CDB signed an Memorandum of Understanding that will help implement the New Clark City Project (Linked to Project ID#64749, #63610, #63593)

On November 26th, 2017, the Philippines and Chinese governments signed a memorandum of understanding for the Clark Industrial Park Project (or the "New Clark City Industrial Park Project"). In the MoU, China committed to developing the industrial park and bring in Chinese investors. On November 19th 2018, China Energy Construction Co. Ltd. and the Philippines representative signed an agreement for the Clark Industrial Park Project. The China Gezhouba Group Company Limited (CGGC) has also signed an MoU for the project with the also partnered to develop the Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA). On January 7, 2018, a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed between the Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA) and China Development Bank (CDB) for a framework agreement for financing cooperation. The agreement would allocate money for projects under the "Build Build Build" initiative, specifically "high impact infrastructure projects," such as the New Clark City Project. New Clark City aims to be the country's first smart, green and disaster-resilient metropolis. For this project, China sought to build one or multiple "industrial parks" across the Philippines to facilitate Chinese investment. China sought to construct an industrial park on 1,000 hectares of land, but the Philippines could only provide 300-500 hectares of land for the project. China wants to build the project in New Clark City because of its connectivity to the airport and the area's adjacent infrastructure. This project is located in New Clark Town, Pampanga Province, in the northern part of the Philippines. The park covers an area of about 500 hectares and is planned to be commercial, industrial, residential and mixed, with high-tech and manufacturing industries.. Construction will start in 2020 and the first phase of the estate is expected to be completed in around one to one and a half years.. According to "The Philippines is building a green, disaster-resilient city," the first phase of the construction is expected to be completed in 2022, with the entire project taking "at least 30 years to finish." Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA) began the construction of the initial phase of New Clark City (NCC), a 9,450-hectare smart city, in January 2018 in the hills of Capas town in Tarlac province. The construction threatens to displace at least 65,000 people from 12 villages, including some 18,000 indigenous people who belong to the Aeta tribe. At least 300 families were evicted when a sports complex in the Phase 1-A of NCC was built. The massive sports complex includes a stadium, an aquatic center, and an athlete’s village where delegates to the 2019 Southeast Asian Games were housed. On December 2, 2019, at least 500 families from the Aeta tribe in Aranguren village in Capas town were given a seven-day notice to evacuate from their lands to make way for the construction of the access road from NCC to Clark International Airport. The BCDA offered the affected communities some $5,900 per hectare of land and relocation sites, but did not disclose where the Aetas would move to, and some Aetas report that claimants who have accepted this money are not actually from their clan or ancestral lands. The Aeta community was told to evacuate by mid-to-late December 2019, but no one came to evict them.

Additional details

1. This project is linked to umbrella project ID#64749, the financing cooperation with the CDB that would fund this project, and subsidiary infrastructure projects also potentially funded by the agreement; project ID#63610, the Subic City Railway project, and project ID#63593, BGC-NAIA-Makati Bus Rapid Transit project.

Number of official sources

9

Number of total sources

26