Gov: Heritage, culture to boost Cebu tourism

Heritage and culture will establish the uniqueness of Cebu and not just its beaches and night spots.

Cebu Gov. Gwendolyn Gacia gave this statement as she pushed for giving the towns more opportunities to showcase their tourism attractions.

“We must give our towns the opportunities to be noticed, to be showcased, and to blossom,” Garcia told the Metro Cebu Development and Coordinating Board in its 3rd quarter meeting on Wednesday.

“There are new products because our towns now know what are their natural sites, heritage, and cultural attractions,” said Garcia.

She was responding to the presentation of the National Tourism Development Plan or Road Map presented by Cebu Business Club executive director Fernando “Perry” Fajardo during the meeting.

She said that the provincial government succeeded in bringing tourism promotion outside Metro Cebu to the countryside.

“If we are to do a tourism roadmap, let us first find out what has already been done,” said Garcia.

Fajardo said the tourism roadmap includes Cebu within Central Visayas as one of the priority areas in the country .

Fajardo said Cebu’s disadvantages include having no unique culture, an unattractive physical environment, and no integrated planning and proper disposal of garbage.

Fajardo said the strategies to address this weaknesses in the road map include product development, infrastructure development, marketing promotion, public involvement and organization development.

Governor Garcia said the provincial government was already doing the strategies recommended in the roadmap.She the province has already clustered 80 percent of Cebu tourism areas and its products.

The southern cluster with 22 local government units focuses on heritage sites. The mid-western cluster with 7 mucipalities, offer adventure areas and the northern cluster with 90 towns offers heritage, culture and adventure to tourists./Contributor Joy C. Quito