Climate sensitive talks boost tourism amidst Ibalong Festival

LEGAZPI CITY, August 19 (PIA)  – Organizers have secured sufficient and comfortable accommodation at the leading hotels here for some 1,000 participants to the First Philippine Tourism Conference on Climate Change Adaptation (PTCCCA) slated this coming Aug. 23-25.

One of them is the Oriental Hotel, Legazpi, the main conference venue which has assured reservations for delegates who chose to stay at said hotel which has a total of 115 rooms.

City Mayor Geraldine B. Rosal said the PTCCCA is a big boost to the city’s tourism activity side by side the Ibalong Festival which depicts local legendary heroes Handyong, Baltog and Bantong of the Bicol epic who fought man-made and natural calamities during the ancient Bicolandia.

The modern ‘heroes’ that ought to be molded within the premises of the conference will be the expected outcome of this historic and first of a kind Climate Change Adaptation strategy focusing on the tourism industry as a significant growth area for countryside to national economic development played by resilient stakeholders, policy makers, key government agencies, planners, scientists, business entities and communities, among others.

City Mayor Geraldine Rosal, Tourism-Bicol Regional Director Maria “Nini” Ravanilla and Local Climate Change Adaptation for Development (LCCAD) Inc. President and PTCCCA Conference Director Nong Rangasa are the prime movers in this national conference.

The PTCCCA coincides with the Street Carnival of the annual Ibalong Festival, will perk up investment ventures in the city in as much as the twin events will be highlighted by the inauguration of the Boulevard de Legazpi, a new road opening going to the South Luzon International Airport.

Aside from the walk-in confirmations, the on-line registration of participants continues to pour in from Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao.

President Benigno S. Aquino III is invited to keynote this remarkable conference to find solutions to the disastrous effects of extreme weather events like the recent floods that hit Metro Manila and the nearby provinces.

The participants expressed anticipation on what the President’s pronouncements will be considering the brunt of “Hagupit ng Habagat” that caused so much hopelessness to the victims.

Besides the President, other key officials of the government are expected to grace the PTCCCA such as Vice President Jejomar Binay; Senator Loren Legarda, the UN Asia-Pacific Senior Champion on CCA and DRR; Secretaries Jesse Robredo of DILG, Ramon Paje of DENR, Lucille Sering and Heherson Alvarez of CCC, Elisea Gozun of PACC, and Nereus Acosta of PAEP, among others.

Senator Legarda, chairperson of the Senate Committee on Climate Change hopes to include the result of the PTCCCA deliberations in the framework plans to address the massive flooding in Metro Manila and the CAMANAVA area following the revelation of Dr. Fernando Siringan, an expert of the UP Marine Science Institute that Metro Manila has started to “sink” and why there is massive flooding even in the absence of a typhoon.   

While the major partners are all agog in the preparation of this significant event, local executives, development and planning officials, tourism officers, and other major stakeholders who have signified their attendance to the PTCCCA have already reached the maximum number of expected participants still more are placing reservations and hotel accommodations. 

Even as the countdown begins today, some national legislators other than the six Bicolano representatives have also manifested their interest in joining the event, not to mention the local officials in Bicol who were mandated by an Memorandum Circular (MC) from the DILG to attend the conference as well as officials of government owned or controlled corporations who were also mandated by an MC from the Civil Service Commission.

Rangasa disclosed that flood-damaged areas like Pampanga, Bataan, Alaminos and Nueva Vizcaya are sending more participants than the expected number. (MAL/LCCAD-PIA5)