By Rhia de Pablo Updated March 18, 2009 12:00 AM
CEBU, Philippines - Although unexpected, the influx of rich Middle Eastern students in Cebu these past few weeks have been making up for the slowdown felt in the tourism and hospitality industry.
In yesterday’s 888 News Forum at the Waterfront Hotel and Casino, Department of Tourism undersecretary Phineas Alburo said that the unexpected influx of Middle Eastern tourists specifically students from Kuwait are bringing in positive business to Cebu’s tourism stakeholders as they fill in hotels at these times of slowdown and at the same time bringing in more positive movements to the city’s business establishments like malls and restaurants.
Alburo said that these Middle Eastern students are currently taking up distance learning programs at the University of the Visayas (UV) and they have come in batches and started arriving in Cebu since last month and are under 21 days tourist VISA.
He said that so far, there are around 2, 400 Kuwaiti students enrolled at UV and most of them are taking up distance learning in courses such as engineering.
Alburo said that their office is working closely with the university and the Immigration Bureau to rationalize the situation so that Cebu can better capitalize on this emerging market.
“Middle East has long been a target market for DOT and we are slowly getting into the direction of gaining more accessibility to this market. The arrival of this big group of Kuwaiti students has been out of the blue but nevertheless, it has been filling in the gap and the downturn in arrivals and hoteliers are happy with this development because it has helped them at this time of low occupancy,” said Alburo.
He said that these tourists may have been attracted to come to Cebu for reasons that we offer a rather cheaper alternative than other destinations in the world and our quality education has also been gaining grounds world-wide.
“The Philippines is inexpensive compared to many other destinations elsewhere and the price of our education is relatively more affordable too so they chose to come over,” said Alburo.
Meanwhile, Cebu City Marriott Hotel general manager Roy Abraham agreed that the arrivals of Kuwaiti students these past few weeks in Cebu has indeed benefited city hotels like them because it has offset the shortfall of business travelers which has been dropping in volume for the past months.
He said that so far, they have 25 rooms occupied by these Kuwaiti students and they expect that the rest of the major hotels in city are also getting their fair share of a good number from this group.
Abraham said that the Middle Eastern market is indeed a huge market to be tapped because they are well spenders and they come in big numbers.
However, he said that in order to further sustain the growth of this emerging market, stakeholders in the tourism sector must work together and should properly orient these tourists about the culture, traditions and social norms of the Philippines as well as also orient Filipinos on how to properly treat them to better capitalize on this market.
“We need to change the perception of Filipinos with Middle Eastern people, educate stakeholders and the public on how to treat them properly and we also need to orient these Middle Eastern tourists about the proper conduct when they are here in the country so that there will be a win-win situation for both cultures. Proper orientation is very important because we need to know how to capitalize on them without sacrificing our own culture and traditions,” said Abraham.
These Kuwaiti students who arrived in Cebu since the past month passed through Qatar and they are staying for the coming weeks and are expected to come back sometime June and October to finish the distance learning program they are currently enrolled in at UV.
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