Traders To Promote Agri And Industrial Tourism In Zamboanga City

ZAMBOANGA CITY (Mindanao Examiner / 23 May) – Local business leaders are pressing for the idea to aggressively pursue agricultural and industrial tourism in a bid to promote Zamboanga City in southern Philippines.

The calls were made after several members of the private sector-led Tourism Association of Zamboanga (TAZ) visited recently the 15,000 hectares eco-tourism park inside the Zamboanga City Special Economic Zone and Freeport Authority.

"There's really a need to look for other alternative. Agri-tourism and the industrial-tourism are just some of the possible tourist destination sites in the city. Tourists, for example can visit several organic farms here.”

“In addition, visitors can also tour the nine sardine factories here," Vicente A. Lim, president of the Insular Travel and Tours and a member of the organization.

Zamboanga City in Zamboanga del Sur province is host to at least nine major sardines companies in the country while Dipolog City in Zamboanga del Norte province has about 23 bottled sardines companies.

The sardine fishing and processing activities alone can generate an average of P 3 billion annually to the local economy.

”We can tap the existing farms and orchards in this city to add the tourist destination sites of the city. If a place lack scenic destinations for tourist, then it is incumbent for us to develop and promote places that are possible to lure more tourists.”

“Agri-tourism and the industrial-tourism should be part of tour packages of the travel and tour agencies," said Onofre T. Griño, president of the Menzi Agricultural Corp.

Ricardo A. San Juan, Tourism regional director, said: “Agri-tourism, in general, is the practice of attracting travelers or visitors to an area or areas used primarily for agricultural purposes. Very often, the idea of tourism stimulates images of mass-produced travel that attracts a large number of travelers.”

”Agri-tourism can be viewed much like eco-tourism, specifically focused on education purposes," he said, adding that a same idea applies to the industrial-tourism. We are now encouraging local businessmen and farm owners to develop their farms into a tourist destination site. Wherein, they can set up some farmhouse for overnight guests,” he said.

Agri-tourism and the industrial-tourism can be also seen as a marketing tool for the companies, he said.

”With tourists having around, local businessmen here can create direct trade linkages with the prospective foreign buyers,” San Juan said. (Darwin Wee)