Crisis prompts Department of Tourism to stimulate domestic travel market

CEBU, Philippines - Although domestic tourism has been the drive of the Department of Tourism (DOT) for the longest time, it is now at these times of global economic meltdown that the agency is further boosting its efforts to attract more domestic tourists to travel and explore the country.

In an interview with DOT assistant secretary Janet Rita Lazatin she said that with the unexpected blow of the global economic crisis to the country, the agency is now going back to its efforts of promoting vacation and relaxation destination in the country to our own domestic tourists.

“It has been our drive for the longest time to promote domestic tourism this is why we have our economic holidays scheduled from Friday, Saturday and Sunday or Saturday to Monday so that families can have time to explore different sites in the country,” said Lazatin.

She said that they are pushing domestic tourism even more at these times of economic turmoil because the foreign markets is experiencing a slowdown of spending.

She stressed that DOT is doing its best to caution the impacts of the economic crisis to the country’s tourism sector.

“We want to be prepared to caution the effects of the economic crisis so we are positioning our products to be reasonable in terms of fare, pricing, rooms and the hospitality of our people. We look forward for a resilient tourism sector amidst the global crisis,” said Lazatin.

She said that this summer season, DOT is still optimistic that the country’s tourism industry will still be strong amidst the slowdown.

“We are now aiming at getting more value clients. We will not put into numbers but value so we will attract spending clients to generate more receipts. This is our alternate marketing strategy to get the economy moving,” Lazatin said.— Rhia de Pablo