AS the government seeks to develop the Philippine creative economy, animation firms are moving to expand their pool of talents by 15 percent over the next three years to boost the capacity of their industry.
Animation Council of the Philippines Inc. President Juan Miguel del Rosario said the animation industry is on its way to increasing its labor count, as it found better backing from the government. Del Rosario claimed there is a need for more talents at present with international studios now paying attention to Filipino animation.
“The [six] major studios in the Philippines, which are primarily service providers, comprise about 75 percent of the total industry. They themselves have about 12,000 artists working both in production and creative stuff,” del Rosario told reporters in a recent interview.
“We would like to grow that between 15 percent and 18 percent [by] 2022,” he added.
Philippine animation recorded $29.7 million in revenue in 2016, of which $10 million was generated by animated films. Del Rosario said the industry is growing annually at about 10 percent to 12 percent.
“And I am being conservative about that,” he was quick to add, “[because] I know of studios that have grown as much as 40 percent between 2016 and 2017 and another 15 percent between 2017 and 2018.”
The industry leader claimed there is now enough support to animation coming from the government, especially with authorities apparently seeing its potential to lead the surge of the creative economy.
“Animation is in the forefront of that because we have been there for 30 years now. Animation quite honestly is an easy vehicle to typify what a creative economy is,” he said.