Brownouts impact Samal tourism

Friday, March 17, 2023

Residents in the Island Garden of Samal City witnesses long and recurrent brownouts. These impact the livelihood of hundreds of residents, and disturb the tourism industry of the area as well.

Samal’s power supply is being handled by the Northern Davao Electric Cooperative Inc.

The manager of Camp Holiday Resort on the island, Michelle Reyes, said that the recurrent brownouts create problem for the tourists, which affect Samal tourism directly.

Reyes stated that they are making use of the generators, which are not sufficient to provide electricity to the resort. Generators are quite expensive, to top it all.

The resort manager added that they use generators when they witness three to four times of brownouts every day. However, generators cost a lot. Like other businesses in the area, tourism companies cannot simply take on extra manpower since the management requires handling the financials in order to carry on, particularly after bouncing back from the recent lockdowns due to COVID.

Other damages due the frequent power interruptions are appliances getting out of order and food spoilage, which local food businesses fear most of the time.

Of late, the Tagum Chamber of Commerce and Industry headed by Aerol Conde arranged a motorcade-rally that concluded at Rotary Park in Barangay Magugpo Poblacion.

Conde said that the power rates of Nordeco are no longer manageable, both in terms of the business community and common people.

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