Can Ph get Rid of being a Tourism Slow Foot in the ASEAN

 AN ANALYSIS

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

Can the Philippines get rid of its disparaging moniker as the tourism laggard in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) before President Rodrigo Duterte will  step out of office next year or after the archipelago’s subdue the lethal pandemic?

Before we plow our eyes to the nitty gritty of the tourism industry of this 110 million acrimoniously populated third world country, the following are the tourist arrival numbers in the ASEAN in 2019 according to GlobalData:

1. Thailand - 39,797 million; 2. Malaysia - 20,1 million; 3. Vietnam - 18 million

4. Singapore - 15.9 million; 5. Indonesia - 13.62 million; 6. Philippines - 8 million; 7. Cambodia - 6.7 million; 8. Myanmar - 4.3 million; 9. Lao PDR - 3.4 million; 10. Brunei Darussalam - 213 thousand.

THE INDEX ranks 140 countries on their relative strengths in relation to global tourism and travel. The global average was 3.8 while the average for Asia Pacific was 4.2, reflecting ASEAN’s strong balance of natural and cultural resources to attract tourism – and its value for money.

Singapore was judged to have the most competitive travel and tourism sector in ASEAN, followed by Malaysia and Thailand. (Photo and caption texts credit to The ASEAN Post Team, September 5, 2019)

The Philippines thanks to the poor planning of its leaders was snagged in No. 6 position – where backwater countries like Cambodia and Myanmar breath behinds her butt, er, neck like an albatross, according to GlobalData. The Christian country being in a lousy post was blamed to her lacks of infrastructure, the high cost of staying in the archipelago, and the pathetic access for foreigners to reach the country and those tourist spots.

One of the complaints I read was a foreigner found himself stuck for in a monster traffic in Manila and those other traffics in the provinces that took him five hours to reach by land a resort say in Pangasinan or La Union.

Speaking at the European Union - Philippines Business Network forum in 2016, Guenter Taus, president of the European Chamber of Commerce in the Philippines (ECCP) cited that If the country would become a desirable tourism destination especially for high spending visitors, she needs to facilitate international investments in infrastructure and facilities that better match the visitors’ expectations.

As the Duterte Administration has one more year left before its ends its mandate in June 30, 2022, my poser: Does its $23 billion (P1.15 Trillion) it spends since it took office in June 30, 2016 enough to wiggle out from its No. 6 post (8 million foreign visitors) and overtakes No. 4 Singapore (almost 16 million tourists) and No. 5 Indonesia (13.62 million arrivals) as ranked by GlobalDatain 2019?

Finance Undersecretary Grace Karen Singson said that under the Duterte administration’s National Tourism Development Plan (NTDP), the Philippines will have to invest $23 billion in tourism infrastructure between now and 2022, when the President’s term ends, to make the sector “not only sustainable and highly competitive in the region but also socially responsible to propel inclusive growth.”

Singson said these proposed NTDP investments cover road networks, airports, cruise ports, railway, site infrastructure, tourism enterprise zones, transport units, accommodation facilities, and aircraft acquisition.

“2,620 kilometers of tourism roads over the next six years, from a baseline of 900 kilometers, which will require an investment of $2 billion,’ she was quoted by the media.

Pump priming the tourism industry is integral to the Duterte administration’s 10-point socioeconomic agenda as this sector is the third biggest contributor to the country’s gross domestic product (GDP).

The agenda provides for accelerated spending in infrastructure from three percent to over five percent of the GDP.

Tourism becomes the third largest contributor to the Philippines’ GDP after the Trade and Real estate Sectors.

As GDP growth where the country reached 5.2 percent in 2015, tourism accounted for 1.11 percentage points of the spike.

Singson said the government’s goal is to double the number of foreign tourist arrivals, increase tourism revenues by 90 percent and generate 14.4 percent of total Philippine jobs from the tourism sector by the time Mr. Duterte steps down in 2022.

NTDP is anchored on major infrastructure development initiatives over the next five years that include the improvement of ports, ferry services, airports in 11 tourism gateways in the country.

Other strategies of the government to boost tourist arrivals include developing the country’s cruise industry, which saw an increase in port calls by 67 percent over the 2013-2015 period.

“These initiatives for Cruise Tourism in the Tourism Development Plan expect that in six years time, ship calls to the Philippines will increase by as much as six-fold and visitor arrivals from Cruise Tourism will increase by as much as 800 percent,” Singson noted.

Casinos in the country were burgeoning too as it drew foreign gamblers especially Chinese Mainlanders before the pandemic wrought havoc in the industry.

There were an average of 60 million Chinese tourists that visited the ASEAN Region in 2019.

Tourism in the Philippines contributes 12.7 percent of the country’s GDP and provides 5.4 million jobs in 2018.

With all those long term plans done by President Duterte since he took office in 2016, can we finally make a breakthrough not only as an economic sluggard among our ASEAN Peers (Damn we are at the bottom No. 6 in terms of exports) but as a slow foot in the tourism market after this pandemic has been finally controlled?

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(You can read my selected columns at http://mortzortigoza.blogspot.com and articles at Pangasinan News Aro. You can send comments too at totomortz@yahoo.com)