Former colony Philippines not a top investment site for Spain

MANILA, Philippines- Spain does not consider its former colony, the Philippines, an important investment site, after it excluded the country it dominated for 350 years from its list of eleven priority locations for major investments. Rafael Aguilar, director for investments and business cooperation of the Spanish Institute for Foreign Trade told reporters in a press conference on Tuesday that in its excitement over other Asian nations, the government of Spain "forgot" to make the Philippines a top investment site. Among the countries in the Asian region that were included by Spain in its lists were China, India and Japan, the rest he refused to enumerate. “Just recently, we (Spain) began to look at other countries in the Asian region, may that was be the reason why we forgot other markets including the Philippines," he said. Despite Spain’s colonization of the Philippines from 1565 to 1898 which left 20,000 Spanish words in Philippine vocabulary, the Spanish trade group claimed to be alien to the Philippine market. In 2007,total trade between the Philippines and Spain grew by an average 10 percent for the last five years, Aguilar said there is plenty of room for improvement like in the area of investments. In 2006, Spain was ranked as the Philippines 31st trading partner equivalent for only 0.20 percent of the total Philippines trade with the world of $98.5 billion; ranked 25th as export market accounting for 0.18 percent of the total Philippine export to the world of $47 billion; 34th as an import source accounting for 0.21 percent of the total Philippines imports from the world of $51.5 billion. Philippine principal exports to Spain consist of crude coconut oil, imitation jewelry, cement clinker, parts and accessories of machine, Portland cement, while products coming from Spain include sausage and ham casings, transmission and radio receivers, pharmaceutical products, and wine and spirits. - GMANews.TV