Lawyer Helen J. Catalbas, Deparment of Tourism (DOT-6) director, was saddened by the “glaring reality” that the island province of Guimaras is not self-sufficient in food production.
“With two to three days non-operation of water transport, the markets are empty. Meaning to say, there is not much local production. There is no food sufficiency in Guimaras,” said Catalbas.
According to her, the Iloilo Terminal Market in Iloilo City serves as a “farm” for “many of the people in Guimaras.”
“You can observe that pumpboats crossing to Guimaras are full of agricultural produce like ‘alugbati’, ‘ampalaya’, and eggplant,” Catalbas said.
“We are trying to reverse that. The purchasing officers of hotels, hospitals and restaurants will cross to Guimaras and buy their ingredients and raw materials, not the other way around,” she further said.
Last year, the DOT-6 launched its market tourism program in Guimaras.
The program aims to “promote markets as among the stops in the itinerary of tour groups and even individual travelers.”
The tourism department have so far identified “2O markets all over the region to be tourist attractions and ‘bagsakan’ centers for tourism establishments to purchase.”
“At the moment, millions of domestic and foreign tourists visiting our region, but sad to say they are fed with produce originating from other regions or from other countries,” said Catalbas.
“While we speak hundreds of billions of pesos in terms of gross income from tourism, our net income could be very low considering that food and drinks are major components of tourism activities,” she explained.IMT
