DENR: Carrying capacity crucial to Boracay’s sustainable tourism

BY BOY RYAN B. ZABAL

Environment secretary Roy Cimatu said the government is putting much emphasis to identify the tourism carrying capacity of Boracay Island before it will re-open to foreign and local tourists on October 26.

PHOTO BOY RYAN ZABAL

Managing the number of tourists the island could accommodate with minimal damage to environment is crucial to the sustainable environment growth of Boracay Island.

Based on the carrying capacity assessment, the island catered to 6,400 average tourists daily and 19,900 tourists on any given day, more than the usual number of guests allowed to stay Boracay Island.

The study noted the peak tourism months of April, May and February exceeded the optimal tourist numbers for Boracay Island over the specified time period.

Last year, the island accommodated more than 2-million local and foreign tourists.

The study pointed out the Boracay’s carrying capacity of the island was beyond threshold leading to worsening of environment and water quality.

In particular, the tourist experience in beach and swimming areas were no longer ‘worthwhile’ and becoming less attractive to tourists.

World Tourism Organization (WTO) defines carrying capacity as “the maximum number of people that may visit a tourist destination at the same time, without causing destruction of the physical, economic, socio-cultural environment and an unacceptable decrease in the quality of visitors' satisfaction".

Cimatu said multi-disciplinary team of experts from Ecosystems Research and Development Bureau of the Department Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) and the University of the Philippines (UP) in Los Banos conducted the tourism carrying capacity study of Boracay Island.

On the other hand, the Boracay Inter-Agency Task Force (BIATF) on Wednesday is planning for a Boracay opening dry-run on October 16 until October 25 with local tourists from the province of Aklan as priority to stay in Boracay.

Cimatu also urged visitors to wait for announcements from the Department of Tourism (DoT) for the list of establishments allowed to operate before they proceed their hotel reservations.

“The compliant hotels will be given the chance to operate. We will make sure these hotels will be able to deliver services to tourists without jeopardizing the environmental laws,” he stressed.

The one-stop-shop operation in CityMall Boracay was also extended from August 25 to September 7 to allow establishments to comply with the necessary business permits.