Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III has told United States officials that public demand was a key consideration for the Duterte administration in deciding which big-ticket infrastructure projects to roll out as part of its “Build, Build, Build” program.

This is to ensure, said Dominguez, that the government would be able to generate adequate returns on its huge investments and pay off loans obtained to finance these projects.

Dominguez cited as an example a former US military base, the Clark Freeport Zone in Pampanga, which would be transformed into New Clark City to decongest Metro Manila and make it the Philippines’ next metropolis.

As part of the government’s 75 flagship projects under the “Build, Build, Build” program, New Clark City will also include the expansion of the existing Clark International Airport as an alternative to the overcrowded Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA).

New Clark City will also be the site of the country’s disaster-resilient alternative government center, Dominguez told Deputy Assistant Secretaries Geoffrey Okamoto and Robert Kaproth of the US Department of the Treasury during a recent meeting.

“We’re not going to make a mistake of going into projects that we don’t have a demand for. We are not going to fall into this trap of ‘build it and they will come.’ We’re going to start the project where we are already behind, like our airports, our Manila transportation system, our railways. We’re already far behind the rest,” Dominguez said during the meeting.

In the case of New Clark City, Dominguez said there is already a demand for this type of project, as development needs to spread towards north of Metro Manila to decongest the national capital region’s overly populated urban hub where the daily road traffic volume has led to massive productivity and revenue losses.

In an earlier briefing with reporters, Dominguez said the big-ticket infrastructure projects that the government wants to build are “long overdue” and thus, have a ready demand and need that people are willing to pay for.

“We are not guessing here. There is already a need, a demand there. (This is) long overdue,” Dominguez said during the recent press briefing, citing as an example the New Centennial Water Source-Kaliwa Dam Project in Northern Luzon, which is being funded with a concessional loan from China.

Dominguez was responding to reporters’ queries at that time about the possibility of falling into a “debt trap” like what had happened to Sri Lanka.

“If you borrow money for projects that don’t already have a demand there’s a chance that your estimates are going to be wrong and your revenues are not going to be enough,” he said during the press briefing. “However, what are we borrowing for? We are borrowing for things (where we) already have the demand…people are willing to pay for that and people need that.”

Earlier, Dominguez said that alongside ​the development of​ New Clark City would be the construction of railways going to Subic and to Manila and the expansion of the Clark International Airport, which will get a new world-class terminal building to accommodate a projected eight million passengers per year. The expansion project for the Clark airport broke ground last December.

He also said the Duterte administration is undertaking at least three flagship infrastructure projects under its “Build, Build, Build” program as the linchpin of its strategy to ​develop major alternative growth areas in Central and Northern Luzon.

These three projects already approved by the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) Board, which is ​chaired by President Duterte, ​are the:​ 1) Chico River Pump Irrigation Project, which will provide water to 8,700 hectares of agricultural land, benefitting 4,350 farmers and serving 21 barangays in the provinces of Cagayan and Kalinga; 2) Philippine National Railways (PNR) North 2 Project, which will connect Malolos in Bulacan, Clark Airport, and New Clark City; and the 3) Clark International Airport New Terminal Building.

Dominguez said New Clark City will soon be the showcase of the Duterte administration’s economic strategy of developing growth centers outside Metro Manila to make the benefits of the country’s fast-paced economic expansion more inclusive.

New Clark City, he said, will house the 40-hectare National Government Administrative Center, which will serve as the government’s backup operations hub to ensure the continuous delivery of services in the country at the onset of a natural disaster.

Dominguez said New Clark City is also ideally suited as a center for agro-industrial activities as well as home to cutting-edge technology companies and world-class sports facilities.

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