Invest in Zamboanga City

Zamboangueños would like to requisition the longest business partner relationship this ancient city has ever had with - the Chinese traders from Fujian, China. Ever since the 13th century, Chinese mariners mostly from Fujian Province of China have plied the sea routes off Zamboanga's busy waterways and established trade relations with our city's founding residents, the Subanons, long before the Spaniards.

To this day, the Chino-Zamboangueño (Chinese-Zamboangueño in Chavacano) are the backbone of the City's business growth and sustainability. They are the major reason why Zamboanga City is the center of commerce for the entire Zambo Peninsula region, Basilan and the Sulu Archipelago. It has been that way for over 700 years! They are the silent heart of Zamboanga that pumps it with constant capital through its veins that keeps the City growing healthier. That is why we seek out our ancient business alliance with China in hopes of their helping our City fund the major infrastructure projects we prioritize herein. There are thousands of Chinese-Zamboangueño blood families in the City whose ancestors can be traced to the Fujian, or Fukien, Province of China. You will be investing in FAMILY!

We also seek our longtime friends from Spain, The Unites States, Germany, Italy, Japan, S. Korea, France and England as major investment partners. The IMF can offer matching investments funds from our partners. Together, our TEAM will do it!

$250 Million - $350 Million

(Additional $25 - $50 Million for building the Sacol Island bridge, roads & railways, and infrastructure for ZIA Industrial / Business Park)

See: Zamboanga International Airport (ZIA) in Sacol Island.

No matter how much or how long Manila-centric Press and nay Sayers try to label Zamboanga City as a "security problem" area, the people who actually control the investment monies keep showing up at the doorsteps of the only Latin City in Asia and laying down their investments, making the Zamboanga area the #1 growth area in the entire country!!! Like Forrest Gump's Momma used to tell him: "Stupid is as stupid does!" If Zamboanga is so bad according to Manila and it is the #1 growth area in the Philippines in spite, or as a result, of their constant wailings, what or where does that leave Manila, Forrest? Answer us... you stupid or something?

The ZIA Project is a must! In order to properly continue the explosive growth of the #1 region in the Philippines, providing much needed air traffic infrastructure for the rest of resources-rich Mindanao, ZIA needs to happen now! The current ZIA is too small and antiquated for handling the capacity that the Zamboanga region is able to produce now and in the future. A new ZIA will help eliminate the middlemen airports that our region's vastly superior and resources rich business enterprises are forced to rely upon now! The Zamboanga and Mindanao region feeds about 60% or more of the entire country with many basic food groups, with the all-important seafood being #1 on the list. If properly developed and managed, Mindanao Island can easily account for at least 50% of the entire GDP of The Philippines! There's plenty gold in them thar hills in Mindanao Island... let's go!

Manila NOTE: Zamboanga is one of the largest generator of taxes for the national government in Manila, however, Zamboanga has never gotten its proportional share of that tax income in terms of Malacañang's investment funds for Zamboanga City. Instead, metro Manila gets the bulk of the Malacañang tax spending to try and fix the exacerbating problems of their over-population, extreme pollution, shamefully visible poverty everywhere you drive around the Metro, yet constantly missing their target! Manila is a dangerous place to be a stranger. It's historical location on an unprotected valley, with no mountains protecting it like Zamboanga has, lends it to the constant cycle of destruction and escalating reconstruction costs from the typhoon pathway of the Pacific Ocean. Manila's Pasig River is the most polluted river in the country and it's the main source of Manila Bay's dangerous levels of pollution! Zamboanga is nevertheless tolerant in the misgivings of their Manila counterparts, regardless of the Manila Press' constant bigotry towards the Zamboangueños and their ballyhooed hypocrisy in mislabeling the progressive City of Flowers. Boy Forrest, just when we thought martial law was over... You better hold a press conference, stupid! ...in Manila! Tell them that Zamboangueños trust their local business leaders more than they do the government in their refusal to request tax receipts for their purchases because the tax income, instead of going to Malacañang and Zamboanga not getting its proportional share of their tax revenues, would rather entrust it to the local moneymen who in return has the interest of Zamboangueños at heart and WILL reinvest it back into Zamboanga. Hey Forrest, Zamboangueños are not stupid. That's why their area is #1!

