BY CHRYSEE G. SAMILLANO
The Bacolod City Tourism Office is projecting a 284 percent increase in tourist arrivals in Bacolod City or more than 600,000 visitors by the end of the year.
City Tourism Officer Ma. Teresa Quebrar-Manalili recalled that in 2019, before the pandemic, Bacolod City had 803,000 visitors. But in 2020, because of the pandemic, the figure dropped about 82 percent with only 143,000 tourist arrivals.
“In 2021, we recovered slowly with a slight increase of 3.12 percent at 147,000 arrivals only,” she said during the Tourism Stakeholders Meeting in Bacolod Tuesday.
However, Manalili said that 2022 is quite a good year because slowly, “We are picking up the pieces with increasing visitor arrivals at 19,000 in January; 24,000 in February; 35,000 in March; 38,000 in April; 46,000 in May; and 57,000 in June.
“So, my conservative projection is that at the end of 2022, we will have about 500,000 to 600,000 visitor arrival which is a 284 percent increase from 2021,” she said.
Manalili said this does not yet include the tourism arrivals they anticipate for the forthcoming grand MassKara Festival celebration in October, and other upcoming events of the city like the Tanduay-Bacolod Rum Festival which kicks off on Friday, Tourism Month in September, Diwali Festival in November, and Christmas arrivals in December.*
