MARINDUQUE: ECOTOURISM CAPITAL OF THE PHILIPPINES
Marinduque, my small heart-shaped province, 30 minutes by air, south of Manila is known worldwide as the Lenten Capital of the Southern Tagalog Region because of its Moriones Festival during Holy Week . Today, the provincial government under the leadership of Governor Bong Carrion is promoting Marinduque as the Ecotourism Capital of the Philippines.
The provincial government ecotourism projects are headed by Head of the Tourism Department, Gerry Jamilla and Allan Jay Velasco, Provincial Administrator. The first project starting development this year is the ECO Park at the Luzon 1911 Datum site in Silangan, Mogpog. The Luzon1911 Datum marker and location established that it was the geodetic point marker for all map makers of the country. Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) of the Philippines in their document dated July 31, 2007 refers to this triangulation document that this marker is the geographical center of Marinduque as well as of the Philippines . It's coordinates are: 13 degrees, 33 minutes and 39.82 seconds NORTH and 121 degrees, 52 minutes and 8.17 seconds EAST. This site has received support from National Mapping Resource and Information Authority( NAMRIA). From what I heard the development of an ECO park has been started by NAMRIA and is now becoming a popular tourist spot for those who love to hike as well as for bikers. The view at the top of the hill is spectacular. The hike is quite hard for senior citizens, but a not too hard a walk for the young and adventurous.
Several other tourist attractions and sites are now considered for development under the Green Tourism Concept by the Provincial Government. These are the Sibuyao Falls in Torrijos, the Palo Maria White Beach in Maniwaya Island and the Tarug Caves in Mogpog. The Palo Maria white beach is touted to be an alternative to Boracay. In addition to the above tourist destinations, the private resort, Bellarocca Island Resort and Spa that was completed last year has already attracted a lot of tourists from Japan and Korea. It was design to look like Santorini Island, Greece where all the building are white and sticking on the cliffs. Just recently, a hidden cave and subterranean river was discovered in San Isidro, Santa Cruz. This discovery brought a lot of excitement to the tourism officials as well as the local barangay officials. Inside the cave, the clear white water of the river are big shrimps and eels and a small waterfall. The caves are inhabited by swallows and huge bats. It will take 2 hours to complete exploration of the caves and the underground river. If this is developed and preserved, it will be a good competition of the Palawan subterranean river system in attracting tourists all over the world. Palawan's subterranean river is the most visited tourist spot in the Philippines. It is listed in the top ten natural wonders of the world.
Governor Carrion in his State of the Province address last year, emphasized the concept of Green Tourism. He stressed that Green Tourism brings together elements of ecology, cultural, agriculture, and even sports or adventure Travel. He said, there are several labels used to refer to Green Tourism today, but he said the definition remains the same. Low impact and environmentally friendly tourism that cherishes, not destroy. Green tourism offers leisure and learning activities where visitors are encourage to enjoy nature and culture, and interchange with the locals in agricultural, mountain or fishing village settings. Carrion said that as a Market Strategy, Green Tourism is most ideal for Marinduque Island Setting. He says it taps into the growing demand for more Holidays and that concerns for the Environment and Global Warming grows daily- so that ecotourism will certainly increase in number for the long term and in the future years.
There is another project that the province has been involved-the Forest Project by DBP/DENR. This involves watershed rehabilitation, fruit tree forestation and mangrove rehabilitation in an aggregate area of 500 hectares as authorized by DENR( Dept of Environment and Natural Resources). Retired General Recaredo Sarmiento, former chief PNP, is the Project Consultant for the Forestation Project. To date about 61 hectares have been covered, 18 hectares at Brgy Canat have been planted with fruit trees, 27 hectares of fruit and forest trees in Santa Cruz and Torrijos and another 15.5 hectares of mangroves have been rehabilitated also in Santa Cruz and Torrijos. Directly benefiting in this program are 33 cooperatives, 33 barangays equivalent to 175 families.
In line with the above topic, the Governor issued an Executive Order declaring Green Tourism as the OTOP (One town, One Product) of the province. There are other tourist attraction being developed not directly related to Ecotourism. These are Battle of Pulang Lupa Commemoration, Araw Ng Marinduque and the annual Moriones Festival. I hope that in the next ten years, Ecotourism will be a success in my poor beloved island of Marinduque-The Heart of the Philippines.
By David B Katague
tagajaro@comcast.net
http://marinduqueawaitsyou.blogspot.com
8 comments:
How can the government of Marinduque promote itself as Ecotourism capital of the Philippines with its daily electrical power outage? Promoting Marinduque as tourist destination would be useless unless they do something about it.
Right you are. But hopefully things will fall into place soon.
how soon will it be?? its been almost 3 months now since the power outages started and its getting worse.
Richard: I can understand your frustration about power outage in Marinduque. I hope that this will be the highest priority of the provincial government. In the meantime, some business entity have their own generator to alleviate this problem. Personally, because of my resort, Chateau Du Mer, the first time I had a chance I purchased a generator. It is indeed a relief of my frustration due to frequent power brown out. Cheers and Good Day!
...and if you are a blogger, power outages could drive you really crazy. I am in the process of gathering info from the parties concerned about this situation, still validating some of the data and will make a post. Thank you guys.
power outages still ongoing and the government of marinduque is not doing anything to solve the problem. maybe its time to do "people power" in marinduque...
Eli, what is the latest news on the brown out problems. I know that other parts of the Philippines with the exception of big cities and metropolitan areas have also frequent brown outs. Good business for generator vendors but bad morale for residents like Richard and most of the local residents of Marinduque without generators. Thank You!
I guess every province around the country are riding on this bandwagon and developing their own
'ecotourism capital' program. While it may be a worthwhile pursuit, i'd like to see the provincial government having strong programs on: (1) ensuring that all Marinduqueno could have quality education and that we can produce highly educated Marinduqueno, (2) ensuring a self-sustaining province in terms of agricultural produce, develop homegrown businesses and industries that can convert our local produce to highly competitive and exportable products, and create ways to attract capital investments, (3) promoting our cultural, arts and historical heritage, and (4)develop programs for the youth that will make use of their talent into producing some tangible results, i.e maybe kabataang barangay could do reforestation projects in their barangay that will really produce reforested areas, in this way the youth will not only have projects like parties and sports activities during summer.
I hope the provincial government will also pursue on establishing an educational or research institutions/centers. I believe we are the only province in southern tagalog that doesn't have a research institution. We have a lot to offer on butterfly research, mining related problems, conservation of small island ecosystem, etc.
Thank you for reading.
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