MANILA - Lance Gokongwei, Chairman of the Gokongwei Group, said he sees a more challenging second half of the year due to inflation and high interest rates.

At the sideline of the Gokongwei Brothers Foundation anniversary, Gokongwei said first half revenues are good, but the second half of 2023 could be more difficult.

• JG Summit net income soars to P9.5B in first half of 2023

"Second half will be challenging because of some... delayed effects of higher interest rates. Also, we're seeing some inflationary pressures as well," said Gokongwei.

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas on Thursday kept its benchmark rate at 6.25 percent, but raised its inflation forecast for the year.

While inflation is expected to return to the target range of 2 to 4 percent by the end of the year, the BSP noted that inflation may be affected by recent oil price hikes, wage hikes and continuing food supply problems, as well as the El Nino phenomenon.

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Gokongwei meanwhile said he is still hopeful for growth for the economy saying the government is doing good in enticing investors from abroad.

He said is also banking on post pandemic spending as Filipinos go back to the 'normal life'.

"It's really more normal life, normal economic growth. Just people going back to what people do which is they want to meet their family, they want to meet their friends, they want to go back to school, they want to go back to work," he said.

The Gokongweis' JG Summit Holdings last week reported core net income reached P9.5 billion in the first half of 2023, a nearly sevenfold increase from the P1.4 billion it earned in the same period last year.

STEM IS THE WAY

The Gokongwei Brothers Foundation (GBF) celebrated its 30th year with a vow to continue helping the education sector in the country.

Gokongwei, Chairman of the Gokongwei Group, said they remain committed to support students, specifically in STEM or science, technology, engineering, and math. He believed that STEM is the driving force behind sustainable national development.

"Our vision is really to support more STEM education in the country. We believe science, technology, engineering, and math are really fundamentals for a country's growth," said Gokongwei to ABS-CBN News.

Aside from students, Gokongwei also put an emphasis on supporting teachers believing that helping educators will have a positive ripple effect to the nation.

"Help teachers really become... achieve better teaching methodology, have access to technology, have access to continuous learning," said Gokongwei.

This was echoed by the last surviving founding brothers of GBF, James Go, who is also President of GBF. He said, "We want to teach teachers, help them, enable them to do better in teaching skills."

GBF has helped 10,000 students and teachers in 2022 in various projects and will have 1,000 scholars enrolled in the current academic year by the end of 2023.

It also granted endowments to educational institutions such as the Ateneo de Manila Univetsity, which now houses the John Gokongwei School of Management and the Gokongwei Brothets School of Education and Learning Design, and the De La Salle University, which houses the Gokongwei College of Engineering.

The Gokongwei Group includes Robinsons Malls, Universal Robina Corporation, Cebu Pacific, among many others. JG Summit Holdings has reported core net income reached P9.5 billion in the first half of 2023.