By Dominique Gabriel G. Bañaga

The Bacolod City Tourism Office revealed on Tuesday, November 22, that the city currently lacks hotel room accommodation that would be required to host bigger events for meetings, incentives, conferences/conventions, and exhibitions (MICE).

Based on data released by City Tourism Officer Ma. Teresa Manalili, the city currently has a total of 3,671 rooms from hotels, tourist inns, motels, pension houses, and resorts.

The availability of rooms is also far when compared to neighboring Iloilo City, which currently has a total of 5,830 rooms.

According to Manalili, one of the objectives of Mayor Alfredo Benitez is to make Bacolod the capital of MICE tourism in the future.

“Bacolod City does not have enough accommodation establishments. We do not have sufficient hotel rooms to cater to conventions and conferences,” she said.

Some of the examples the tourism officer pointed out was during the Philippine Councilors League national convention in 2019, where more than 6,000 attendees arrived in the city but they were forced to book room accommodations available even outside Bacolod./DGB, WDJ