(Daily Tribune) Trade Secretary Fred Pascual has big plans for the domestic electric vehicle (EV) industry, calling on local suppliers to manufacture EV parts and components and investors to invest in EV in the country.

“I want Philippine manufacturers and small and medium enterprises to become suppliers of parts and components and to be part of the global value chain. We will come to a stage where we will assemble the vehicles here. However, we are not yet there because there are so many preconditions to bringing in vehicles here,” Pascual told reporters at Thursday’s Management Association of the Philippines membership meeting

More importantly, the trade chief added that setting up charging stations in strategic areas across the country would play a crucial role in the development of the local EV sector, “otherwise, there will be no buyers as users cannot bring their EV outside Metro Manila.”

He said the government had laid the groundwork to simplify the process of setting up manufacturing plants, including the passage of the Ease of Doing Business and Republic Act No. 11697 or the Electric Vehicle Industry Development Act (EVIDA) in May 2022.