By Ma. Stella F. Arnaldo / Special to the BusinessMirror
THE Department of Tourism (DOT) sees an increase in the number of tourists to Mindanao, with the renewed interest in Davao due to the election of Rodrigo R. Duterte, the city’s erstwhile mayor, as President.
Tourism Secretary Wanda Corazon T. Teo made this bold prediction as she joined thousands of tourists and spectators that flocked to Davao City for the Kadayawan 2016 festivities last week.
In a news statement, she also disclosed that one of the immediate plans of the agency is to push for the Samal-Davao City connecting bridge project to address the growing number of visitors to the island.
She added that the DOT “intends to make the current international attention on Davao a major turning point for Mindanao tourism.”
Latest data from the DOT Region 11 indicated that Davao City recorded 1.7 million in visitor arrivals in 2015. Of these arrivals, 1.56 million were domestic tourists, while 128,333 were foreign visitors. Overseas Filipinos were recorded at 14,699.
In August last year, visitors reached 161,339 visitors, of which 12,142 foreign tourists and 147,207 locals. The third week of August is when the Kadayawan celebration is held. It is regarded as a thanksgiving for an abundant harvest and brings together its various ethnic tribes and local residents in a celebration of culture through street dancing, fashion shows and a beauty pageant, among others.
“The interest in Davao is really high these days, as people want to see how then-Mayor Duterte has managed the city,” DOT Mindanao Officer-in-Charge Eden Josephine David said, in reference to increasing visitor arrivals in Davao City at the onset of the Duterte presidency.
The DOT projects a 10-percent increase in tourist arrivals in Davao this year, or close to 1.9 million.
David added that the DOT is banking on the new administration’s plan to implement the Mindanao Logistics Infrastructure Network as part of its revitalized infrastructure spending, to help address the connectivity and infrastructure gap of the region. For her part, Marco Polo Davao new General Manager Dottie Viajar Wurgler-Cronin, who had a brief meeting with Secretary Teo at the sidelines of Kadayawan 2016, expressed confidence that “Davao and the entire Mindanao region would be given more attention now that we have a tourism secretary from the region.”
Cronin said with Teo’s appointment to the DOT, she expects a “better understanding of what we have and can offer from this region,” and describing the DOT chief as a “perfect example of Mindanao tourism.”
Teo was owner and president of Mt. Apo Travel & Tours in Davao before she assumed her post at the DOT.