Presidential Adviser for Entrepreneurship Joey Concepcion said placing the country under the least restrictive alert level 1 by March is key to more tourism activities that would translate to small businesses' recovery.
Concepcion said in a televised interview on Tuesday, Feb. 15, that lowering the current alert level to 1 will allow more tourism mobility in the country and will likewise help the sector regain its losses from the two-year pandemic.
"Yung domestic tourism natin sisigla uli at makakatulong ito sa maliliit na negosyante dito sa tourism sector--mga may ari ng souvenir shop, mga tour guide, mga maliit na hotel (Our domestic tourism will be alive and this will also help small businesses in this tourism such as souvenir shops, tour guides, and small hotels)," he said.
"Importante rin yan para sa ibang grupo na talagang (It is also important for other groups that) for the last two years, they suffered a lot. At least they can come back and do better in their tourism sector. I'm hoping that we proceed in this direction na (where) we bring down the alert level," he added.
The Go Negosyo founder on Feb. 8 urged the government to place the country under alert level 1 by March in order to "deescalate from crisis mode to recovery mode."
He stressed that shifting to the least restrictive alert system will give the country an opportunity to see how well it will manage by relying only on maintaining prescribed public health safety protocols.
He, however, pointed out that places with high infection level and low vaccination level will have "to be corrected before we bring it down to alert level 1."
"Kasi kung hindi bakunado ang isang lugar and way below 50 percent, medyo delikado. So kailangan sikapin nila na at least minimum 70 percent fully vaccinated yung lugar and then pwede nang ibaba sa alert level 1 (Because if an area's vaccination rate is way below 50 percent, it's a little dangerous. So it must achieve 70 percent fully vaccination first before it is deescalated to alert level 1)," Concepcion said.
Shifting to alert level 1 by March, he further said, will be timely as summer period starts.
People, who have not gone out for a vacation in the past two years, would probably want to take their vacation, pay for airfare, for hotel, and restaurant which will be a great help to small tourism businesses, he said.
READ MORE: 'From crisis mode to recovery mode': Palace adviser urges move to Alert Level 1 by March