BIMP-EAGA Note:

East Asia Growth Area - the truism to that reference is reflected squarely on Zamboanga City and the Peninsula area of Mindanao it services, in its title as the #1 GDP area in the Philippines! Majority of the international income it derives from is BIMP-EAGA. This ancient trading partnership continues its frenetic pace and will help bring social change to a region and people that deserves more than what they're getting now. The new ZIA will bring that to them.

3-5 years

new Zamboanga Containerized Seaport for the Ecozone

Zamboanga Containerized Seaport

and BIMP-EAGA SeaLinks

$100 Million - $150 Million

Historical facts have served the City of Zamboanga very well because the people who have come before them have already paved the way for them to learn and progress from it. Expert and world-renowned Mariners have visited Zamboanga on many occasions and time and again, they face the strong currents of the Basilan Straights along its North-West coastline.

Their most favorite spot to moor safely has always been within the safe confines of La Caldera Bay - many even refused to go to the downtown pantalan due to the strong currents there. The mariners who have plied the waters of Zamboanga the past few centuries were the main reason why the city became the success it has been. Zamboanga has had the #1 port traffic in the Southern Philippines for a long time, even before statistics came along.

The ground-bound government officials never attempted to try and dictate sea commerce to the water-borne captains of the mariners. This is the same reason why today's city officials should stay away from trying to dictate where the ideal location of the future Zamboanga Seaport for servicing the Ecozone should be built! The folks from Manila have already made the biggest mistake in Zamboanga's maritime history by expanding the downtown pier in its same location! The downtown of La Bella was never meant to accommodate that much automotive traffic, especially heavyweight trucks! Its road and support infrastructure was meant for a small pantalan and not a busy international containerized cargo seaport. Just as well, the damage is already done by Manila.

Now, it looks like those silly Millionaires from the City Council are following the exact same path as those erroneous folks from Manila! There they go again, sticking their noses where they don't belong! We have been informed that they have already chosen the San Ramon prison property to construct this sorely needed seaport to support the future expansion of the Ecozone. Their logic on this location choice is a disaster of white elephant proportions! Are they going to hire the prisoners to run that seaport? Why don't we relocate all of the city councilmen there and have them supervise those prisoners to do their idea work? Hey capitan, do you have a clue?

Just leave well enough alone and concentrate on bringing in the investment funds for the seaport expansion into the city. The "Captains" of the maritime business will take the helm on this Ecozone Seaport project and will wisely proceed in constructing it in the Caldera Bay area of Barrio Recodo!!! The shipping infrastructure is already there and skilled labor can easily be found around Recodo town without having to IMPORT them from Columbato! The shipping companies who will do business there will be the happiest business partners this project can ever hope to get because it is located in the best possible mooring for their business investment. History is a great selling point! Mayor, let's hope you can Captain this ZC Seaport into the rich water$ of Caldera Bay and our oldest founding Barrio Recodo.

2-3 years

new Roads: Barrios-to-Markets

$25 Million -

$100 Million

About 80% of Zamboanga's road infrastructure services about 20% of its total land area. Around 80% of the City's productivity comes from the 80% of its total land area where there is no adequate or poorly constructed (or non) service roads for the required Barrios-to-Market accessibility. This is the banal point in exclaiming that Zamboanga City is NOT DOWNTOWN!!! Although about 60% of Zamboanga is mountainous, there is no excuse for those highly productive agricultural regions to not get the required Barrios-to-Market ROADWAY infrastructure!!! This is basic civic responsibility!

