Chinese Filipino - Trade and Industry

Trade and Industry

See also: Economy of the Philippines

Chinese Filipinos play a major role in Philippine economy, which mirrors the Overseas Chinese experience in Southeast Asia. Chinese Filipino entrepreneurs are particularly strong adherents to the Confucian paradigm of intrapersonal relationships, and have a proclivity to reinvest most of their business profits for expansion. Most conglomerates and corporations owned by Chinese Filipinos were grown from small enterprises, attesting to the group’s entrepreneurial flair and talent. Despite constituting a small fraction of the country’s population at 1.3%, the Chinese Filipinos have a disproportionate impact on both trade and industry. Many stores and restaurants, as well as factories and manufacturing firms are owned by Chinese Filipinos, who are estimated to control 50 to 60 percent of non-land share capital in the Philippines, and as much as 35 percent of all total sales in the Philippines are attributed to firms owned by the ethnic Chinese, who essentially focus on sectors such as semiconductors and chemicals, real estate, land, and property development, banking, engineering, construction, fiber, textiles, finance, consumer electronics, food, and personal computers. In the Philippines, ethnic Chinese are estimated to control over one-third of the 1000 largest corporations. In the Philippines, Chinese entrepreneurs control 47 of the 68 locally owned public companies. Chinese owned companies account for 66% of the sixty largest commercial entities. The economic power of the Chinese Filipino community is portrayed by Chinese American writer Amy Chua, who said that "the country's four major airlines and almost all of the country's banks, hotels, shopping malls, and major business conglomerates” are owned by the Chinese. In addition, they dominate "the shipping, textiles, construction, real estate, pharmaceutical, manufacturing, and personal computer industries as well as the country's wholesale distribution networks and six out of the ten English-language newspapers in Manila, including the one with the largest circulation."

Retail Trade

Chinese Filipinos pioneered the ‘’shopping mall” concept. Most of the Philippines’ shopping malls are owned by ethnic Chinese or Chinese Mestizos. These include the SM Group of Malls (SM North Edsa, SM Mall of Asia, SM Megamall, and The Podium) of Henry Sy, Robinsons Group of Malls (Robinsons Place Manila, Robinsons Galleria, and Robinsons Magnolia of John Gokongwei, Ayala Malls (Glorietta, Greenbelt Mall, and Trinoma) of the Zobel de Ayala group, Megaworld Corporation (Newport Mall and Eastwood City) of Andrew Tan, Rockwell Center of the Lopez family, and Shangri-La Plaza of the Kuok family.

Banking

From small trade cooperatives clustered by hometown, the Chinese Filipinos would go on to establish and incorporate the largest banking institutions in the Philippines. Majority of the country’s principal banks are owned by Chinese Filipinos, such as the Allied Banking Corporation, Banco de Oro group, China Banking Corporation (Chinabank), East West Banking Corporation, Metrobank group, Philippine National Bank, Philippine Trust Company (Philtrust Bank), Rizal Commercial Banking group, Security Bank Corporation (Security Bank), United Coconut Planters Bank. Also, 40% of the Philippines’ national corporate equity is owned by the ethnic Chinese.

Food Industry

Small and medium-sized factories engaged in food processing, as well as the production of liquor and tobacco. 80 of all 163, as well as 15% of distilleries Philippine companies involved in the food industry are shown to be owned by ethnic Chinese. Chinese Filipino entrepreneurs were also the first to capitalize and invest in oil processing industry, which increased the national production of vegetable oils, butter, soap, grease, and copra cakes as fertilizers for rice fields and sugar plantations.

Almost all restaurants serving Chinese cuisine in the Philippines are owned by Chinese Filipinos. Meanwhile, the Chinese have also entered the fastfood business, such as McDonald’s (franchised by George Ty, the Jollibee group (Jollibee, Chowking, Greenwich Pizza, Mang Inasal, Red Ribbon, and the China-based Yonghe Dawang (永和大王).

Also, the largest food manufacturer in Southeast Asia, the San Miguel Corporation, is owned by Chinese Filipinos.

Lumber

About 85% of the lumber sector and 10% of the timber industry are owned by the Chinese Filipinos..

Transportation

The Chinese Filipinos pioneered the shipping industry in the Philippines, which eventually became a major transportation as a means of transporting goods cheaply and quickly between islands. Important shipping magnates owned by the ethnic Chinese include Cokaliong Shipping Lines, Gothong Lines, Lite Shipping Corporation, Sulpicio Lines, and Trans-Asia Shipping Lines.

Likewise, Chinese Filipinos own most of the major airlines of the Philippines, including the flagship carrier Philippine Airlines, AirphilExpress, Cebu Pacific, South East Asian Airlines, and Zest Air.

Manufacturing and Real Estate

Majority of Philippine companies that produce textiles, plastic products, footwear, glass, as well as heavy industry products like metals, steel, industrial chemicals, semiconductors, and personal computers are owned by the Chinese. Of the 500 real estate firms in the Philippines, 120 are Chinese-owned and mostly specialize in real estate and construction and are concentrated in Metro-Manila. By 1986, Chinese Filipino entrepreneurs controlled 45 percent of the nations top 120 domestic manufacturing companies. These companies were mainly involved in tobacco and cigarettes, textiles, and rubber footwear.