The inclusion of Bacolod City in the list of 11 top business process outsourcing sites outside of Metro Manila in a recent study conducted by the Institute for Development and Economic Analysis Inc. was welcomed by Councilor Jocelle Batapa-Sigue yesterday.

Batapa-Sigue said she is happy that Bacolod has been acknowledged as a BPO center, not merely a site for call centers. Batapa-Sigue is the main convenor of the Bacolod-Negros Occidental Educational Foundation for Information Technology.

B-NEFIT, which is seeking registration with the Securities and Exchange Commission as a non-stock, non-profit organization, is a collective effort of the academe and human resource development, real estate and business and local governments to undertake projects and programs.

Bacolod now hosts three major call centers, namely, Teleperformance, TeleTech and Convergys, and has five special economic zones for IT, two of which have been declared as IT parks.

Batapa-Sigue said the inclusion of Bacolod in the list of alternative BPO sites is an acknowledgement of the initiative even before by the city's IT Focus Team to make Bacolod as an ideal site for BPO services.

She added that Bacolod is blessed with a strong fiber optic backbone and quality human resources.

The IDEA study, commissioned by Bayan Telecommunications Inc., also named Iloilo, Dumaguete and Leyte as the best BPO sites in the Visayas.*NLG

back to top