The City has no known or reliable road infrastructure contractor and must rely on foreign-based engineering/construction contractors to do its work. Corruption still runs rampant within and local borne technical skills are a disgrace to the popular area institutions of (higher?) learning. It is a fundamental embarrassment to those City schools for NOT being able to teach and train local human resources in the necessary construction and engineering skills required to maintain and expand the City's basic infrastructure! The local colleges and universities must make a concerted effort to expand on their engineering curriculum and qualified teachers in order to make the grade. If not, they become part of, or, the actual problem. This major problem may be an area of investment potential for foreign-based education businesses to come in an create from scratch a brand new technology and engineering school - let's call it: Zamboanga Institute of Technology, or ZIT. No pun intended!

Now, back to the roads. For now, it's a shame to say that the City will have to keep relying on foreign-based construction/engineering contractors to do their basic civic infrastructure projects with local muscle to finish them, with all the accoutrements of "siesta" workers the foreigners complain about. Zamboanga's hard-work ethics can use improvement to match those of their fellow Asian competitors. No matter, the Mayor must concentrate on expanding the road network of the Barrios-to-Market business to help improve the business potential of the "OTHER" City residents. Maybe, when the new roads are in place, City officials can visit their Compoblanos more often in their Pueblo-paid Pajeros! Merienda, anyone?

2-5 years

100% Dependable City Water Supply

$25 Million -

$175 Million

(Possibly $250 - $300 Million with the Dam & the Hydro - Electric Power Plant)

Zamboanga City is NOT DOWNTOWN!!! The Mayor of "Downtown Zamboanga" must make this project his #1 Social Revolution for the rest of the non-downtown Zamboanga or risk losing everything Zamboangueños are striving for!

Lack of dependable water supply for the outer Barrios will tear apart Zamboanga City just as it does abundantly surround it. The Zamboanga City Water District (ZCWD), which is directly controlled by the Mayor's office, needs a swift kick in their behinds for sitting on them for too damn long and alienating the other 80% of the barrios that make up the City of Zamboanga! It is plausible that some of their leaders are involved in the movement to convert these 80% into a province because their ineptitude or closet mentality (read: guaranteed government salaries or kickbacks!!!) is what’s corrupting the process. Mayor, YOU will loose Zamboanga if you do not act on this project immediately! The immediate solution is to drill a few hundred deep wells to help the impoverished Barrio folks get 100% Dependable City Water Supply that is clean and potable. This 100% Dependable City Water Supply project is in conjunction with the City Health Department’s oath and task to keep its population healthy. Clean, potable water is the elixir of life for the people and a job-saver for the government. Drilling those wells is pennies compared to the palace that the City Council built for their own self-serving asses! Take care of your constituents now!

The next project for the Mayor's Office and its ZCWD will be to construct a dam in the Pasonanca reservoir (or another suitable location) that will sustain the city's future water supply for decades to come and provide clean hydro-electric power that will drive the future of the city. Oil prices will continue to rise and will cripple the city's potential growth. There's no need to elaborate on this any further. Get rid of the people who don't have the vision and partner with those who do! Hydro-Electricity is a goldmine for the city!

Update on progress - 7/9/07.

1-2 years total

20-30 Barrios:

= 6 months

30-60 Barrios:

= 6 mos.-1 year

60-98 Barrios:

= 1-2 years

new Rivers & Waterways Management

(Flood-Control, Environmental Protection, Restoration and Usage)

$25 Million -

$100 Million

The rivers and inland waterways of Zamboanga are the second largest bodies of water after the sea that surrounds its archipelago tip. The extensive mountain range of Zamboanga City is the main source of water for all the rivers that flow from it into the sea beyond. Long ago, before the government and private sector stole all the gravel and sand from our healthy rivers, the wide and deep rivers of yore were able to absorb a lot of the rainy days versus the terrible state they're all in today. Flooding is a constant problem nowadays and is getting worse as neglected time goes by, more people are dying or made homeless from loss of property as a result of the more severe cases of flooding in the city.

