What should we do NOW to promote the NMI?

Second of a four-part series

The administration should guide local people on how to cultivate vegetables, flowers, fruits, and tropical trees. Again, this could be easily done with consultation with our northern neighbors in Okinawa. If the budget permits, the administration should deliver the seed or seedling of trees and charge a minimum fee to local people who would agree to cooperate in this campaign to beautify the island environment with coffee bean plants, mango and lemon orchard and other fruit gardens. A good example of this is the botanical garden being operated by Ken Corp. and the fruit garden run by Mr. Borja, whose residence is near the statue of Maria. Another more recent example is that over 100 Mount Carmel students who just recently spent their entire Saturday planting shrubberies and other plants around the Public Library as a way to beautify the areas immediately surrounding the library.

It is recommended that we give our ocean, beaches, and reef the importance they deserve. After all, our water, beaches and reefs are high priority in our tourists’ reasons for coming to the CNMI. I suggest that the northern barrier reef immediately below Mariana Resort & Spa be renamed the Fantastic Northern Barrier Beef or some other such designation similar to the Great Barrier Reef of Cairns, Australia. A lookout point can then be constructed from the hills near the Mariana Country Club from where one can have a most panoramic view of the Fantastic Northern Barrier Reef all the way to the island of Managaha and beyond.

The administration should keep beaches clean all the times. It is very important to clean the beaches to attract tourists. After all, the beaches rank right up there as No. 1 on the list of the tourists’ reasons for coming to the CNMI. Japanese people living in mainland Japan seldom see the beautiful coral sand beach in Japan so they look forward to seeing and enjoying ours. If the beaches are kept clean and beautiful, tourists will find something new or something special and they will leave the CNMI with a positive outlook and with confidence that their visit was well worth it. And they will talk endlessly to others about their beautiful time in the CNMI. Unfortunately, they will also talk endlessly if they are not happy about their visit. So how do we want tourists to talk when they return to their home countries? It is up to us.

At the very least, Micro Beach, Beach Road and Sugar Dock area have to be kept clean and beautiful all the time. To clean those beaches, there are two measures. One is to get rid of seaweed in the water of all beaches. The seaweed in the water of beaches has been widely and badly spread because of dirty water from inland. The dirty water containing the nutrient substances coming in from septic tanks located in the private residences make the seaweed in the water grow rapidly. Therefore, it is very important to stop setting up septic systems as fast as possible.

The other measure is to cut the seaweesd that are already growing in the waters, as the administration of Guam did in Tumon Bay, where we don’t see the seaweed anymore. The private sector should willingly co-operate to get rid of the seaweed, if the administrations were to begin the seaweed purge campaign, in which participants will cut the seaweed one by one by hand. Of course, this will probably have to be done hand in hand with Coastal Resources Management and DEW and Fish and Wildlife to make sure that a food source for fish is not disturbed.

Stopping dirty water flowing into the ocean from dirty rivers is absolutely necessary. Dumping in the rivers should be strictly controlled and penalized by the administration.

The administration should also take the necessary steps to stop the dirty polluted water flowing into the lagoon out of Puerto Rico dumping site, which has reportedly rendered the lagoon water by Micro Beach and Charlie Dock polluted. People used to catch lots of horse mackerels as well as other fish on the pier of Charlie Dock but there is no more fishing now due to the polluted waters.

Again, the above steps are recommended to accord the high importance that our beaches, ocean, and reefs—the very top reasons tourists choose to come to the CNMI—deserve. (Koki Narita, Special to the Saipan Tribune)

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Editor’s Note: The foregoing is a letter submitted by the author to the Office of the Governor, the Legislature and the Marianas Visitors Authority. The letter was made available to the media. Mr. Narita is a Japanese with extensive experience in the tourism business, beginning in Guam in the early ’70s and ending on Saipan in the early 2000. He was involved with the Japan Travel Bureau and its subsidiary companies for 41 years, six of these in Guam and 17 on Saipan, including three years as president of Kan Pacific Saipan Ltd., dba Mariana Resort & Spa. He was a board member of the Guam Visitors Bureau, the first president of Japan Guam Travel Association, Public Relations committee member of the Marianas Visitors Bureau, president of HANMI, and president of the Saipan Association of Travel Agent.

In a letter accompanying his suggestions, Mr. Narita said: “Please understand that by submitting the enclosed observations and suggestions, I am merely trying to assist the administration to see things from the perspective of someone who has been involved in the tourism game for as long as I have and especially one who was involved from the very beginning, the infancy years of Japanese tourism in the Marianas. I am not trying to get a job with the administration. I, again, only wish to share based on my experience and knowledge of the Japanese tourism market in the Marianas.

“I am now retired and in Japan but because I left my heart in the Marianas. I am still a frequent visitor to Saipan.

To be continued.