CEBU CITY, Philippines - Cebu's position as an international gateway will be strengthened with plans to open more direct flights to various international tourist destinations.Tourism Secretary Joseph "Ace" Durano said officials are hoping to see direct flights from Osaka, Japan and Chiang Mai, Thailand to Cebu and vice versa. Durano said Cebu flights to Nanning, China will also be implemented between May to June 2008. This flight adds up to the existing charted flights between China and Cebu. At present, chartered flights include Shanghai-Cebu and Guangzhou-Cebu and vice versa, which are being served by China Southern Airlines. “Cebu is really an international hub, evident in the wide mix and number of tourists who visited the province last year,” Durano said. According to data from DOT-Central Visayas, close to two million tourists visited Cebu in 2007 with Koreans, Japanese and Americans as the top three nationalities. Chinese tourists, on the other hand, are seen as the country's emerging market along with Russians and Indians. "This is why it is important for our (tourist) guides to learn Mandarin Chinese and Russian," Durano said. Durano also expressed optimism that the planned direct flight from Cebu to Los Angeles, California will be implemented by Philippine Airlines (PAL) as soon as the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) of the US will upgrade the country's civil aviation rating to category 1. The recent FAA downgrade prevented PAL from increasing the number of direct flights to the US, Cebu's third largest tourist market. Around 64,495 tourists from the US visited Cebu in 2007, an increase of 20.84 percent from the 53,374 tourists in 2006. With the increasing number of tourists coming to Cebu, Durano reiterated his call to expand the Mactan Cebu International Airport (MCIA). "In 2005, seventy-five percent of the airport terminal was used. This needs to be expanded. I don't know the decision of the MCIAA board but I hope that they will expand it soon especially with PAL planning to make Cebu as a hub," he said. Earlier, PAL president Jaime Bautista said they would lease 6.6 hectares of the airport for a minimum of five years because the company will build a hangar and a maintenance facility for additional aircrafts. | 