After the pillage of the city's rivers by bulldozers and trucks, many on private river properties, another band of river land thieves and rapists came right behind those drivers. They are the menacing SQUATTERS, the #1 problem of Zamboanga City, and are protected from their illegal acts by, guess who?, their corrupted friends from the City Government!!! These illegal squatters cling on to littoral properties that are legally owned by mostly private landowners, like parasites onto their preys. Mother nature has a way of doing the eradication work of these squatters for the City when it floods the river banks and wipe away many of the illegal structures of squatters, and some of them along with it, causing alarming increases in loss of property and lives. Death by City government sanction! The truth is a hard pill to swallow but the annual floods swallow them easily.

Management of our City's rivers and waterways will require heavy investment in the flood-control infrastructure for these abused rivers. All squatters must be removed immediately by the city police and put in jail for breaking the law! Then, the Mayor needs to offer an apology to all the legal land owners who are victims of his own government's corruption and ineptitude. With proper investment funds, the city must widen many of the choking points of the river system and shore up the loose and vulnerable areas.

An aggressive planting of trees along the rivers banks will help prevent erosion and can cost less. Re-introduction of riverine trees, like the fast-growing bamboos (grass), will help stabilize the soil. Many of the trees along the river's edge have been illegally cut down for firewood by many of these illegal squatters. The more river trees the City restores, the better protection they will provide the environment. The trees by themselves cannot stem the tide of human abuse so the City will need to implement new regulations for proper usage and punishment for improper usage. The rivers of Zamboanga are polluted because the city allows anyone to empty their waste water onto the banks and throw garbage on them. It does not take a scientist to see who the violators are! Just go down the river banks or bridges and you can see their sewer pipes emptying into the rivers in bold daylight!

The final resolution to this river and waterways disaster is the City's investment into critical sewer system infrastructure throughout the entire metropolitan downtown area, where 80% of the city's population live. Bigger sewer pipes will need to be laid down and newer and bigger sewer treatment plants will need to be established to handle the present and future capacity of a growing highly urbanized city, or downtown.

Update on progress - 7/7/07.

Established:

5-10 years

Restored:

10-20 years

new Low-Cost Multi-Family Housing

(Multi-Story Buildings/Skyscrapers)

$200 Million -

$500 Million

The City's #1 problem, the squatters, can be removed and relocated to these social structures.

Since Zamboanga's ideal flatland area is where majority of its people live, including the poor, the squatters, the thousands of refugees from terrorist-inflicted regions of Mindanao and Sulu, including Basilan, the home-less (read: State-less) Deportees from Sabah (a Malaysian government's despicable crime against humanity - crime against their own fellow Muslims from the Sulu Sultanate, who "legally" owns Sabah, and who continues to receive lease rent payments from the Malaysian government for their century-plus lease agreement on Sabah), it is ideally prudent to build high-rise buildings to house this section of the disadvantaged urban population. This project would go along with the need to provide for the many gainfully employed residents who barely get by with the monies they make for their sustenance, and having to get by with the good grace of their family or friends, ever-so tempting to bite the omnipresent apple of the local loan-sharks.

Zamboanga is proudly the #1 producer of sardines in the country, and it is also shamefully a top producer of human-sardines, in the sense of how a bounty of Zamboangueños are crowdedly housed like sardines in a can because they cannot afford to buy or rent a living space in their own city. There are NO high-rise dwellings that have ever been conceived, designed, or least built in Zamboanga to address their growing social problem of NO affordable low-cost housing.

NOTE: It would be very interesting, and socially important, to know how many of the current squatters, poor, home-less, job-less, or help-less city residents are from Zamboanga naturally (born & raised) OR decidedly relocated from elsewhere (by their own free choice) OR forcefully evacuated there, due to terrorism violence from outside the city. Zamboanga has become a safe haven for many evacuees, offering them its peaceful and prosperous way of life, reflecting centuries of fine tuning and dogmatically defending its self-made right to be, and do so, from either outside terrorists, dictator, or foreign occupation.

