Govt to beef up RP tourism using new media — DOT

Despite having a lower budget, the Department of Tourism (DOT) on Monday said it will be allotting P100 million or almost 8 percent of its 2011 budget for new media in the hopes of attracting more tourists to the Philippines. "Sa tingin namin importante yung new media (We think that new media is important)," Tourism Secretary Alberto Lim told reporters after the Senate hearing on the proposed DOT budget. Lim explained that they are focusing on new media because most tourists gather information and reserve bookings online. He said their department is already working on a new website, which he hopes will come out within the year. The DOT's budget for 2011 is P1.3 billion, of which 8 percent or P100 million will be allotted to their new media projects. The department's 2011 budget decreased by P380 million compared to the year before. "Magtitiis na lang kami (We will try to bear with it)," he said. Aside from strengthening their new media devices, however, Lim said they are also in the process of creating a new "brand" for the country. Increasing tourist arrivals With these plans, he said they hope to attract 10 percent more of their target of tourist arrivals in 2010. "(We're aiming for) another 10 percent increase, (thats about) 3.6 million for 2011," he said. Lim said the countries with the highest tourist arrivals in the Philippines are South Korea, United States, and Japan. "Yung Japan ngayon ay encouraging their people to travel dahil malakas ang Yen (Japan is encouraging their people to travel because the Yen is getting stronger)," he said. On the other hand, Lim downplayed the supposed effects of the August 23 hostage-taking incident - which killed at least eight tourists from Hong Kong - on the tourism of the country. "Wala naman masyado dahil alam ninyo naman Hong Kong is a small market (It doesn't have that much of an effect because Hong Kong is a small market)," he said He said only 4 percent of tourist arrivals, or about 150,000 Hong Kong nationals, come from the Chinese territory every year. Lim likewise said they focused much of their tourism promotion efforts on other nearby countries when the tragedy happened and the relations between Hong Kong and the country were strained. — RSJ, GMANews.TV