00:00The Wraith Laying Ceremony was conducted by the Department of Tourism and Bataan LGU
00:04along with the delivery of the DOT of the Philippine Experience Program in the Philippines.
00:08This is Rod Lagusan with the report.
00:13In general, the tourism of the country is in a good state.
00:17This was also given by Tourism Secretary Cristina Garcia-Frasco.
00:20Next is the 712 billion pesos in visitor receipts or income from tourism as of December 15.
00:27This is higher than the 697 billion pesos recorded last year
00:32where the country's recovery rate reached 119%
00:35from the date of 2019 or before the COVID-19 pandemic.
00:39According to Secretary Frasco, this is one of the important parameters to say that tourism is active
00:44despite the possibility that the first target of 7.7 million international tourist arrivals for this year will not reach.
00:51According to the Department of Tourism, as of December 17,
00:54almost 5.65 million international visitors were recorded
00:57where South Korea is the leading top source market.
01:00For me, while it is traditional to look at the number of people arriving into the country,
01:09we would invite an expanded view to look at the tourism numbers that matter to the economy,
01:18that matter to the lives of the Filipino people.
01:22They are considering the various factors that are affected
01:26since the announcement of the target of 7.7 million international visitors.
01:30For example, this is expected to reach 2 million Chinese tourists in the country.
01:35But the Department of Foreign Affairs is also suspending the implementation of the electronic visa system here.
01:39This is also in line with the involvement of some Chinese nationals in the Pogo issue.
01:44Meanwhile, the Labor Force Survey of the Philippine Statistics Authority added more details.
01:49In April, the number of tourism workers was 16.4 million.
01:53In 2023, the tourism investment was estimated to reach Php 508.8 billion.
01:59From this, more than 51.4% came from the accommodation sector,
02:04whose target to exceed is also in line with the President's commitment to create more law.
02:08We have seen that from an average of 9 nights,
02:11tourists are now staying over 11 nights in the country.
02:16We have the highest tourism per capita spend in the ASEAN at over Php 2,000.
02:24And we have seen that over 70% of the tourists that come into the country are repeat visitors.
02:32Because of this, the income from tourism is increasing
02:35and the government is expecting the possibility of expanding this
02:39because of the more diversified or more choices of tourism products that can be tried in the country.
02:44Rod Laguzad for Pambansang TV in Pagong, Philippines.
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