A home-grown business process outsourcing company has launched a web portal aimed at being a “fun” master directory of many of Cebu’s tourism products to the world.
The web portal www.morefunincebu.com in Cebu also aims to complement the efforts of the Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry to further strengthen Cebu’s tourism industry, said Lilu Aliño, business development manager of Konsum Technologies during yesterday’s forum at the Marco Polo Plaza Hotel.
The web portal is now running on beta mode and is ready to partner with the different establishments in Cebu, including restaurants, hotels, resorts, food manufacturers, schools, spas and wellness establishments and more, said Aliño.
“It is envisioned to become Cebu’s attractive address in the web and soon to become a robust and compelling presence in the Internet. It aimed to further boost Cebu’s tourism industry by becoming a major source of content and information about Cebu,” said Aliño.
Aliño encouraged all establishments to contact them so that they can give them a page linked to the web portal which each establishment can maintain themselves by posting their pictures and update events for free.
The portal features next month’s Cebu Business Month in its More Fun Events calendar—a click on the featured event will link the portal’s visitor to the Cebu business month site— www.cebubizmonth.org.
“This year’s Cebu Business Month (CBM) includes a Tourism Congress event on June 28- at the Cebu International Convention Center. One of the projects under the event will carry the same ‘More Fun in Cebu’ line through a poster contest that will run from May 15 to June 15,” said Tess Chan, CBM Tourism Congress chairperson.
Chan said CCCI planned to bring stakeholders together to discuss issues relating to Cebu’s tourism including its strengths and weaknesses.
“Stakeholders will look further into the status of our basic services, like infrastructure, power, hotel, restaurant, and airport facilities, safety and security and human resources, sanitation, beautification and creative tour packages and more knowledgeable tour guides and staff so we can promote ‘More Fun in Cebu!’” said Chan.
house Bills
Meanwhile, Rep. Pablo John Garcia (Cebu 3rd district) told reporters about two pending House bills he sponsored, which would impact on Cebu’s tourism.
“These two bills primarily tackle the improvement of the charter of our port authorities like the Mactan Cebu International Airport Authority (MCIAA) and Cebu Ports Authority (CPA). It will make them more feasible in making decisions for the improvement of our airport and seaport,” said Garcia.
On the China conflict, tourism stakeholders present during the forum said that the conflict would have an impact on the tourism industry with China contributing from 17 percent to 20 percent of our total foreign visitors every year.
The industry would now need more marketing people to further promote tourism in the country to other markets, said Bobby Joseph, National Association of Independent Travel Agencies (Naitas) in the Philippines chairman emeritus.
Joseph called for sobriety and for the government to discuss the issue with China.
“China is our neighbor, let’s solve this among ourselves,” said Joseph.
Prudencio Gesta, CCCI president, agreed with Joseph but said that it would be best to just let the national government deal with the issue.