ILOILO City – The city government approved a total of 16,018 business licenses and renewal applications from January to March this year, exceeding the previous year’s record of 14,311, data released by the Local Economic Development and Investment Promotion (LEDIP) Office showed.
Mayor Jerry Treñas initiated bringing the services closer to clients through offsite payment centers at malls and online transactions for convenience.
“The economic revival has been felt since last year; we are gradually coming out of the pandemic, and people are starting to catch up with marketing and sales,” LEDIP Head Velma Lao said.
She added, “The facilitating factor for the increase in business applications is the dynamism of the local economy and the business-enabling environment. It is also because the city government continues to promote the market, where it is seen that there is an influx of people going in and doing business in the city.”
Lao said this year’s sales are higher than 2019 in most sectors, especially in the tourism sector like hotels and restaurants.
The city’s business industry is classified into the following:
* 40 percent for wholesale and retail trade,
* 18 percent for accommodation and food service,
* 12 percent for other service activities,
* 10 percent for real estate,
* 5 percent for transportation and storage,
* 3 percent for manufacturing, and
* 2 percent for activities related to human health, social work, financial and insurance services, and education./PN
