‘Paradise lost’ in Philippines

Cecil Morella
Tue, 29 Aug 2006

Resorts in the Philippines are starting to count the cost from the country’s worst oil spill as tourists shun the blackened beaches of what was once a tiny corner of paradise.

For Helen Stummer, more than 20 years of hard work virtually disappeared overnight when the oil tanker Solar I went down off Guimaras Island more than two weeks ago.

As waves of foul-smelling oil started to wash up on the pristine beachfront of the Nagarao resort, her guests packed and left.

“Our investment is totally lost,” sighed Stummer, a Filipina who bought the uninhabited, 10-hectare coral outcrop on the southern edge of the Guimaras Strait with her German husband nearly a quarter-century ago.

Staff of the secluded, family-run tropical island haven valiantly fought back the giant slick with hastily cut down logs, bamboo and wild palm fronds, and the improvised effort managed to keep away most of the sludge.

But to no avail — mass cancellations of reservations have all but wiped out this year’s tourist season and most of next year’s.

“We are not talking about today and tomorrow,” she said of the crisis facing her and other island resort owners. “We are talking about years to come.”

The Nagarao has built a cult following among northern Europeans who flee the continent’s harsh winters.

Stummer says her European guests, who make up 60 percent of the clientele, stay for between two weeks and six months at a time to enjoy the solitude of snorkeling and boating around the surrounding marine reserves.

“They are not backpackers. They are people willing to spend money for peace and quiet,” she told AFP.

Tourism is a backbone of the Guimaras economy. Tourism receipts reached 204.3 million pesos ($4- million) last year, or nearly 10 percent more than the provincial government revenues for the same period, according to the provincial tourism office.

But since the spill, the industry has plummeted despite the fact that resorts on the island’s western and northern flanks have been unaffected, according to staff at the tourism office.

The provincial government said only eight of the province’s 22 beach resorts have been hit by the slick, but most of the best snorkelling, swimming, and island-hopping sites have been damaged.

“Bringing the tourists back would be the hard part”

The Taclong marine reserve, where Nagarao guests had gone to swim and snorkel among the thousand-plus hectares of mangroves, coral reefs and sea grasses, is knee-deep in black ooze.

Environmentalists and officials have warned that the situation could get still worse.

While around 50 000 gallons of oil has spilled into the waters, another 450 000 gallons is still onboard the sunken ship, and those tanks could give way before they are drained or the vessel is re-floated.

The clean-up could take three years, but according to Stummer it could be decades before the area’s damaged corals return to their previous state — and maybe just as long before visitors decide to come back.

“Bringing the tourists back would be the hard part,” she said.

Source:

http://travel.iafrica.com/bulletinboard/973827.htm