CBM 2019 tourism forum to explore potential of sports tourism, other subsectors

Lilu Aliño

CEBU CITY, Philippines—The Cebu Business Month (CBM) 2019 tourism forum will focus on different subsectors of tourism and how the industry stakeholders can maximize their potentials.

Lilu Aliñ0, CBM 2019 chairperson, said they are now finalizing the program for the Tourism Innovation Forum scheduled on June 18.

Cebu’s tourism industry is a major contributor to the growth of the province’s economy.

Of the 3.6 million foreign tourists, 77 percent or 2.8 million came to Cebu. This also holds true for domestic tourists with Cebu having 62 percent or 2.77 million of the 4.465 million visitors.

The Tourism Innovation Forum will help the industry stakeholders since it will provide a venue for networking and discussion of updates on various innovative solutions for the development and further growth of the country’s tourism industry.

“We will have some topics like Innovate or Die and experiential tourism. And then we’re going to discuss the significance 2021 as an anchor for tourism activities for the next two years,” Aliño said.

The year 2021 marks the 500th year anniversary of the arrival of Ferdinand Magellan in the Philippines.

In addition, she added that the forum will also feature sharing of best practices in sports, film, farm, amusement and food tourism.

The Department of Tourism Central Visayas office (DOT-7) recently organized a group composed of sports enthusiasts and organizations to see how to transform sports events in Cebu and the rest of Central Visayas as major attractions.

According to Aliño, the forum will also tackle how the industry stakeholders could be more responsible and more sustainable.

CBM 2019 plans to have the top and most promising tourism players as well as high caliber speakers to emphasize the month-long event’s theme of Innovation in Action./dcb