JBIC Executive Officer Takaya Naito making a presentation

The conference and exhibition, Mining Philippines 2009, was held with the title, “Strengthening Competitiveness,” from September 15-17 in Manila, the Philippines.

The conference addressed ways to draw foreign investment to the mining sector in the Philippines amid rising demand for minerals in Asia. Policymakers in the Philippine government and representatives of foreign firms doing business in the country’s mining sector made presentations on their efforts.  JBIC participated in this event with its speaker delivering a presentation.

In the third plenary session titled “Capital Raising and Risk Management” held on September 16, JBIC Executive Officer Takaya Naito made a presentation on “Funding Mining Projects in Today’s Investment Environment.”  He first gave an overview of recent developments in investment in the mining sector and described JBIC’s financing instruments, schemes and financing operations to date in the mining sector. He also delved into considerations being made when JBIC provides financing in this sector and key factors for managing the project risk.

  Left: Secretary Atienza; Right: Vice President De Castro   Secretary Atienza

In this conference, Vice President Noli De Castro of the Philippines touched on a relatively low ranking of his country in the assessment of the investment climate in the latest Doing Business Report published by the World Bank and stressed more efforts to be made to improve the investment climate of the Philippines.

Secretary Jose L. Atienza, Jr. of the Department of Environment & Natural Resources expressed his intent to simplify and streamline the procedures and processes of issuing permits and environmental compliance certificates for new mining projects, while taking account of their environmental and social impacts.

JBIC will continue to support Japanese business operations in the Philippines.