The country’s tourism department is eyeing to adopt “travel bubbles” to help the industry recover from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Tourism Secretary Bernadette Romulo Puyat
(CZAR DANCEL / MANILA BULLETIN)
Travel bubbles or "corona corridors" act as travel bridges for select groups of travelers from areas or countries where coronavirus cases have been contained.
In a press briefing, Tourism chief Berna Romulo-Puyat said the department is looking at the possibility of creating travel bubbles between neighboring Asian countries as the Philippines has various international airports in different provinces that are offering direct flights from the region.
She said most of the country’s tourist hotspots remain COVID-free or have only a minimal number of coronavirus cases.
“The Philippines is lucky because we have 7,641 islands and our tourist spots have practically no COVID cases, or if there is any, it comes only in single digits,” Puyat said.
“We were talking to our Australian partners last week. We were telling them that there’s an option for them to fly from Australia to, let’s say, Bohol or direct to Kalibo,” she added, saying that tourism magnets Bohol and Boracay were among the areas where coronavirus cases have been contained.
Australia and New Zealand were the first neighboring countries to adopt such a mechanism to kickstart their tourism.
As of June 11, Australia’s health department recorded an estimated 7,000 COVID-19 confirmed cases in their country, while New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced that they were finally able to eradicate the deadly virus as their last known COVID-19 patient has finally recovered.
Both regions managed to contain the spread of COVID-19 within their countries after their aggressive efforts to completely shut down their borders in March.
In the Asia Pacific region, the governments of Thailand, Japan, China, and Singapore also expressed their interest in adopting travel bubbles.
In the case of the Philippines, Puyat said the Department of Tourism can market Bohol and Boracay to other Asian countries as there were enough and continuous efforts to ensure tourists’ safety.
She said Bohol Gov. Arthur Yap is now building a COVID laboratory in the province and Aboitiz Foundation has donated one reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) machine. Filinvest City Foundation also donated three RT-PCR machines to Aklan, which is handling the reopening of Boracay along with the Boracay Inter-Agency Task Force.
“We are so grateful to the private sector for donating kasi ito yung kailangan na not only ng domestic but ng ating mga foreign tourists na (because this is what we need not only for domestic, but also foreign tourists that if) they go to a place, it’s safe, may (there are) health protocols in place. We will not open it until these are present,” she added.