THE regional office of the Department of Tourism (DOT) are now gathering reports from various resorts operating on the Island Garden City of Samal (Igacos) on the possible adverse effects in the tourism industry of the recent abduction of three foreigners and a Filipina at the Holiday Ocean View Resort in Barangay Camudmud, Babak District in Samal.
Roberto "Robby" Alabado III, DOT regional director in a phone interview with Sun.Star Davao, said the Tourism department has started to closely work with City Government to monitor if there are cases of booking cancellation by tourists right after the kidnapping incident.
"We now cnduct meetings with the resort owners. Our main concern is to find out if there are bookings that are being cancelled because of the incident. We hope to come up with a report so that we can see the real picture on the impact as far as tourism is concerned," he said.
"Normally, we cannot see the impact immediately but days or weeks after kapag lumabas na sa news, especially internationally, probably diyan na natin makikita kung meron ba talagang adverse impact," he added.
But he emphasized that apart from the tourism industry, the safety and welfare of the tourists abducted are also of their paramount concern.
Alabado said the kidnapping incident was an isolated case and Davao Region at large remains to be a safe tourist destination.
Based on DOT data, there are a total of 70 resorts registered with the City Tourism Office of Igacos.
The report based on the monitoring conducted by DOT with the LGU is eyed to be released by next week.
Alabado said that at present there is only one tourist booking cancellation case in Samal that has been reported.
"So far with our monitoring, only one incident was reported to us that a single foreign tourist identified as American cancelled his/her vacation in Samal," he said.
Alabado refused to disclose the resort's name for confidentiality. (ASP)