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MVA wants $7.4M budget for FY06
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Posted on Feb 21 2005
The Marianas Visitors Authority is seeking a $7.4-million budget for fiscal year 2006.
The budget proposal recently submitted to Gov. Juan N. Babauta is 5 percent greater than the $7-million annual appropriation that MVA has been receiving the past several years.
MVA managing director Vicky I. Benavente said the $400,000 increase would cover increased promotions in new tourism markets that the tourism agency is planning to develop. These include Russia, Europe, Taiwan, and the Philippines.
“Our budget proposal is very close to what we’ve had over the past years. We’re asking for a little bit more, so we can cover new markets next year,” said Benavente, who declined to make public the breakdown of MVA’s budget proposal.
MVA is also planning to conduct more surveys on travel market trends and undertake tourist site development projects on Rota, she added.
In related news, Benavente reported that MVA is still owed about $2.26 million by the CNMI government.
Although the Department of Finance remitted $365,000 to MVA on Feb. 4, some $2.18 million of the tourism office’s budget for FY 2005 and $78,000 from FY 2004 remains due from the central government.
Only $5.957 million of MVA’s current $7-million budget goes to the agency.
The Department of Lands and Natural Resources gets $858,000 for the care of Saipan tourist sites. One percent of the budget is mandatorily paid to the Office of the Public Auditor while another 2 percent is reserved to help retire the government’s accumulated deficit.
Of MVA’s funding, $3.72 million is allocated to advertising, with some $3 million set aside for promotions in international markets.
The biggest advertising budget-at $1.78 million-is budgeted for the Japan market, the primary source of visitors to the Northern Marianas. The China/Taiwan market comes next with $590,731, followed by Korea with $485,000.
MVA has budgeted $1.53 million for personnel expenses, while the remaining $709,491 is reserved for other operational expenses.
