SAN JOSE De BUENAVISTA, Antique — The province of Antique is experiencing a tourism boom with its visitor arrivals tremendously rising to almost 1.5 million this 2017 with its untapped natural wonders newly discovered through the social media.
Antique Provincial Tourism Officer Ramlu Villaluna said that from 448,101 total numbers of visitors in 2016, the tourist arrivals this year almost tripled and this is being attributed to “Experience Antique” website where beautiful spots in the province are posted to lure both domestic and foreign tourists.
“We have the official website that is being visited by more than 10,000 visitors who also share what we have posted to their friends. Most of them (reposting) are millennials,” Villaluna said.
The website has successfully fulfilled the task of advertising the province’s tourism through pictures of popular destinations and events to be held in Antique to inform the public, especially those thinking of coming back for a visit to their hometown.
Most places being visited by the tourists are in the northern part of Antique like the town of Sebaste that has natural tourist attractions such as the Kalamasag Falls, Igpasungaw Falls, and Bugtong Bukid.
Libertad town, which is at the northern tip of the seahorse shaped province, together with Pandan, Tibiao and Culasi also received spill-over of tourists from the neighboring Boracay Island in Aklan province.
Villaluna said the hosting of the Palarong Pambansa last April 23 to 29 and the Western Visayas Regional State Colleges and Universities Athletic Association (SCUAA) last December 3 until December 8 also contributed much to the boom of the tourism industry of the province.
“We had thousands of visitors who came for the sports events and they had their side trips to our different destinations,” he said.
Villaluna added that the Department of Tourism Regional Office 6 introduced programs such as “Bring Home A Friend” for locals to encourage their other Filipino and foreign friends to visit Antique.
Business
Whenever there are people, food should always be present.
Wilson Alian, trade and industry development specialist of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Antique provincial office, said business is booming in the province this 2017 with the opening of food chains such as McDonalds, Max’s, and Shakey’s.
“There is also the 7-Eleven’s ongoing franchise expansion in several municipalities in the province,” he said.
According to Alian, enterprising Antiquenos used to invest their money in Iloilo City, which is considered to be the center of trade and commerce in Western Visayas, but this year the locals put their money into their own home province.
Antiquenos have started to invest here due to the efforts of their own local government units. “We also have conducted around 75 free entrepreneurial training to starting businessmen,” he said.
Alian, who is also in charge with the “Go Negosyo” Center at the DTI Antique provincial office, said that this year they were able to assist six local government units to open their own “Go Negosyo” Centers in addition to the five launched in the different municipalities in 2016.
“The ‘wait and see’ attitude of Antiquenos toward business in the past had changed to a more opened and enlightened mindset because of the training from simple bookkeeping to a more complex financial literacy we have conducted,” Alian said.
More banks have opened in Antique in 2017, now with more than 20 located in the provincial capital San Jose de Buenavista alone.
Employment opportunity
With the boom in both tourism and business sectors, the primary benefactors are the people.
With the opening of more businesses, there were also many Antiquenos who were able to get employment right at their home province.
Donna Baldonado, information officer of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) Antique Field Office, said there were three job fairs conducted this year with 23, 241 qualified jobseekers referred for placement.
“Eighty percent of the 23,241 qualified jobseekers that we referred were then hired by the participating agencies that were mostly locally based,” Baldonado said.
She added that Antique before the year ended is the only province in Western Visayas to receive “Tulong Pangkabuhayan sa Disadvantaged (TUPAD)” that provided a 23-day employment to 8,000 indigent beneficiaries not included in the Pantawid Program.
She credited Antiquena Senator Loren Legarda, who chairs the Committee on Finance in the Senate, who looked for a special fund for the TUPAD so that poor Antiquenos would have money for their Christmas and New Year’s celebrations.
“The beneficiaries were paid PHP323.50 daily wage for their work done such as canal cleaning, reforestation or other works as identified by their local government units as priority,” she said.
She said that last Christmas Day, the beneficiaries received double pay for their work.
TUPAD was implemented from December 3 in all 18 towns of the province.
Agriculture
The progress in both business and tourism industries, however, are not enough for Antique to turn its back on agriculture.
The province remains to be self-sufficient in terms of rice production with a 5 to 10 percent increase in yield over that of 2016 which was only 225,915 metric tons.
According to the Office of the Provincial Agriculturist (OPA) chief Nicolasito Calawag, Antique was spared by strong typhoons and calamities this year positively resulting to a higher yield.
“The total rice area planted this year is 43,000 hectares,” he said.
In order to also boost the fishing industry, the Philippine Fisheries Development Authority last Oct. 4, 2017 turned over a new fishing port to San Jose de Buenavista local government worth PHP40 million.
The fishing port will also be used by fisherfolk of other towns in the province for it will have cold storage facilities given by the Department of Agriculture.
Social development
The Antique provincial government’s investment on human development is also making huge impact especially on the marginalized sector.
Its program “Kabalaka kang Gobernadora kay Lolo kag Lola” has benefited more than 900 seniors, from 85 years old and above, who were given monetary assistance in the total amount of PHP3.4 million for the year.
“We give financial assistance to the elderly persons so that they would have also some money to buy their milk and food,” Governor Rhodora J. Cadiao had said in a previous interview.
The governor said that the program includes retirees receiving pension so long as they reach the age of 85 so they could also avail of the provincial government assistance.
“There are retirees whose pensions are not even enough for their needs so the amount from the provincial government is a little help for them,” Cadiao said. (Annabel Consuelo Petinglay/PNA)
