The Information and Communications Technology- Business Process Outsourcing industry of Dumaguete City has assured students in Negros Oriental and neighboring provinces of the availability of  jobs.

 ICT Dumaguete Board Secretary Danah Fortunato said,  the group  had expressed  positive prospects of  trhe employment of graduates in the administration of Dumaguete City’s Higher Education Institutes at an ICT-BPO Industry Forum for Educators,  recently at SPi Global’s facilities in Barangay Bagacay.

 The forum  was aimed at recognizing  the valuable contribution of HEIs to the success of BPO companies in the city,  and be the de facto beginning of a closer partnership between HEIs. It  also focused on  BPOs in bridging the gap between the skills of graduates and the entry level skills required in the industry, as reflected in the relatively low passing or hiring rates.

Dumaguete ICT president, Randolf Bandiola, said  ICT-BPO jobs are not merely about “answering phone calls”, even  if by the end of 2010, the Philippines had surpassed India in the number of voice jobs.

 In Dumaguete, ICT-BPO jobs are  now  in customer management, copyediting, graphics, animation, web design, software programming, architecture, market research, medical transcription, and engineering.

 Meanwhile, companies involved in other non-voice work, like legal research and accounting services, are checking out the city’s business conditions.

 Guest speaker Dr. Jeff Sallaz, Fulbright Scholar and Professor of Sociology of the University of Arizona, said the industry could be a way for Negros Oriental to “leapfrog from an Agricultural Economy straight into the Information Economy”.

 Sallaz cited BPOs that  have drawn most foreign direct investments in the country from 2000 to 2010, thus reversing the lack of investment and manufacturing growth in the 70’s and 80’s.

 Income derived from the industry, he said,  is  a welcome addition to an economy that is too dependent on agriculture and remittances.

 Worldwide, BPOs is a rapidly growing industry where the Philippines is uniquely poised to increase employment from 500,000 individuals in 2010, to 1.3 million  by 2016, he said.

 Fortunato said ICT Dumaguete projected the availability of more than 2000 jobs in BPOs in 2011 alone. The reality, however, is that only about half of those positions were set to be filled by the end of 2011 because the critical factors mentioned kept the hiring rate only  at around 20 to 30 percent.*RG

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