DUBAI: The Philippine government is keeping its target for tourist arrivals this year despite the closure of Boracay Island, one of the country’s major magnets for foreign visitors.
“[Our target tourist arrivals] is still the same, 7.5 million [this year]. We’re hoping we will be able to [reach] the target,” newly appointed tourism secretary Bernadette Fatima Romulo Puyat said during her confirmation hearing on Wednesday.
The world-renowned Boracay Island, located in central Philippines, received over two million tourists last year, with foreign visitors coming mostly from China, South Korea and Taiwan. Tourist spending in the island also rose 14.83 in 2017 to 56.15 billion pesos ($1.07 billion) from 48.9 billion pesos the previous year.
The Philippine government has implemented a six-month closure of Boracay, named in 2016 as the world’s best island by Condé Nast Traveler’s 2016 Readers’ Choice Awards, over concerns the island’s famous white sand beaches and turquoise waters have become a ‘cesspool’ because of environmental abuse.
No tourists – domestic or foreign – are allowed entry into the island during its half-year clean up and rehabilitation.
“Almost all our canceled bookings were for Boracay; our business was affected by the refunds we have to give our clients,” tourism operator Izrael Felipe G. Nilo, Jr. told Arab News. “Hopefully the closure [of Boracay] will be lifted by October, or even earlier.”
Tourists are now diverting into alternative destinations with Boracay closed, Nilo added.
Tourism chief Romulo Puyat also said her department would be promoting these alternative destinations and “a lot of them [tourists] have already diverted to Cebu, Siargao and Bohol.”
She also committed “to prioritize improving polices on access, connectivity and security as well as enhance programs on tourism infrastructure.”
Cebu is home to the Sinulog Festival and whale shark watching in Oslob; Siargao is considered the Philippines’ surfing capital while Bohol boasts of the tarsier – the world’s smallest primate – the Chocolate Hills and Panglao’s beaches, which are comparable to that of Boracay’s.
