Cebu could be next creative entertainment hub in PH

 MINERVA BC NEWMAN

CEBU CITY – The creative entertainment industry sector and its stakeholders noted that Cebu could be the next creative entertainment hub in the country and is expected to achieve P500 million annual revenue in the next two years and over P30 billion by 2030.

According to Mario Panganiban, a trustee of the Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCCI) and president of Toon City Academy in Cebu that creativity is in the DNA of Cebuanos and Cebu has a vibrant creative entertainment subsector, including radio dramas, Visayan-language movies and music, among others.

“We are naturally creative. We like to entertain. We like to perform,” he shared this during the virtual launching of the Creative Entertainment Week (CEW) on Sept. 27 as among the activities of the 2021 Cebu Business Month (CBM), an annual event organized by CCCI.

Panganiban cited as an example the holding of the Cebu Pop Music Festival, which had generated original Visayan songs in 1981; there were also Visayan language drama series aired over the radio, a popular entertainment at the time and he recalled that Cebu had been making films in the 1960s.

He added that Cebu and other areas in the Visayas and Mindanao had a very prolific comics industry published in the local language.

“After realizing that we are behind and we have big potential, we have to push the creative entertainment sector and that’s the reason we have the Creative Entertainment Week (CEW). When we really look at the global figure, even Manila, we’re getting to be behind in a field where we have a natural advantage,” Panganiban pointed out.

 Need to develop animation and gaming industries in Cebu

Meanwhile Animation Council of the Philippines Inc. (ACPI) president Juan Miguel del Rosario revealed that while the global value of animation is $270 billion, the Philippines only accounts for between $20 million to $30 million in revenues as of 2020.

“Our hope is ultimately that by 2030 the Philippines will be a premier destination of animation in Southeast Asia, adding that ACPI wants to make Cebu a major provider of animation in the Philippines,” as Del Rosario noted that there are existing creative businesses in Cebu that are very successful and global.

He said that the country’s animation industry has registered 5.5 percent growth per year with five major studios supplying 75 percent of the country's total revenues. The Philippines services Japan, Germany, United Kingdom, France, United States and Canada.

The gaming industry is another huge creative sector, according to James Lo, president of Game Developers Association of the Philippines (GDAP) that country’s game companies have been involved in the creation of high-quality games.

“If you’re familiar with Playstation or the Xbox or the Nintendo Switch, and so on, these are what we call consoles. We call them the category of Triple A and basically the best of the best. I proudly announce that a lot of our game companies that are focused on animation and game assets, they actually provide all of these,” Lo revealed.

A number of games that are played on the different consoles, some of those games are actually the art assets, the environment, maps, the characters, the animations, effects are actually done here in the Philippines, Lo said.

Lo bared that in 2020, the global games market reached $86.3 billion for Mobile Devices and P37.4 billion for personal computers.  Of this amount, Asia Pacific share is at $74.8 billion while Filipinos spending on games reached $572 million.

“There are many, many opportunities in the game industry and I am happy to sit down with you and talk about all these opportunities,” Lo stated.

Panganiban noted that these targets and developments for Cebu’s creative entertainment industry as the next economic driver can be achieved with the support of the Creative Industries Development bill, the City of Cebu, and the support of partners such as the Animation Council of the Philippines Inc. (ACPI), the Creative Content Creators Association of the Philippines (SIKAP), Game Developers Association of the Philippines (GDAP), Film Development Council of the Philippines, Cultural Center of the Philippines, and other government agencies.

CCCI Immediate Past President Virgilio Espeleta believes that CEW paves the way for the Cebuanos to perceive shared challenges within the creative sectors, and to ponder on the best strategies that CCCI and other sectors can adopt in proactively finding support, programs, and interventions for the artists.

Espelita said that CEW is an exceptional example of collaboration and cooperation of the business community, the government, private sectors and organizations can work as one under one goal to support our artisans. (Photos: Google Images)