FILIPINOS’ love affair with good food—served in restaurants or via mobile services—helped heap cash for four regions in 2016, data from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) revealed.
The National Capital Region generated a total income of P182.8 billion, almost half of the total income for the food sector. This was followed by Central Visayas with P29.6 billion, Central Luzon with P26.8 billion and Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal and Quezon) with P25.3 billion.
“Restaurants and mobile food-service activities was the top contributor with total income of P242.1 billion or 65.7 percent of the total income for the sector,” the PSA said.
The three regions also recorded the largest expense in 2016 with NCR recording expenses worth P186.7 billion. This also accounted for more than half of the total expense of the sector.
The expenses of the other three regions Central Visayas, Central Luzon and Calabarzon reached P24.7 billion or 7.9 percent, P22.7 billion or 7.3 percent, P20 billion or 6.4 percent, respectively.
“Among industries, restaurant and mobile food-service activities incurred the highest share in expense amounting to P207.7 billion or 66.5 percent,” the PSA said.
Firms engaged in accommodation and food services with a total employment of 20 and over reached P368.3 billion in 2016.
Apart from food, top earners in the sector were accommodation activities with P112.5 billion, or 30.5 percent, and beverage-serving activities placed third with P6.9 billion, or 1.9 percent of the total.
The PSA said, however, that other accommodation had the least share in income with P77.3 million, or 0.02 percent of the total in 2016.
In terms of expense, the PSA said the sector’s total reached P312.3 billion in 2016.
Apart from restaurants, other industries that posted high expenditures were short-term accommodation activities spent a total of P93 billion, or 29.8 percent and beverage serving activities came next with P6.2 billion or 2 percent.
The remaining P5.4 billion, or 1.7 percent were incurred by event catering and other food-service activities with P5.3 billion and other accommodation, P73.6 million.
In 2016 PSA data showed restaurants and mobile food-service activities led the sector with 4,312 establishments accounting for 72.2 percent of the total number of establishments.
This was followed by short-term accommodation activities with 1,279 establishments which accounted for 21.4 percent and beverage serving activities with 285 establishments or 4.8 percent.
“Combined total number of establishments for event catering and other food-service activities, and other accommodation was registered at 95 [1.6 percent],” the PSA said.
The data was based on the preliminary results of the 2016 Annual Survey of Philippine Business and Industry for the formal sector of the economy.
It showed that a total of 5,971 establishments with total employment of 20 and over were engaged in accommodation and food-service activities.