SANTA ROSA, Laguna – The unemployment rate in the Calabarzon Region remained relatively low at 5.5 percent as of the Philippine Statistics Authority’s (PSA) survey in April.
The same survey also showed that the five-province region had an underemployment rate of 13.3 percent.
The numbers will continue to improve with the opening of yet another digital infrastructure hub here, the Vitro Sta. Rosa Data Center of ePLDT, a subsidiary of telecommunications firm PLDT.
In an email to the Philippine News Agency (PNA), Gary Ignacio, ePLDT’s chief data center officer, said aside from new jobs, the facility “is expected to generate economic opportunities by pushing land values and bringing in additional revenue streams for our host community.”
“As a data center designed to cater to hyperscalers, VSR is likely to attract significant investments from international companies,” he said.
Ignacio said the data center is already bringing new employment opportunities as it is being built.
He said it will continue until it becomes fully operational in 2024, requiring skilled personnel to manage and maintain its facilities.
Hyperscalers are large cloud service providers that can provide services such as computing and storage at enterprise scale.
Meanwhile, the Trade Union Congress of the Philippines urged President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. to pioneer measures safeguarding the rights of workers to freedom of association in the modern digital economy.
“Digital transformation ushers in new, higher quality, and more meaningful jobs through improved productivity due to modern technologies. Massive upskilling and reskilling of workers is key to seizing these new job opportunities,” the union said in a Friday statement. (PNA)
