With the CNMI\u2019s tourism industry at a standstill, what\u2019s next for the Commonwealth?<\/p>\n
With the COVID-19 pandemic laying bare the vulnerability of the local economy\u2014with the revenue downturn from the lack of tourists in the CNMI, mass layoffs, businesses and hotels closing, and even the government shutting down\u2014the question of what\u2019s next for the CNMI\u2019s primary economic driver is paramount on everyone\u2019s mind these days.<\/p>\n
Gov. Ralph DLG Torres emphasized, though, that, while revenue from tourism is important, the health of the community is the government\u2019s priority.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs much as our revenue here is derived from our tourism, our priority and my priority, with the administration and public health, is our [health],\u201d Torres said in an interview.<\/p>\n
While he does hope that the islands can have the tourists back, he does not foresee tourism numbers growing in the CNMI soon while the COVID-19 pandemic in ongoing. \u201cI hope that this year, in the next several months,\u201d Torres said when asked when expects to open the CNMI to tourism again. The governor was quick to add, though, that he \u201chonestly does not foresee the tourism industry opening up.\u201d <\/p>\n
The governor also added that even if Saipan gets clear and becomes coronavirus-free in the next month or two, the industry would still be in a freeze, given that Asia is the CNMI\u2019s tourism market.<\/p>\n
He also foresees the CNMI tourism industry changing due to the pandemic. \u201cWe\u2019ve done so much precautionary measures, so much preventive measures, that even our tourism industry is going to change.\u201d<\/p>\n
He hinted that there would be an added layer of security that the Marianas Visitors Authority is planning to implement, such as requiring visitors to be tested for COVID-19. \u201cOur tourists that come here, we welcome them, when and if we open those borders, but we would want to have our own test kits ready here and mandate every tourist that comes to the island to get our own test here, and get swabbed here, and make sure that everybody that\u2019s landing will go through the same process.\u201d<\/p>\n
The governor said that tourism measures are being planned ahead, with MVA, to protect everyone in the CNMI. \u201cThat\u2019s a security for us, and also security for our tourists. I know that we don\u2019t have tourists coming in yet but\u2026we\u2019re already planning ahead, what we should do here…to protect our nurses and doctors and everybody so that CNMI is viewed as a tourist destination that is safe\u2026[with] our beautiful, natural habitat, and the environment.\u201d<\/p>\n
MD: With the COVID-19 pandemic, what\u2019s next for CNMI\u2019s tourism?<\/p>\n
KW: Tourism, COVID-19, Marianas Visitors Authority.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
With the CNMI\u2019s tourism industry at a standstill, what\u2019s next for the Commonwealth? With the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":320730,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[257],"class_list":["post-321177","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","tag-nmi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321177","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=321177"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321177\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/320730"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=321177"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=321177"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=321177"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}