The batchoy Catch-22

We’ve spent the better part of a year patting ourselves on the back for the UNESCO Creative City of Gastronomy title. It looks fantastic on a plaque at City Hall. But if we don’t get serious about the unglamorous work of protecting our culinary assets, specifically La Paz batchoy, that title is going to go stale fast.

Think about a tourist landing at Iloilo International Airport right now. They’ve read the 2024 TasteAtlas review naming our offal soup the best in the world. They step into the terminal, hungry for the real thing. What do they find? None of the heritage brands that actually built that reputation.

Why? Because the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) has a strict “no cooking” rule. Meanwhile, Changi Airport serves world-class Hainanese chicken rice, and Narita slings authentic ramen to millions. Even closer to home, you can buy Cebu lechon at Mactan and Pampanga sisig at Clark. Yet here we are, paralyzed by red tape. Local operators say they can use specialized heating equipment to bypass the open-flame ban. The Department of Tourism and CAAP need to find a functional middle ground, and a unified manifesto from local stakeholders is long overdue to force the issue.

But we can’t just blame national agencies. The batchoy industry itself is a fractured mess.

Right now, commercial instant noodle conglomerates and out-of-town knockoffs are perfectly free to hijack the “La Paz” name without consequence. A recent UP CIDS policy brief points out the glaring obvious: Geographical Indication (GI) registration is legally impossible without a governing body. Local makers have to stop guarding their individual recipes like state secrets and actually unite under a formal association. A temporary core group under the Gastronomy Council is the most pragmatic first step to force competing brands to the same table.

Then there is another key issue – hygiene.

Another UP CIDS discussion paper laid out an uncomfortable truth: nostalgia should not be an excuse for microbial hazards. Traditional micro-enterprises are still using porous wooden chopping boards and inconsistent broth temperatures. Upgrading these protocols will not kill the soul of the dish; it is the only way to future-proof the industry for a global market. We don’t need to punish small vendors with expensive, corporate food safety regulations. Instead, the local government should continue providing practical support – perhaps subsidizing food-grade chopping boards or handing out simple temperature logs. It only takes one major foodborne illness outbreak to severely damage our culinary reputation.

The UNESCO designation brought international scrutiny. It magnified the flaws in our local food governance. We can’t just throw PHP 500,000 at a quick marketing campaign and call it a day. The roadmap is right in front of us, courtesy of local researchers. It’s time to stop coasting on the hype, legislate the necessary infrastructure, and actually safeguard our heritage.