The Philippines: Mr. Five-Year Plan

On a spit of land overlooking Manila Bay, a glistening, 205-ft. tower spewed steam one day last week—and the technicians who watched could hardly have been more excited if they had just launched a moon rocket. The tower is the heart of the first oil refinery in southeast Asia to be controlled and managed by Asians. Sprawled across 230 acres 22 miles south of Manila, the Filoil refinery will ultimately turn out 17,000 barrels of high-octane gasoline and other products daily. “This,” said Filoil President Ramon V. del Rosario. “is a dream come true.”

Characteristically, when the $17.5 million refinery was tested last week, lean, amiable Del Rosario, 44, was halfway across the world in Manhattan, lining up investors for a chemical fertilizer plant to be built near the refinery. The refinery should save enough foreign exchange for oil imports to pay for itself in four years. The fertilizer plant will supply 60,000 tons of urea that now have to be bought abroad.

Brave New Band. Del Rosario himself is a sort of walking five-year plan. In addition to running Filoil Refinery Corp., he is president of Filoil Marketing, which started with one service station in 1960, now has 200. Del Rosario is president of International Electric Appliance Co.. Inc., organized two months ago to assemble General Electric appliances. He is chairman of Del Rosario Brothers Industries, which has a majority interest in the appliance company and in a pioneering credit company (of which he is president). He is also president of Philippine Investment-Management Consultants, Inc.. which has put together such deals as the refinery, a cement plant and a glass company—and pockets handsome profits for its services. In all, Del Rosario and his three brothers run industries worth $50 million. With careers based on ability and integrity, rather than pull and inherited millions, they personify a brave new band of Filipino industrialists.

Del Rosario’s grandfather founded Manila’s first Western-style undertaking parlor. Little interested in burying as a career, Del Rosario joined IBM-Philippines after college, eventually became the IBM subsidiary’s vice president and general manager. By 1951 he had decided that business machines “did not mean too much in improving the lot of the Filipino masses.” He left IBM. became executive vice president of Philippine-American Life Insurance Co. In 1953, after the Del Rosario brothers decided to operate on their own, they got a franchise to distribute International Harvester refrigerators. Cracks Ramon: “All we knew about refrigerators was how to open the door.”

More than Money. One good company led to another. As they grew, the brothers persuaded U.S. capital to join them on a minority basis. “Even if we had the necessary capital ourselves,” says Del Rosario, “we would still look for partners like these. They have vast research facilities, technical services and marketing know-how.”

After he gets his fertilizer plant, Del Rosario hopes to start a petrochemical industry. He explains: “It’s not a case of pyramiding companies merely to make money. We’re a new country and we must rely on selfhelp. Today 72% of our population [27.5 million] are under 30 years of age. These young people are going abroad and getting educated. I’d like them to come back home and look at me and say, ‘Why, he’s only a Filipino like I am. If he can do it, I can do it too.’ “