THE country is losing thousands of potential German tourists to Indonesia and Thailand every week because big tour operators in Germany are currently avoiding the Philippines due to the absence of international airports in key tourist destinations here.

Juergen Warnke, president of the German Club and board member of the newly formed German-Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said the Philippines is currently attracting only about 60,000 German tourists per year due to this hindrance as compared with  Thailand, which was visited by about 1.5 million Germans last year.

Warnke said although there are places in the country that are already popular to Germans such as Palawan, Bohol, Puerto Galera, Dumaguete and Boracay, big tour operators could not offer them on group-tours basis because direct charter flights from Germany to these islands could not be arranged due to the absence of the big airports.

“It does not make sense for them to bring these charter planes to Manila and then start taking smaller planes to send them out. It is too complicated. They must go straight to a big airport which is in the middle of a small island and where the beaches are, so within one hour they can reach by bus their different hotels,” Warnke told the BusinessMirror.

The lack of hotel accommodations and road systems in these prime tourist spots compound the problem.

Warnke said the government should start investing for these international airports and roads and the hotel investors will certainly follow.

Bali, he noted, also started small but became a top tourist destination when it had its own international airport. He said although Mactan in Cebu has its international airport, the province is already too crowded with Japanese, Koreans and other Asian tourists, which is why no European company wants to fly to Cebu right now.

So, unlike Thailand and Indonesia, which welcome Germans by charter planes several times a day, the Philippines is only being promoted in Germany as a niche market.

“It’s just on a smaller scale. The individual travelers come here through Manila and then take small planes to the beach resorts,” he said.

With a big airport, Warnke said Palawan—where he owns two beach resorts—can increase German tourist arrivals by up to a hundred thousand individuals in a span of two years as the charter planes start coming in.

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A GROUP of German investors in the Philippines said the political infrastructure in the government plays a major hindrance in attracting more investments into the country, citing the absence of a resolution to the long-delayed opening of the $450-million Terminal 3 of the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (Naia).

THE country is losing thousands of potential German tourists to Indonesia and Thailand every week because big tour operators in Germany are currently avoiding the Philippines due to the absence of international airports in key tourist destinations here.

The Philippines has lifted the temporary ban it imposed on the importation of domestic and wild birds and their products including poultry meat, day-old chicks and eggs originating from Germany.

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PATRIOTISM,” simply, is the love for one’s own country. It is a term generally used to describe: (1) the attitude that the members of a nation have when they care about their national identity, and (2) the actions that the members of a nation take when seeking to achieve (or sustain) independence/self-determination.