2-10 years

new Low-Cost, Low-Value Loan Bank

(Micro-Credit Social Economics)

$100 Million

Zamboanga's #2 business growth generator are its own industrious and independent business owners. From the lone fisherman, side walk vendor, to the pedi-cab driver. Creativity and ingenuity are striving and driving the under current of big business, and those self-motivated people need to get away from the loan sharks who eat up most of their earnings, forcing them into a cycle of debt and subsistence. It won't take much for them to make it to the next level if they were not forced to pay the high interest rates these unregulated loan sharks charge, the only source of low-value capital loans available to the underclass. Traditional banks do not recognize these hard working Zamboangueños, but without them, these banks would not exist because they are the major force that's driving Zamboanga's economy and making it the #1 GDP area in the country. Zamboanga is a prosperous City of micro entrepreneurs!

These low-cost (interest loans), low-value (small amounts) (LC-LV) loan institutions (or Banks) spread out in the barrios will help propel many industrious families into a life of decency and away from modern-day financial bondage to these loan sharks. All they need is a little break and a little extra help from a center of conscience that provides "micro-credit." Profit will be made from the people, but blood will not be drawn from their family's dinner table. A lot of little profit will spell a good amount of profit for the LC-LV project and the city can help get these loan centers or banks funded by the IMF or World Bank. The man who pioneered something similar in Bangladesh, Muhammad Yunus, 30 years ago just won the 2006 Nobel Peace prize along with his "humanitarian" bank, Grameen Bank, which became one of the fastest growing and profitable banks in their country. It can work for Zamboanga because it has worked elsewhere. It just needs to be implemented. Mayor, you should lead this valuable quest.

Update (6/21/07):

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, for listening to our quest. Your leadership in making these LC-LV loans we prescribed above to the industrious micro entrepreneurs of Zamboanga City is a model for others to achieve. As the city's leader, you are encompassing the essence of our proclamation above:

Invest in Zamboanga City!!!

We look forward to your continued support and we challenge others out there to join in this quest for financial emancipation of Zamboangueños who deserve that chance. Goodbye loan sharks!

10-20 years

*Mindanao is also responding to our plea for help:

(View report here)

new Agriculture Infrastructure, modern Technology & Production Techniques

$50 Million -

$100 Million

Zamboanga's agriculture industry is one of the most productive in the country because of the city's naturally favorable climatic conditions and location, and the minimal storm damage it receives, making its return on initial investment and production higher in ratio than most areas of the country. Meaning, higher profits for any investor.

It is quite amazing to note that most of everything that you plant in the city's rich, fertile soil grows naturally without much human intervention, except watering new plantings. It has been that way for centuries and is one of the main reasons why flowers were growing abundantly here when it was discovered, causing the city to be named the "place of flowers."

However, in spite of the blessed soil the Zamboangueño farmers establish their agriculture business on, their productivity level could be increased to possibly double their yield with the badly needed investment capital to help them attain that capacity. Without the infusion of new investment, the additional profits are passed on to the middlemen and beyond. Investing in Zamboanga's agriculture industry will stop the substantial bleeding of profits from the city and will maintain it here for the investors and farmers to gain from! Oh, the sweet taste of success!

One of the major agricultural products of Zamboanga is the sweet mango - the Zambo-Mango!

Mangoes from Zamboanga are some of the sweetest and biggest around, with more varieties grown here than in many places in the world! Mangoes are some of the most tropical of fruits available in the supermarkets today and their healthy benefits are world-renowned. It's market life and value can be increased in more ways than one, but the local infrastructure for that capacity is pretty much limited to one for Zamboanga growers - fresh! Although fresh mangoes are eaten more than any other fruit in the world, the local growers do not benefit from available modern technology that can help them attain more life and profit from the mangoes, and many other tropical fruits that are grown in Zamboanga.

New investment in processing plants, technology, and production techniques will need to be infused here with strict compliance to international standards. The local conditions are ripe for these types of capital expenditures and their return-on-investment (ROI) can be significant. The ROI for the city will be the increased greening of Zamboanga, not just the bucks, which will help clean its air from the increased pollution from traffic emissions. Agriculture is one of the biggest source of income for the Zamboangueños, along with seafood and marine agriculture, or seaweed.

