Metro Iloilo-Guimaras Tourism Action Plan

December 20, 2007 | By admin In Donor News, Tourism Development

1.1 Overview of MIGEDC

The Metro Iloilo-Guimaras Economic Development Council (MIGEDC) is an alliance of the City of Iloilo, the Municipalities of Leganes, Oton, Pavia, Santa Barbara and San Miguel and the Province of Guimaras. It was formally established by Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo through Executive Order No. 559 signed on August 28, 2006 and was designed to help address the area’s emerging problems brought about by rapid urbanization and the spatial development challenges of tourism and economic development.

As a working and strategic alliance, the MIGEDC formulates, implements, coordinates, and monitors programs, projects, and activities that support the Mega-Region Economic Development Strategic Framework of the national government.

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METRO ILOILO-GUIMARAS (MIG) TOURISM 3-YEAR ACTION PLAN (2008-2010)

2.0 STRATEGIC CONTEXT

2.1 Goals and Objectives of the Strategy

Given the overall directions and priorities of MIGEDC, the objectives for MIG Tourism are as follows:

1. To develop the Metro Iloilo-Guimaras (MIG) area as a leading destination in the Philippines for international and domestic tourists.

2. To stimulate investment, income, employment opportunities, and enhanced linkages between tourism and other economic sectors of the MIG area.

3. To sustain and enhance the natural and cultural heritage of Metro Iloilo and Guimaras.

4. To effectively manage and mitigate the negative impacts of tourism in the MIG area.

5. To build a tourism industry that is socially inclusive and benefits all sectors of the MIG community.

6. To enhance and sustain partnerships between the key stakeholders in MIG development.

2.2 The Strategic Framework for MIG Tourism

The overall approach to achieving the vision and objectives for the Metroi Iloilo-Guimaras tourism sector involves three general strategies:

Build Metro Iloilo and Guimaras Province as complementary destinations making up the primary gateway to Panay Island, and Western Visayas as a whole;
Adopt a sustainable development approach to tourism in the Metro Iloilo-Guimaras area; and
Institutionalize a partnership-based, stakeholder driven approach to the development, marketing, and promotion of MIG as an integrated tourism destination.

Positioning and Destination Development Strategy. The proposed strategy builds on Metro Iloilo’s current function as the primary urban center of Western Visayas. As the hub of economic and political activity in the region, Metro Iloilo (specifically Iloilo City) will continue to be the most important destination for corporate travel, meetings, conferences and conventions, exhibitions, sporting events and festivals in the Western Visayas. In addition, the growing fields of language tourism and medical tourism are areas of opportunity for Metro Iloilo. As a leisure and recreation destination, Metro Iloilo’s main resources are geared towards urban tourism activities with cultural themes. Shopping, dining and evening entertainment opportunities will be important urban activities for leisure and business travelers to Metro Iloilo, not to mention the large segment of tourists who come to visit friends and relatives in the area (VFR).

Guimaras will be developed as a true complement to Metro Iloilo, offering tourist activities and attractions that are not found in sufficient quantity or quality in Metro Iloilo. Guimaras will be differentiated from Metro Iloilo because there will be more beach, adventure, and ecotourism-oriented attractions on the island. All of these can be packaged or promoted to complement the Province’s agritourism thrust. In this manner, Guimaras’ rural/agricultural lifestyle and products serve to distinguish it from destinations in Central Philippines offering comparable beach and marine-based attractions.

Sustainable Development as Tourism Development Strategy. Given the positioning strategy for Metro Iloilo and Guimaras Province, the strategy for developing the region’s tourism product will be based on sustainable development principles. This will ensure that the focus of tourism development in the MIG will have a three-pronged measure of success: economic growth, environmental sustainability, and social equity.

Economic growth through tourism will require a competitive MIG tourism product. Over the six-year time frame of the strategy, the focus will be on upgrading the quality of MIG’s tourism attractions, amenities, and services. This will include improving the standards for hotel accommodations, presentation of tourist attractions, and competencies of tourism industry workers.

These tourism products will be supported with infrastructure to create tourism circuits that will encourage visitor movement throughout the MIG, and hopefully facilitate greater distribution of economic benefits to all areas of the region. Important clusters of cultural, historical and natural heritage resources in the MIG area will be identified and established as heritage tourism zones. Infrastructure, policy, and capacity-building support will be provided to these destinations for the conservation and proper management of their cultural and natural heritage resources.

