DUMAGUETE CITY -- President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo inaugurated the latest Business Process Outsourcing center of the TeleTech Holdings Inc. at the Dumaguete Business Park in Dumaguete City yesterday afternoon, further boosting the Philippines as the most favorable BPO destination in the world, next only to India.

The TeleTech-Dumaguete Customer Management Center was the second to be inaugurated by the President on the twin Negros provinces in the last two weeks.

She inaugurated the TeleTech-Bacolod BPO in Negros Occidental on Feb. 2, which, together with the Dumaguete BPO, will support the President's jobs creation program, a Malacañang press statement said.

The Dumaguete BPO Center houses 578 work stations and currently supports more than 600 employees, 87 percent of whom are from Oriental Negros.

Through its first BPO Center in Dumaguete, the company has provided high quality jobs to the residents of the two Negros provinces as well as the neighboring provinces of Iloilo and Cebu, Malacañang said.

Upon arrival at the Dumaguete Business Park area, where the TeleTech-Dumaguete is located, the President, assisted by TeleTech Vice President and General Manager Maulik Parekh, cut the inaugural ribbon and unveiled the marker.

She then witnessed the presentation of the signed Memorandum of Agreement between TeleTech and the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority for the implementation of TeleTech's P5 million grant for the President's English Proficiency Program spread over three years.

Parekh, in an interview, said the P5 million English proficiency scholarship will be given to the "near-hires" or those who do not make it the first time with TeleTech but have potentials to be good BPO staff.

"We have to put these near-hires through a four-week training which will be facilitated by TESDA," he said. He said around a thousand near-hires could avail themselves of the scholarship.

The President was also given a tour of the facility that occupied 5,900 square meters of the Phase One of the Dumaguete Business Park-Information Technology Plaza Building.

The expansion of TeleTech Holdings in the Philippines was the result of the President's meeting with TeleTech President Kenneth Tuchman on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland last month.

Tuchman reportedly wants Teletech to further expand its business in the Philippines, particularly in the provinces.*

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