their PSP/BOT projects work.

The assistance was formalized in a Technical Assistance Agreement (TAA) signed by Gen. Abat and Undersecretary Noel Eli B. Kintanar, CCPSP executive director, on Sept. 30 at the CCPSP conference room.

Under the TAA, the CCPSP will assist JPDC in the formulation of its development plan; in identifiying specific projects and their viabilities for PSP/BOT; in defining terms of references necessary for project packaging studies; and in seeing these projects through transparent and competitive procurement processes.