CEBU, Philippines -
The sudden boom of the tourism industry in the past few years comes as a “pleasant surprise,” this according to Department of Tourism Secretary Joseph Ace Durano.
Durano shared during a recent interview with the media that they are looking forward to the continuous growth of the sector for this year in which he said they will be hitting 7 million in terms of tourist traffic going to all the destinations in the country.
According to Durano, this is definitely a good indication of the development of the industry basing on the numbers in the past particularly in 2004 where they had a projected 5 million growth in terms of tourist arrivals for 2010.
“In terms of the growth we were working for, I think it has been a pleasant surprise.”
He said that there have been a lot of welcomed surprises for the industry like the P500,050 billion in tourism investments which they did not expect.
Durano added that he also did not expect that since he started, there will be so many new hotels that has greatly helped the accommodation of the increase of tourists both from local and foreign markets.
Likewise, Durano said he didn’t expect the country would become a popular destination in just a short period of time as far as the new markets are concerned like Russia.
“It surpassed our expectation.”
But Durano said that regardless of the positive results, it is still important to address the concerns that could greatly affect the whole country and not just the tourist industry.
This including the environmental concern, which Durano said may not pose as a threat for the present time to the people and other government officials who think that it would not create damage in the near future.
“These are realities that were not part at all of our planning and for the sustainability in our country,” he said adding that most of the tourist destinations are in the coast line and could be greatly damaged if sea water level continues to rise due to climate change.
“The most difficult thing is the fact that it still has not sunk in to lot of leaders and individuals and a lot of people think that it is a future event.”
Durano said that therefore it is important to spread the information and educate the people on what is happening. He stressed that it all starts in education and convincing the people to take part in environmental concern and engagement in activities that would protect the world in general.Source:The Freeman Cebu
