2nd Visayas OTOP Fair Goes to Boracay

Expected to join the 2^nd Visayas One Town One Product (OTOP) Fair goes to Boracay are 99 OTOP Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) from Region 6 (39 SMEs), Region 7 (35 SMEs), and Region 8 (25 SMEs).

Department of Trade and Industry Western Visayas Regional Director Dominic P. Abad said that the fair will run for five days from 23 - 27 May 2007 at the La Carmela de Boracay Resort.

Two selling areas will be provided for the buyers. One is at the second floor of the resort for the regular selling from 2:00PM-11:00PM daily and the other is at the beach front of the resort for the night market from 7:00PM-11:00PM daily.

Products for sale are souvenir items, beachwear, novelty items, furnishings, natural fiber, and fashion accessories such as bags, shawls, headgears and footwear, including food items and horticulture inputs.

To add color to the fair, two live mannequins will carry and present Visayas OTOP products under the direction and choreography of International Lifestyle Designer PJ Aranador.

To make the fair more alive, a rolling band will be commissioned to roam from station 1, 2 and 3 in addition to a sailboat bearing the OTOP logo that will sail around the Island.

To enliven the night market, a sand art castle with all the candle lights featuring OTOP will be mounted plus a band to play reggae music on May 25.

Abad said that the Island of Boracay was chosen as the venue because most of the souvenir shops are here, domestic and foreign tourists abound in the area, and it has great market and tourism potentials.

Invited to come are buyers from Manila and from the three regions, governors and mayors and other government officials from the National Government Agencies, among others.

The 2^nd OTOP fair will focus on selling the products produced by the SMEs of the three regions under the DTI OTOP Philippines program.

OTOP is one of the priority programs of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo to promote entrepreneurship and create jobs in the countryside.

It encourages the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) to produce and market distinct products or services using indigenous raw materials and manpower of every municipality or city.

Executives of the Local Government Units (LGUs) take the lead in identifying, developing, and promoting a specific product or service which has a competitive advantage.

The DTI through the Provincial Offices and the SME Development Group assist the LGUs in identifying the specific product and coordinated other forms of assistance from other government agencies such as the Departments of Agriculture (DA), Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), Interior and Local Government (DILG), Science and Technology (DOST), Tourism (DOT) and the Technical Education Skills Development Authority (TESDA), among others.

Package of assistance include business counseling, skills and entrepreneurial training, marketing, and introduction of appropriate technologies.

The 1^st OTOP fair, which was held in Cebu City last year, focused on the product development initiatives of the DTI highlighting the tourism and market potentials of the Supra Region, the Central Philippines , which attracts more than half of the foreign tourists in the country.

The fair became a vehicle to showcase the OTOPs of Region 6, 7 and 8 and generated sales amounting to P 3.77M for the 4-day fair.

Bent on promoting the products of small entrepreneurs in LGUs, DTI -Regional Operations Group (ROG) Undersecretary Carissa Cruz-Evangelista signed a Memorandum of Agreement with the Development Bank of the Philippines for a special window on financing for the OTOP SMEs on April 16 this year. (DTI)