Councilor Al Ryan Alejandre, Kadayawan Execom Spokesperson, told the media in an ambush interview right after the Indak-Indak sa Kadayawan Saturday on, August 20 at the San Pedro Street that based on their monitoring, almost all hotels and other accommodations in the city are fully-booked.
“Puno-puno atong hotels (Our hotels are fully occupied) because we are expecting around 50,000 tourists arrivals. Na-meet nato kana [nga target]. Kulang-kulang pa gani atong (We met our target. We even experienced shortage of) hotel accommodations),” Alejandre said.
He added that they are also anticipating more tourists to come as the Kadayawan celebration will still be until Sunday, August 21, with the Pamulak sa Kadayawan — a floral float parade.
As to the crowd estimates, the official said he has yet to get the data from the police officials.
But overall, he said the event is well-executed. Although he said, again, he has yet to get the general assessment.
Davao City Mayor Sebastian Duterte, in his short speech, also thanked everyone for making the comeback in-person celebration of the Kadayawan successful.
The 37th Kadayawan festival marks the comeback of the in-person celebration of activities after it was halted for two years due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Former City Tourism Operations Office (CTOO) Generose Tecson bared in a previous interview that based on the collated 2019 figure, the city generated P6.15 billion in that year.
For 2020, following the cancellation of the face-to-face celebration, the city incurred P1 billion losses.