Finally, social equity in tourism development will require strategies for managing and mitigating the negative social impacts of tourism. Related to this, the Strategy explicitly seeks to assist disadvantaged and displaced groups, such as women, children, and ethnic communities, by facilitating their access to economic resources and opportunities through tourism. In addition, communities will be empowered, through institutional and capacity-building programs, to participate in the tourism planning and development initiatives in their respective localities.

Partnership-based Approach to Tourism Development. The overall approach to tourism management and development in Metro Iloilo-Guimaras will be partnership-based and stakeholder-driven. The approach for ensuring the long-term viability and implementability of the Strategy will be to build and strengthen partnerships, on various levels, related to different requirements of the tourism sector.

Thus, the strategy will involve strengthening the links between and among the public and private sector members of the MIG tourism industry. Within the MIG structure itself, the partnerships between the LGUs must be strengthened through the Tourism Committee. A critical element of the Implementation strategy will be the establishment of a public-private sector partnership-based institution to oversee and coordinate the implementation of MIG-wide tourism marketing and development initiatives.

An investment promotions plan will seek to engage development partners and private investors in implementing the key projects of the Strategy. Finally, the strategy recognizes that the long-term sustainability of the tourism sector will require the active participation and full support of the residents of Metro Iloilo and Guimaras. Thus, programs for building pride of place in the MIG communities have been built into the Tourism Strategy.

2.3 Strategic Programs.

More specific strategies have been developed to flesh out the the three general strategies described above. These specific strategies have been organized into ten (10) programs: 1) Marketing, 2) Tourism Product Development, 3) Infrastructure Development, 4) Heritage Conservation, 5) Managing the Negative Social Impacts of Tourism, 6) Environmental Management for Tourism, 7) Human Resource Development and Institutional Capacity-Building, Implementation, 9) Tourism Investments Promotion, and 10) Building Pride of Place.

Strategy 1 (Positioning and Destination Development): Build Metro Iloilo and Guimaras Province as complementary destinations making up the primary gateway to Panay Island, and Western Visayas as a whole.

PROGRAM

SPECIFIC STRATEGIES

Marketing

1. Develop Iloilo City and the other municipalities of Metro Iloilo as an urban tourist destination built around the key themes of culture and heritage; urban tourism; MICE; festivals; health and wellness; education; and community-based tourism.

2. Build up the tourism destinations and attractions of Guimaras Province around the key themes of marine (island and beach) resort vacations, adventure tourism, ecotourism, agritourism, health and wellness, and cultural encounters (e.g. with Ati communities, farming communities, or spiritual communities)

3. Promote Metro Iloilo as a gateway or staging area to other tourism activities and circuits in Iloilo Province and other parts of Western Visayas.

4. Implement a clicks-and-bricks strategy for disseminating tourism information on Metro Iloilo-Guimaras through a MIG Tourism website, complimented by a network of tourism information centers (TIC) around Metro Iloilo-Guimaras.

5. Design and produce collateral materials (tourist brochure/map) for the MIG area, to complement the existing set of informational materials available for the respective member LGUs.

Tourism Product Development

1. Develop tourism circuits based on the key tourism clusters or destinations of Metro Iloilo-Guimaras:

• Iloilo City Heritage Loop to link the historic commercial and Port areas of Iloilo city with the heritage districts of Jaro and Molo;

• Metro Iloilo Heritage Circuit linking town plazas and heritage churches of the MIG LGUs

• Guimaras Province Agritourism Circuit with linkages to the island’s Beach Resort Areas.

• The 1,714 ha. marine conservation areas of Guimaras including the marine sanctuaries.

2. Diversify Metro Iloilo’s urban tourism product through the development of new tourism and leisure precincts in areas such as:

• The Iloilo River Zones 1 and 2 (as identified in the Iloilo River Development Plan), with possible link to the Iloilo City Commercial Business District (Calle Real heritage district)

• Old Iloilo Airport Site (Megaworld Development) and KAPIDECO site in Mandurriao

• Proposed Iloilo Province development site in Sta. Barbara (several sites available for consideration)

3. Develop pilot community-based tourism programs or community-based livelihood programs (tourism-related) in each of the Metro Iloilo and Guimaras municipalities, with emphasis on creating economic opportunities for women and other disadvantaged groups and on promoting heritage conservation.

Strategy 2 (Sustainability): Adopt a sustainable development approach to tourism in the Metro Iloilo-Guimaras area.

