Bacolod City is one of the areas being considered as a potential site of the world's largest US-based call center.

Representatives of the Convergys One led by its vice president and country general manager Marife Zamora were welcomed by Bacolod Mayor Evelio Leonardia yesterday at City Hall yesterday.

Zamora said their company has already six call centers in Manila and one in Cebu and that a number of their agents come from Bacolod and Negros Occidental.

Leonardia said: "We want to see to it that the entry and official operation of Convergys in Bacolod could be hastened." IO Asia has already started its operation in the city while Teleperformance, Teletech and Focus Communications are set to operate within this year.

"With the entry of these call centers aside from the entry of Shoe Mart, 2006 is going to be a boom year for Bacolod City in terms of employment opportunities and economic stimulation," Leonardia said. We have to concentrate on taking efforts to train our people in order to fill in the manpower requirement of the call centers, he said.

Councilor Jocelle Batapa-Sigue said the city will hold a Human Resource Summit in Bacolod in July after the Mayor approved the budget for the Bacolod Information Technology Team.

We will gather all school heads of the 40 colleges and universities in the province for a dialog with the academe and the call centers in order for them to map out a human resource growth plan for the region, she said.

Batapa-Sigue said the city will not discourage the coming on of other call centers but they have to self-regulate. For the meantime, the city can only handle five and later on, as we manage the resource growth, we will be able to handle other call centers, she said.

After the five call centers, the city will focus on developing its manpower so that it will be able to support and fully satisfy the requirement of these call centers, Batapa-Sigue said.

"In the meantime, our focus will be on software development and legal transcription. We have a good number of medical transcription businesses coming in, and we will link with companies in Manila to be able to train our potential animators," she said.

Leonardia assured the Convergys representatives that the city government will provide them a climate that would help them grow in Bacolod and that they will be entitled to tax incentives.

Batapa-Sigue said all IT industries in the Philippines will also enjoy incentives offered by the Philippine Economic Zone Authority if these are located in an IT park or building owned by a locator.

"In Bacolod, even without locators, we have already convinced real property owners to prepare their sites for accreditation with PEZA," she said.*CGS

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