The National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) in Central Visayas is confident in achieving the region’s target gross domestic product (GDP) for this year.
“Despite of the two calamities that hit Central Visayas, we are confident that we are going to hit a growth rate of 7.5 to 10 percent for our Gross Regional Domestic Product (GRDP),” said Efren Carreon, regional director of Neda, said in a press briefing yesterday.
He said the region already has the momentum as it has been in the top three best performing regions in the country in terms of GRDP for the last three years.
“We are also confident because the total cost of damage in the region is practically less than one percent of the GRDP in Central Visayas for 2012,” Carreon said.
According to the Neda official, there has been a total of P5 to 6 billion estimated damage in the region for public infrastructure, crops and livestock.
“Therefore we can say that yes there is impact of course but I believe it’s minimal,” Carreon said.
He added that another reason for them to achieve their target GRDP growth is because of the coming reconstruction and rehabilitation efforts in the region.
Carreon said money will be poured in the region with rehabilitation efforts from both the government and the private sector.
This will also go with increased demand for construction materials and employment opportunities for those in Central Visayas, neighboring regions and the transients who are currently housed in Cebu City, Carreon said.
In fact, there were already some transients housed in barangay Tinago sports complex who have been employed and have started to work in the city.
“Over the weekend, we conducted a job fair. Twelve were hired on the spot and there were another four later. Some have already started reporting to work,” said Tinago barangay captain Joel Garganera.
Carreon assured that they will be closely monitoring that the typhoon victims could avail of the different job opportunities that are available.