By Ma. Stella F. Arnaldo / Special to the BusinessMirror
A BEVY of foreign beauties will be descending on the major tourism destinations in the country when the Miss Universe beauty contest is held in January 2017.
In a hastily called press conference on Thursday, Tourism Secretary Wanda Corazon T. Teo said “it’s 100-percent [go]” for the popular beauty pageant, which will be telecast live around the world on January 30.
She added that President Duterte wants the pageant to be held “in the provinces to avoid traffic here [in Metro Manila]. He doesn’t want to inconvenience the people here.”
She also said Mr. Duterte will be meeting with the National Security Council to draw up the security plans for the beauty pageant, which will have some 100 contestants from around the world, aside from members of the Miss Universe Organization, Manila organizers, sponsors and other VIP guests.
Teo again stressed that “the government is not going to spend a single centavo on this. We have a lot of private-sector [individuals and enterprises] interested in the Miss Universe beauty pageant.”
She called the news conference to dispel rumors arising from a recent published report (not in the BusinessMirror) that Mr. Duterte said holding the Miss Universe beauty pageant was “not a priority” for his administration, and that he wouldn’t spend money on the project.
According to Tourism Undersecretary for Media Affairs Katherine de Castro, the total cost holding the beauty pageant in the Philippines is $11 million (P518.76 million). She said this includes “franchise fee and the production cost.”
Some of the interested financiers include Okada Manila, the integrated casino and resort project of Japanese billionaire Kazuo Okada at the Pagcor Entertainment City in Pasay; and the Sy family, who owns the Mall of Asia Arena, where the main pageant is supposed to be held.
The tourism chief added that she is just waiting for Malacañang to issue an executive order formalizing the holding of the beauty contest.
“Once it is announced that the Miss Universe pageant in 2017 will be held here, everyone will be looking where the Philippines is…I’m sure we’re going to have increased tourist arrivals,” Teo said.
She added that the tourism destinations being considered for inclusion in the pageant are Davao, Cagayan de Oro, Boracay, Cebu, Palawan and Vigan.
Tourism studies show that being a mainly US production, the Miss Universe pageant is most popular among Americans, than in any other market. The US is consistently the second-largest market of foreign visitors to the Philippines. Of the 5.3 million total visitor arrivals in 2015, the US market accounted for 779,217, which was an increase of 7.8 percent from 2014.
American are also the second-largest group of tourist spenders in the country, with some P42.31 billion going into the economy last year.