DOT exceeds 2022 target, logs more than 2 million international arrivals

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines has recorded more than two million international arrivals since the start of the year, surpassing the Department of Tourism’s baseline target for 2022.

Tourism Secretary Christina Frasco said in a statement Saturday that the department data showed that the Philippines has logged 2,002,304 international visitor arrivals from January 1 to May 12.

With this record, the DOT has exceeded its 2022 target of 1.7 million foreign visitors.

Frasco said: “Notwithstanding our challenges and difficulties that our country has faced, a pandemic and the various calamities that come into our shores the good news is that this has done nothing to break the Filipino spirit or to diminish the beauty of the Philippines.”

The Philippines, like the rest of countries in the world, was forced to shut its borders to travelers when the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020. The country only opened its doors to foreign tourists in February 2022.

The department said that South Korea topped the highest number of visitors with 487,502 (24.35%), which is almost a quarter of the total number of visitors so far.

The United States followed with 352,894 (17.62%), Australia with 102,494 (5.12%), Canada with 98,593 (4.92%) and Japan with 97,329 (4.86%).

“Rounding out the top 10 are China (75,043), Taiwan (62,654), United Kingdom (62,291), Singapore (53,359) and Malaysia (36,789).

The same report also said that the DOT recorded P168.52 billion in inbound visitor receipts from January to April this year. This is 782.59% higher than the P19,093,427,035.59 in tourism revenues generated in the same period last year. — Kristine Joy Patag