PROGRAM	SPECIFIC STRATEGIES
Infrastructure Development	1. Upgrade and enhance transportation infrastructure to facilitate tourist circulation along the priority tourism circuits. 2. Upgrade and enhance transportation infrastructure to allow the linking of Metro Iloilo-Guimaras with other destinations in Iloilo Province through provincial tourism circuits such as a Western Iloilo Coastal Heritage Loop, a Central Iloilo Tourism Circuit, and an Eastern Iloilo Coastal Tourism Line. 3. Enhance the visitor experience by upgrading the existing visitor facilities and infrastructure at key entry and transit points along the priority tourism circuits 4. Provide a package of destination utilities to ensure the sustainability of priority tourist sites in each MIG LGU. These utilities include sewage treatment plants, water distribution systems, solid waste management systems, and other necessary infrastructure in the following sites: 5. Provide a package of public tourism support infrastructure and amenities at key tourism stops along the priority tourism circuits. These packages can include parking, landscaping, alternative energy, package sewage treatment, signages, etc.
Heritage Conservation	1. Implement cultural resource mapping programs in the MIG LGU’s to identify the local heritage resources, and to establish the foundations of local heritage awareness, appreciation, and conservation programs. 2. Design and implement a demonstration project to highlight the principles of heritage conservation, redevelopment, and community effort for a selected pilot site in the Iloilo City CBD heritage area.
Managing the Negative Social Impacts of Tourism	1. Facilitate access to resources, facilities, and services by displaced and disadvantaged groups. 3. Institutionalize gender- and group-specific (e.g. cultural communities, poverty, etc.) frameworks in the tourism development and planning processes in the MIG area.
Environmental Management	1. Design a network of existing marine and terrestrial protected areas in the MIG and strengthen its management and enforcement capacity 2. Reorient tourism towards an environmentally sustainable one by allowing environmental costs to be internalized, particularly aid for activities which damage the environment (e.g. oil spill); 3. Adopt a consistent methodology for monitoring and evaluating the relationships of tourism activities with environmental conservation.
Institutional and Human Resource Development	1. Provide a structure to strengthen institutional capacity of MIGEDC in Tourism. 2. Develop an HRD Plan for Tourism in MIGEDC 3. Build leadership capacity of public and private tourism institutions in MIG 4. Build tourism skills of public tourism institutions in MIG 5. Build skills capacity of private tourism institutions in MIG 6. Facilitate recruitment & selection qualified employees in tourism industry 7. Upgrade capacities of MIG-based artists, crafts people, souvenir manufacturers, and retailers to package, display, and market local products for tourists. 8. Build capacities of local government officials, community leaders, natural resource managers, and natural resource developers on the sustainable use of habitats, development of sound resource management structures in the MIG, and mechanisms and procedures for addressing trans-boundary institutional challenges.

Strategy 3 (Implementation and Partnerships): Institutionalize a partnership-based, stakeholder-driven approach to the development, marketing, and promotion of Metro Iloilo-Guimaras as an integrated tourism destination.

PROGRAM	SPECIFIC STRATEGIES
Implementation	1. Establish a public private partnership-based institution to oversee and coordinate the implementation of MIG-wide tourism development and marketing programs. 2. LGUs to institutionalize the position of tourism officer with staff and budget appropriation.
Tourism Investments Promotion	1. Partner with landowners and developers in Metro Iloilo-Guimaras, Iloilo Province, and Metro Manila for a coordinated approach to tourism investment/development 2. Initiate a campaign to inform and educate owners of MIG-area heritage buildings on the possibilities for conservation and creative, commercial re-use of their buildings. 3. Produce and disseminate investment portfolios of priority tourism projects for public and private investment.
Building Pride of Place	1. Mobilize citizens to help implement the tourism strategy and action plan by echoing tourism appreciation workshops to various sectors of civil society. 2. Introduce tourism awareness and tourism appreciation programs at the barangay levels, starting with the barangays in the priority tourism development areas. 3. Use media as a channel for increased tourism awareness and appreciation and for harnessing public support for the tourism strategy. 4. Partner with the local primary and secondary education institutions to incorporate heritage and tourism appreciation in social studies Sibika and Kultura subjects. 5. Hold tourism awareness month celebrations in conjunction with cultural and heritage months (with public and school participation) in order to highlight the linkage between tourism and cultural heritage.

3.0 ACTION PLAN

The following Tables outline the three-year workplan for implementing the various programs of the Metro Iloilo-Guimaras Tourism Strategy. This Action Plan covers a three-year timeframe. It identifies the key tasks and activities that must be undertaken – for each year, from 2008 to 2010 – in order to achieve the objectives and associated outputs of the Strategy.

For each activity, the Action Plan identifies or recommends the public and/or private stakeholders who should be responsible for completion of the task. Where appropriate, success criteria have been suggested as possible monitoring and evaluation measures.

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