New tourism dev’t program to unroll soon

THE TOURISM Congress can get going as soon as it can prove it truly represents all tourism enterprises. Otherwise its recommendations to the Department of Tourism, Tourism Infrastructure and Enterprise Zone Authority, the Tourism Promotions Board and other tourism bodies will be unrepresentative of the best intentions and ideas of the tourism enterprises and stakeholders taken as a whole.

The present Tourism Congress should therefore give Tourism Secretary Alberto Lim a free hand to transform the Tourism Congress into the true representative of all tourism enterprises.

Also, too much has been said by the present Tourism Congress of the so-called slow rate of change in tourism-related concerns such as transportation, infrastructure, security etc.

One should be held responsible and accountable for a task in the light of the authority and resources he has to undertake such a task. The Department of Tourism, the Department of Transportation and Communications, the Department of Public Works and Highways, the Manila International Airport Authority, the Philippine National Police, etc. have their respective short-term and long-term obligations and objectives that can have an impact on tourism. It is unfair for the present Tourism Congress to blame Secretary Lim and make him accountable for matters beyond his control and authority.

Lim is going to present a new Tourism Development Master Plan this July or August. Prepared in close consultation with many focus groups across all stakeholder sectors, the new plan envisions to attract billions of pesos of new tourism-related investments (especially in infrastructure, transportation and training), and to create jobs and livelihood for millions of Filipinos from Batanes to Sibutu.

The master plan provides a roadmap by which the resources, creativity and discipline of the government and private sectors, both local and international, can be harnessed to boost Philippine tourism, retirement migration, employment and income. In the last 20 years, the Tourism Development Master Plan was never revised, updated and upgraded as thoroughly as now.

—VEREDIGNO ATIENZA, [email protected]