By: Glazyl Y. Masculino
BACOLOD City – Cebu Pacific announced on Thursday that they will be launching daily flights for Bacolod City and Clark in Pampanga starting August 9.
Chichi Bautista, airline’s area sales manager for the Visayas, said the new air route will ease the congestion in the Manila airport, and will open investment opportunities to the provinces of Negros Occidental and Pampanga.
“We are not only able to establish yet another gateway, but we believe that by opening up another hub, we are also opening up new trade and tourism opportunities as well,” she said.
Bautista also said that flying via Clark going to north Luzon is convenient, as an alternative route from Manila.
For their part, Maan Banawa of the Department of Tourism (DOT) – Region 3 and Elen Lorenzo of Clark Development Corporation, during the Clark Trade and Tourism Session at the L’ Fisher Hotel here, presented the reasons for Clark’s growing economic gateway in north Luzon, highlighting it as an ideal destination for meetings, conferences, exhibitions/events, sports and leisure, adventure and ecotourism activities, culture and arts.
It was also stressed that there are currently 1,038 locators and 124,584 workers in Clark, with total investments of P154.6 billion.
Meanwhile, Bautista also revealed that Cebu Pacific will also launch its Iloilo-Clark and Clark-Narita, Japan routes on August 9.
The flight for Clark-Puerto Princesa is set to commence operations in October this year, she said.
“These four new routes will boost our total capacity in Clark by 40 percent in 2019, following a 75 percent increase in 2018,” she added.