Officials of Clark Development Corp., which oversees development of this special economic zone north of Manila, and the SM group’s Premier Central Inc. have signed a lease agreement allowing the latter to start a P500-million expansion project for SM City Clark mall here.

The expansion project of Premier Central, the property development arm here of the SM group of the mall magnate Henry Sy Sr., comes five years after the mall was opened in 2003.

Clark Development president Levy Laus and Premier Central president Henry Sy Jr. signed last Wednesday the lease agreement for a 5.5-hectare land near the mall.

Under the agreement, Premier Central will put up and operate a mixed-use facility for office, retail, commercial, leisure, entertainment and hotel and other tourism-related projects.

It expects that it will hire some 2,000 employees see the expansion project through.

Clark Development expects Premier Central to hire 70 percent of its workers from the Central Luzon region.

Clark Development gave Premier Central a minimum guaranteed lease of US{BodyText}.30 a square meter a month starting on the third year.

The rate will increase by 10 percent on the eighth year and every three years after.

Premier Central’s first lease contract, for 25 years and renewable for another 25 years, covered 16.5 hectares where the mall is located.

The original agreement provided that Clark Development would grant Premier Central in five years the option to lease the adjoining 5.5 hectares, Clark Development said in a statement.

Laus said Premier Central’s additional investments would boost Clark’s growth. Total investments in this free port has hit P80 billion, an increase of 600 percent from the 2007 level.

More than 50,000 workers are employed in the over 200 enterprises operating in the Clark Freeport, Laus said.