Seaweed farming in Zamboanga is another big source of revenue for the city and, once again, Zamboanga is a top producer and supplies majority of the world's needs. Innovation and increased yield are required to stem the tide of foreign competition on its higher quality product. Investors are already guaranteed the #1 producer in the world in Zamboanga (The Philippines is the #1 producer country in the world with about 80% market capacity, and Zamboanga controls 70-80% of the Philippine production) and will profit immediately from their investments. Again, the middlemen can be eliminated by the investors in helping fund the creation of processing plants here according to world standards and ship the higher-value Carrageenan byproducts to a built-in multi-billion dollar world market!

The total global market value of Carrageenan products annually made by a few multi-national corporations is about USD $10 billion and is growing at 3–5% per year, according to BioOne research statistics. As the Asian and Western countries' population get older, they will rely more on processed foods for human, and their pets, consumption and Carrageenan is highly valued in the applications used in their production. Most types of Carrageenan usage are for dairy and meat products, water-based foods, pet foods, air freshener gels, toothpaste and cosmetics.

Important NOTE: There is a crucial unknown factor that we want to highlight here because it brings local, national, and global ramifications. The seaweed product and the producers of the byproducts are usually the ones who get the attention, but we want to bring critical focus to the actual marine farmers who grow and harvest the best seaweed in the world - the Moros. They are the #1 farmers of the #1 seaweed type used for the #1 Carrageenan quality in the world that is the #1 key additive used in majority of the human and pet food processing and personal care products, including pharmaceuticals, around the world for many decades now!!! The Zamboangueño Moros are the #1 unsung heroes of this global industry in our book! Yet, as much as their daily efforts help human kind on a scale beyond their level of education and comprehension, there is no discernible effort to help the Moros arise from their languishing hardship from the same people their profound toil helps. We want to challenge those multi- nationals and their governments to invest directly in the barrios of Zamboanga where those Moro seaweed farmers come from and build processing plants nearby, along with necessary infrastructure to help educate and employ their people. Additional investments should be made for the expansion of seaweed farming towards the other Moro populated areas along the very fertile Moro Gulf waters of Mindanao Island, our neighboring Basilan Island and the Sulu Archipelago chain of islands. This can help ensure the future growth and profitability of the farmers, producers and their global customers. Helping raise the standard of living, skills and education of the Moros can bring economical and social change for the betterment of a people and place. May profit and peace be with us all. Invest in Zamboanga!!! Bienvenidos!

2-5 years

Zambo-Eco Tourism: The next best idea!

$25 Million -

$50 Million

Zamboanga City IS the City of Flowers! It has always been that way and it will continue to flourish in that fashion. It is appropriate for this next investment priority to follow the agriculture industry in #8, "because of the city's naturally favorable climatic conditions and location." How many tropical flowers grow in La Bella and how many are unique to the area or the country. How many trees? How many corals? How many marine species or plants? How many mountains or islands? How many beaches or bodies of water? How many natural or historical landmarks?

How much money can be made from these local pluralities and still maintain a green future for the city? Look around you... what you normally "see" is what will help propel Zamboanga into a unique tourist destination and will help others envision a piece of paradise they would want to participate in.

The current stable of "tourist attractions" in Zamboanga covers about 5-10% of the city's land mass, while the "Zambo-Eco Tourism" encompasses about 70-80% of the entire city! This project will help employ thousands of Zamboangueños who already live and work in the areas of this eco-tourism zone, helping to supplement their income or become their major source when implementation is a success. The city's Tourism office will need to coordinate with the Mayor's office in soliciting home owners within the Zambo-Eco Tourism zone to apply for a special eco-tourism operating license with the city and provide them with some capital to certify their homes as live-board "pension homes" for the future eco-tourists. This will help the city monitor eco-tourism statistics and help implement any needed updates or improvements based on tourists' feedback.

The city engineer's office will need to use their own surveyors, or hire a consultant surveyor from another country who has experience in defining and establishing the types of trails to interact with the highlights of Zamboanga's many unique natural attractions. The eco-tourism trails will be the most important aspect of this endeavor.

More to come...

1-10 years