Tourism industry leaders are looking forward to working with the new government as they strive towards making tourism the number one industry in the country.

In a press conference at the Century Park Hotel last Friday during a gathering of tourism stakeholders, Robert Lim Joseph, chairman emeritus of the National Association of Independent Travel Agencies (NAITAS), said there are still lots of work to be done to realize Philippine tourism’s full potentials.

“The government and private sector should work together to give tourism the attention it deserves,” said Joseph as he expressed optimism the industry is further poised to grow under the incoming administration.

The press conference was held as tourism stakeholders like travel and tour operators, airline executives, hotel and restaurant owners and executives, school officials, and tourism students met to discuss industry issues. Tourism Undersecretary Oscar Palabyab was also present during the gathering, which was called by Joseph to discuss important matters.

After the issues were threshed out and matters were clarified, the stakeholders called for the holding of election of officers of NAITAS in June to avoid putting the organization in limbo.

During the press conference, Joseph, who is also the honorary consul general of the Republic of Latvia to the Philippines, said: “We are very positive about the incoming government because of the encouraging feedbacks we received from abroad, specially about the holding of clean and honest elections.”

He said the private sector welcomes the statement of presidential frontrunner Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III about stamping out corruption in his administration.

“This is what we want, what we’ve been fighting for, that there should be no corruption in tourism. Aquino’s statement gives us so much confidence,” he said.

Joseph said there are strong sentiments the new leaders will carry out policies beneficial to the nation. “We expect the economy to become stronger as the fundamentals are already there and there will be more investors, particularly in the tourism sector.”

He said the new administration should work towards bringing back the country to Category 1 status to further boost the aviation and tourism industry.

Joseph said the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) should work hand in hand with tourism stakeholders so that it can address the issues and concerns raised by the US Federal Aviation Authority when it reviewed the country’s aviation preparedness and downgraded the Philippines to Category 2.

He said because of the downgrading to Category 2, many prospective tourists were prevented from visiting the Philippines as they were not being given insurance coverage because of the negative feedback about the country.

Despite the slowdown in travel worldwide and the economic difficulty, the Department of Tourism projects foreign tourist arrivals this year at 3.27 million, which could generate direct revenues of US$3.31 billion and employment of 3.39 million.

Joseph said the Philippines can achieve more given the right policies and once the government addresses the issues holding back the growth of the tourism industry.