By: Johnny Dayang
In cooperation with the Zambales Provincial Government, the Publishers Association of the Philippines, Inc. (PAPI) holds its 22nd National Press Congress, mandated under Presidential Proclamation No. 1187, on December 1-3, this year at the Balin Sambali Conference facility in Iba, Zambales. It will have “Towards a Stronger Media and Tourism Partnership for Socio-economic Development.” for its theme.
The spotlight on tourism by the PAPI event is certainly not whimsical. Tourism is one industry the Philippines can immensely profit from. No country has lost is its tourism investments. This has been proven by Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Macau and Hongkong and Vietnam among others. Here at home it has amply been validated by the experiences of Albay, Baguio, Boracay, Palawan, Tagaytay and several others.
Our top foreign tourism inflow sources are South Korea, China, US and Japan. Only recently, the Philippines has made a strong tourism pitch at the World Travel Market event in London to tap the UK market. With the improving relations between Manila and Beijing, Chinese tourist arrivals this year is projected to top the ONE MILLION mark.
Interestingly, the Philippines may hit its 7-million tourist-arrivals target this year. The 2016 figure was 5.97 million. Department of Tourism records show over 4.5 million tourists have already visited our country as of last August. The figure must have already swelled significantly with the thousands of foreign arrivals during the recently concluded Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) leaders’ summit and related meetings the country hosted.
Albay’s tourism gains should inspire other LGUs. From a measly 8,700 foreign tourist arrivals in 2006, the province recorded 374.949 foreign tourists inflow in 2015. Domestic tourists swelled to 1,417,646 last year from only 124,675 in 2006. This huge tourism hike significantly contributed to the growth of Albay’s local economy and helped reduce the province’s poverty incidence to 15% today from 41% in 2007 as recently reported by the Philippine Statistics Authority. Much of these gains have been achieved during the three-term governorship of now Congressman Salceda from 2007 to 2016.
Salceda, currently senior vice chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, has expressed confidence Albay’s tourism, supported by related programs in place, will continue to prosper and hit its goal of five million tourists and US$ 1 billion investments shortly.
Tourism can indeed contribute significantly towards realizing inclusive economic growth which is definitely not an impossible dream.
