By Rodel Rodis
SHANGHAI, CHINA- “Visit the Shanghai World Expo 2010″ has been on my bucket list for some time just below another item that I thought was near impossible – “Witness the inauguration of an honest Philippine president.” I did both in two weeks.
The Shanghai Expo, which opened on May 1 and will last until October 31, 2010, is expected to draw anywhere from 70 to 100 million people, almost all of whom will be Chinese. More than 190 countries and 50 international organizations have set up pavilions in this the largest, most expensive Expo ever. China has poured $4 billion into this event – twice what it spent on the Beijing Olympics – and this figure does not even include the $50 billion it invested in infrastructure improvements for the Expo.
When I visited the Philippine pavilion here, I was impressed by how much was done with very limited resources. It is a rectangular-shaped pavilion built without any walls to subdivide the different sections within it – food court, handicraft bazaar, tourist photo exhibits, and two live music stages. On the walls surrounding the pavilion are photos of Filipino hands – caring hands that massage, play music, clap and touch. It is a modest building compared with those of its rich Asean neighbors, Indonesia, Singapore and Malaysia, and is dwarfed by the monoliths Japan, China and South Korea.
The Indonesian pavilion right next door, easily four times the size and10 times the cost of the Philippine structure, is composed of several floors of exhibits featuring the country’s vast mineral resources, cultural legacies and its commitment to preserving the ecosystem.
The Philippine pavilion offers live musical performances featuring folk dances and a Freddie Aguilar-like guitarist-singer belting “Anak”, a crowd favorite. I was told that after their pavilions close at night, exhibitors from various countries troop to the Philippine pavilion to enjoy the live music and unwind.
At least 20,000 visitors stream through the Philippine pavilion daily attracted by the live music, colorful lights, native food, handicrafts and soothing massage. The visitors are also enticed by the chance to win a free PAL round trip ticket to the Philippines. offered daily to a lucky pavilion entrant.
It’s a mistake for PAL to offer a free RT ticket to the Philippines daily, it should offer 5 a day. The lucky winners will undoubtedly bring along friends and relatives and will tell everyone in their town or village about the Philippines which will attract even more visitors.
As you wander through the Expo’s 240 pavilions (which will take weeks to explore), you will notice that there are hardly any westerners (Americans or Europeans) and you will also quickly realize why China is the most populous country in the world (1.3 billion).
When I inquired as to why there were so few western visitors to the Expo, the explanations from both the few Americans and the many Chinese I spoke to were the same: “it’s the economy”.
Americans and Europeans are still reeling from the global recession which denies many of them the means to go on trips abroad as they used to do in the past. But that is not a problem for the Chinese. Aside from the fact that it’s their home turf, they have also racked up a huge trade surplus with the United States and Europe, accumulating over $1 trillion in foreign currency reserves. This surplus has allowed the Chinese masses to travel within China and abroad.
According to official statistics, 47.66 million Chinese went abroad in 2009 and this year the number is expected to increase to 54 million. . The China National Tourism Administration projects that in five years, more than 100 million Chinese mainlanders are expected to travel abroad where they are expected to spend at least US$100 billion.
What all these facts mean is that the future of tourism in the Philippines lies not with the west but with China.
Japan, reeling from its prolonged economic downturn, understands this new economic reality and is actively seeking to cash in on Chinese tourism. Starting July 1, 2010, the annual income requirement of Chinese applying for tourist visas to Japan was cut from $37,000 to $10,000 and Japan has increased the number of consulates in China accepting applications from three to seven. Japan expects to increase Chinese tourists from 110,000 last year to 1.5 million this year.
According to the Philippine tourism attaché in Beijing, some 180,000 Chinese tourists visited the country last year, up 13.3 percent from 2008. China is currently the Philippines’ No. 4 source of tourists but this number will certainly grow more in the years to come.
Newly appointed Tourism Secretary Alberto Lim does not seem to grasp this new economic reality yet as he declared in a recent interview with Agence France Press (AFP), which appeared in the Malaysian Mirror I read, that he wants the Philippines to “maximize its potential of being an English-speaking nation” to attract more medical tourists who feel comfortable with English-speaking doctors and nurses (those who haven’t immigrated to the US, Canada, Australia and the UK yet).
Lim’s focus on English-speaking tourists is misplaced. Last year, the East Asia market -composed of China, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea and Taiwan – accounted for 41.78% of the 848,518 tourists who visited and stayed in Metro Manila hotels and accommodation facilities.
But Lim, who used to operate a high-end tourist resort in Palawan, may just be relying on his own limited experience. In due time, he may come to realize that teaching Filipinos some Mandarin may be the more productive way to go in the future.
I hope his learning curve is short because one thing the Philippine pavilion can do right now to boost tourism, with more than three months still remaining in the Shanghai Expo, is to emulate Peru and Indonesia. The Peruvian pavilion features a wall devoted to the history of the Chinese in Peru while the Indonesian pavilion pays tribute to Admiral Cheng Ho, the greatest Chinese explorer of the 15th century.
With limited funds, a wall in the Philippine pavilion could be easily set up devoted to the distinguished history of the Chinese in the Philippines and could feature bios of prominent Chinoys (Chinese Filipinos) like Philippine national hero Dr. Jose Rizal and the current president of the Philippines, Noynoy Cojuangco Aquino, whose mother, the late former Pres. Cory Aquino, once visited the ancestral village home of the Co family in China. The Chinoy exhibit could also include the bios of the current secretary of tourism and his sister, prominent broadcast journalist Cheche Lim Lazaro.
Let’s start learning Mandarin now. Ni hao ma? (How are you?)
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