Cebu province eyeing on adventure tourism

CEBU, Philippines — The Cebu Provincial Tourism Office seeks to further develop the adventure tourism in the province.

Provincial tourism officer Joselito Costas in a recent interview said they seek to develop more tourist destinations in the province this year, as he also emphasized the need to ensure adventure safety among tourists.

The Cebu tourism office continues its training of various local government units (LGUs) on sustainable tourism.

The tourism office allots P6-million budget this year for the training of LGUs and development of new tourist sites.

At the same time, the PTO will be hiring a person who will be in charge of developing adventure tourism sites in the province.

Being one of the top tourist destinations in the country, Cebu offers various adventure activities to travelers such as sky diving, canyoneering, scuba diving, cliff diving, rock climbing, sky biking, wakeboarding, and snorkeling, among others.

Costas said tourist safety has to be improved especially with the emergence of new outdoor adventure activities.

“We want it to be safe. We are calling stakeholders especially in towns with heavy tourist traffic to institute programs,” he said.

The tourism office is likewise looking to develop Cebu’s faith tourism as it anticipates 2021 when the province is set to be a center in the celebration of the 500th year since the first navigation around the globe by Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan as well as the 500th year of Christianization in the Philippines.

Costas noted they plan to improve cultural and heritage sites in Cebu such as churches as well as boost the value chain of faith tourism.

He projected an influx of tourists in Cebu by 2021 with the celebration of the event, especially Catholics and those coming from European nations.

According to data from the Department of Tourism in Central Visayas, Cebu’s tourist arrivals hit 2.25 million in the first half of 2017.

Earlier, DOT regional director Shalimar Tamano said he was bullish on the continued growth of Cebu’s tourism industry with the opening of the Terminal 2 of the Mactan-Cebu International Airport middle this year.

"It's tempting to say that there is no other way but up for tourism in Cebu, and in the rest of Central Visayas," Tamano had noted.

DOT data also showed 2.98 million visitors came to the region between January to June 2017, down by 3.85 percent from the 3.10 million arrivals recorded during the first six months of 2016.

The region’s top five foreign markets in terms of tourist volume for the covered period are Korea (402,858), Japan (183,644), China (171,197), USA (106,075) and Australia (32,396).

Arrivals from Korea, Japan and China posted positive growth at 2.31 percent, 2.82 percent and 55.54 percent, respectively. The number of visitors from the US and Australia, meanwhile, dropped by 4.26 percent and 64.14 percent, respectively. (FREEMAN)