Antique will officially introduce its Sibalom Natural Park as an ecotourism destination in the southern part of the province on May 10.<\/p>\n
Republic Act 11038 declared SNP a natural park. It extends to 18 villages of Sibalom, including Mt. Porras in Barangay Imparayan, and covers an area of 6,778.44 hectares.<\/p>\n
SNP Protected Area deputy superintendent Joery Oczon said in an interview Tuesday that they will provide forest tours, serve food and beverages, and offer a community experience distinct to the area.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe tour-guiding, housekeeping, customer service, and other skills required by tourists will be done by the trained Bantay Gubat (Forest Guardian) volunteers,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He said the opening the park as an ecotourism destination is an offshoot of the tour-guiding and community-based ecotourism development training conducted by the United Nations Development Program-Biodiversity Finance Initiative (UNDP-BIOFIN) in partnership with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) since 2022.<\/p>\n
The UNDP-BIOFIN and DENR identified the SNP as a recipient of its ecotourism product development training, being home to the wildlife Visayan warty pig, tarictic hornbill, Walden\u2019s hornbill and spotted deer.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe world\u2019s largest flower Rafflesia speciosa grows in the SNP aside from the boulders of gemstones,\u201d Oczon said.<\/p>\n
The Rafflesia speciosa is considered the world\u2019s largest flower because it can expand up to 56 centimeters in diameter when in full bloom.<\/p>\n
SNP has ready amenities such as picnic tables, gazebos, and cottages to cater to families and organizations wanting to hold their meetings or stay overnight stay.<\/p>\n
\u201cBantay Gubat volunteers will entertain tourists and visitors with local songs and dance,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Local dishes such as native chicken dishes porbida (cooked in alupidan leaves) and papisik (stuffed with tomato, onions, and garlic cooked on a clay pot and firewood) that won in the 24th SNP anniversary cooking competition on April 23 will be served.<\/p>\n
Rafflesia, a concoction of fruits growing within the area, will serve as signature drink.<\/p>\n
He said Bantay Gubat volunteers are now putting up their makeshift reception and orientation facility made of bamboo and coconut leaves, among other preparations for the launch.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe envision the SNP to soon become a world-class ecotourism site after its launching,\u201d Oczon said. (PNA)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Nature lovers, rejoice! Sibalom Natural Park in Antique is set to open its doors to visitors on May 10.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":75,"featured_media":255771,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[101],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-255770","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-travel"],"zyndk8_nxtgen_metadata":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bourbon.ph\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255770","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bourbon.ph\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bourbon.ph\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bourbon.ph\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/75"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bourbon.ph\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=255770"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bourbon.ph\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255770\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bourbon.ph\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/255771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bourbon.ph\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=255770"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bourbon.ph\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=255770"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bourbon.ph\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=255770"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}