World's travel wholesalers coming to RP for PITF '09

MANILA, Philippines - Big travel wholesalers from all over the world are coming to the country for the Philippine International Tourism Fair (PITF) 2009, the premier and only global travel event held annually in the tourism super region of Central Visayas.

Tourism Secretary Ace Durano said the travel agents were invited by the Department of Tourism (DOT) to check out at the PITF which of the country’s finest tourism destinations, products and services they could offer to their clients in their respective countries.

“More than a hundred of them from untapped and emerging markets can bring in hordes of inbound tourists and thus contribute significantly to the DOT’s efforts to raise our tourism volume and dollar receipts,” Durano said.

“They include tour operators, travel agencies, retailers, corporate travel planners, specialized tour companies, incentive travel and wellness program organizers, and medical tourism intermediaries, among many others,” he added.

These foreign buyers will have pre-scheduled, one-on-one business meetings with local sellers of tourism packages during the PITF’s Travel Market Exchange (Tramex).

Managed by the DOT’s marketing arm, Philippine Convention and Visitors Corp. (PCVC), Tramex is a full day of serious business negotiations that generate highly productive and lucrative deals.

Aside from Tramex, the PITF also includes corporate exhibitions, seminars and educational sessions, business networking, marketing presentations, product launches, pre- and post-event tours, and many other activities for both buyers and sellers, according to PCVC travel trade head Tess Mauricio.

Among PCVC’s target 200 local participants in the PITF are airlines and airline alliances, hotels and resorts, travel agencies, tour operators, management companies, spa resorts and destinations, medical and wellness service providers, leisure properties, theme parks and amusement centers, travel wholesalers, consolidators and retailers, online travel companies, golf courses, airports, tourist transport operators, cruise lines, retirement villages, travel insurance firms, and special interest companies.

Also expected to join the PITF are foreign sellers and exhibitors, mostly from nearby Asian countries, according to event chairman Angel Ramos Bognot of the National Association of Independent Travel Agents Inc. (NAITAS), the country’s biggest industry organization with more than a thousand members nationwide.

Bognot said the choice of Cebu as the permanent venue of the PITF was consistent with the government’s strategic designation of this “Queen City of the South” as the capital of the country’s tourism super region of Central Visayas.

Industry members who want to join the PITF and/or Tramex may call the PITF secretariat (523-8375, 523-7504 or 523-7501 or e-mail pitf_sec@yahoo.com) or the Tramex secretariat (525-9318 or 525-7320 or e-mail ttu@dotpcvc.gov.ph).

Now on its third year, the PITF 2009 will be held at the Imperial Palace Waterpark Resort & Spa in Maribago, Lapu-Lapu City, Cebu on June 25-27.

“The PITF 2009 will serve as a launching pad for our new tourism products, and as a forward base for our foreign market development efforts, both constituting our product and market diversification strategy to surmount the current global economic challenge,” Durano said.

Supported by the DOT and its attached agencies PCVC and the Philippine Tourism Authority, the PITF is a strictly business-to-business international event that unveils the latest market trends and best industry practices, and generates optimum deals and long-term corporate alliances.