The country’s latest campaign branding – “We Give the World Our Best” – aimed to “honor and uplift the spirit” of overseas Filipino workers, Presidential Adviser on Creative Communication Secretary Paul Soriano said over the weekend.
Soriano also clarified the new tagline is different and will not replace the country’s long-time tourism slogan “It’s More Fun in the Philippines.”
“At its core, the project intends to let the whole world know how good, compassionate, and competent Filipinos are. Filipinos bring their ‘best’ through daily actions that touch lives all over the world,” he said.
Senator Nancy Binay earlier said she was baffled by the transit ad in London extolling the crucial role of Filipino nurses during the coronavirus pandemic.
The complete campaign slogan read: “The nurse who gave the world’s first COVID-19 vaccine. A Filipina. We give the world our best. The Philippines.”
“Is the ad intended to encourage tourists to visit the country? Is it aimed to encourage more foreign investments? Or, is it meant for hospitals abroad to hire our nurses? It’s really vague,” Binay said.
“It seems that we are offering the world our nurses—which is a bit off since we are running out of supply of health workers. We don’t want to commodify our people, and we don’t want to be tagged as a labor-exporting country.”
Soriano said the bus advertisement in London, which came out in time for King Charles III’s May 6 grand coronation given the anticipated large international crowd to attend the historic global event, was just “among the first communication outputs” of the OPACC’s nation-branding project.
“Unfortunately, the London (advertisement) was misconstrued as part of the country’s tourism promotion campaign. OPACC wants to clear the confusion and clarify that it was not meant, in any way, to promote the country’s tourist destinations,” he said.
“Video (advertisements) featuring true stories of successful Filipinos in different countries were also released within the same period, aired overseas. The first two ads tell the story of Charm, a Filipina caregiver in the UK, and DJ, a barista in Italy,” he said.
“Through this country branding campaign, we want to uplift the spirit of our overseas Filipinos and honor them, particularly for their values that make Filipinos known to do their best at whatever chosen field, wherever they go and whatever it is they do. They truly deserve this,” Soriano added.
Tourism Secretary Christina Frasco said the DOT will eventually come out with a tourism brand aligned with OPACC’s country brand.
“There is a sea of opinions about this. But I would like to remind our fellow Filipinos that the statement ‘We give the world our best’ is a statement of fact. Do you not agree?” Frasco said.