THE Visit Davao Fun Sale (VDFS) 2016 is expected to draw more tourists to Davao Region as it offers more attractions and tour packages next year.
VDFS is slated on March 25 to May 31, 2016.
Robby Alabado, regional director of the Department of Tourism-Davao said in a phone interview with Sun.Star Davao that the tourism department and the VDFS executive committee are confident that the third edition of the tourism event will be bigger and will result better outcome for tourism stakeholders in the region.
"I believe that with more attractions and new tour packages that will be offered for next year, we will have more tourist arrivals," he said.
Based on DOT data, tourist arrivals increased by 45.7 percent during the staging of VDFS 2015 in March-May to 408,223 tourists as compared to last year's 280,183. The figures are based on occupancy report presented by the city hotels.
Of the total arrivals, 406,073 were domestic travelers while the remaining 29,908 are foreign tourists.
The VDFS 2016's soft-launch was held on Monday during the Kapehan Sa Dabaw at the SM City Annex. It will be formally launched during the Philippine Travel Mart in September.
"We are positive that we will surpass this year's data because we will be promoting VDFS 2016 as early as now. If this year we started around two months earlier in promoting the event, how much more next year that we already start promoting it with a longer period of about seven months," Edward Mayormita of the Visit Davao consortium said.
The organizers said that more tours, members and players are coming up to help sell and promote Davao. The VDFS 2016 will also offer Samal eco-tourism tour and island tours. Davao Wellness Spa Association is also taking measures for more spa owners to participate and come up with a Davao massage oil.
"Hotels, tours, events, restaurants, spa, among others, we are looking the whole value chain of tourism," Eden David, DOT-11 chief tourism officer said.
The VDFS 2016 will run from March 25 until May 31, 2016. Installed in 2014, VDFS already became an annual tourism sale campaign offering sales and discounts from hotels, dining, adventure, shopping and relaxation and all sectors in tourism.