Government Plans to Limit Tourists on Boracay Island

The government plans to control the number of tourists who will visit Boracay but the inter-agency task force overseeing the ongoing rehabilitation of the island has not yet determined the number of people who would be
This was learned Monday at the joint hearing of the Senate Committees on Tourism and Local Government after an official from the Ministry of Environment and Environment Natural Resources (DENR) told Senators that the research that will determine the carrying capacity of the island has not yet been completed.
According to Bighani Manipula of DENR's Office of Ecosystem Research and Development, the research, which is expected to be completed in August, will determine the island's capacity
. study, the carrying capacity of the island is about 35,000, although normally the population at one point reaches 60,000 and 110,000 during the high season.
The president of the Committee on Urism, Senator Nancy Binay, said that according to initial figures, Boracay has exceeded its capacity.
She said that the island's rehabilitation efforts would be lost if the government allowed overpopulation in the island. discussed by the working group once the study on the carrying capacity of the island is available, "said Deputy Interior Secretary Epimaco Densing .But Binay said that the Government would send false hopes by announcing that Boracay would be open in October when in reality the island can not accommodate more visitors.
"You say that by October 29, Boracay will be operational but apparently It is possible that Boracay is not yet ready to welcome tourists, "said Binay to Densing.
Densing said that once the data is available, the working group will put in point a mechanism to manage the number of tourists
The Committee must hold another hearing before the reopening of Boracay to verify the progress of its rehabilitation
.