A SHOT IN THE ARM Korea markets CNMI as a tourist destination

It looks like the CNMI will still get the much needed media exposure in Korea despite the limited budget of the Marianas Visitors Authority in promoting the island as an ideal tourist destination.

An 80-minute weekly television show in Korea entitled “The Challenge – Earth Exploration,” will feature the CNMI. It is the first time that the Northern Marianas will be shown on a special television program on Korea’s Independence Day on Aug. 15, 1999.

Total cost of the television production was estimated to reach $800,000, which includes air time, according to Glen Palacios, manager of Orca Dive Shop. It will be seen by an estimated 10 million televiewers.

A group of production crew from the government-owned Korean Broadcasting System stayed on Saipan from July 9-18. Four celebrities, including the Y.Z. Hwang, gold medalist in the 1994 Barcelona Olympics marathon, took a survival training on the island. This will be included in the TV show. They also took scuba diving lessons provided by Orca Saipan.

Before the Korean crew left, a war memorial was sunk in the ocean near Saipan Harbor for some 5,000 Koreans who died during the war in the CNMI. The trip was jointly sponsored by MVA and Orca Dive Shop.

As part of its commitment to promote the Northern Marianas in Korea, the MVA board has allotted only some $164,000 for marketing campaign. A huge chunk of its budget went to promotion in Japan, the island’s main source of visitors.

Visitor arrivals in the CNMI has drastically declined since the pullout of Korean Air in August 1997 due to the tragic crash on nearby island of Guam that killed 230 people. Korean Air used to ferry an average of 12,000 passengers a month to the islands.

Tourism officials have tried to convince Korean Air to resume service, but the collapse of the Korean economy led the airline executives to suspend service indefinitely. Recently though Korean Air executives have expressed interest in resuming service before the end of the year.

Asiana Airlines’ decision to increase the frequency of flights to the Northern Marianas is a welcome relief to the shrinking tourism market. The airline executives raised the possibility of providing charter flights from Pusan to Saipan because of the growing honeymoon market there.

Korea projects the honeymoon market to increase continuously as some 400,000 couples are expected to get married this year, a good reason for airlines and tour operators in the CNMI to prepare for the competition with Guam in getting a bigger share of the Korean market.

Based on the visitor arrivals record of MVA, the Korean market started showing some signs of recovery in December 1998. Passenger demand jumped 50 percent in January 1999 compared to the same period last year.

MVA officials have traveled to Korea where they met with the biggest tour operators early this year to seek their assistance in marketing the CNMI.