The Department of Tourism (DOT) remains optimistic that over four million foreign tourists will visit the country this year despite the warning against travel to Mindanao. “The Philippines remains as an ideal destination with foreign travelers and groups continuing to arrive,” the DOT said in a statement yesterday. The DOT further noted that there had been no travel cancellations made by tourists from various countries, including the United Kingdom. “Travel advisories to some areas in the country have been constant and common, but this did not deter tourists from visiting the country,” the DOT said. Last year, the DOT said, visitor arrivals reached a record high of 3.9 million or 4.6 percent higher than the target of 3.7 million even with the travel advisories. The United Kingdom earlier warned its citizens against traveling to the Philippines, particularly in the South following the kidnapping of two European wildlife photographers in Tawi-Tawi. The DOT said the issuance of travel advisories is part of the regular functions of embassies in line with ensuring the safety and security of their citizens in a foreign country. “The Tawi-Tawi incident is considered unfortunate and could have been avoided had the visitors taken necessary precautions,” DOT said. Based on DOT data, bulk of foreign tourists visit the Nation Capital Region, the Bicol region, Western Visayas and Central Visayas as well as the Cordillera Administrative Region. In 2010 more than 52,000 travelers from UK toured Luzon, while 27,480 visited the Visayas and 3,835 went to Mindanao. The DOT said the tourism industry and the government are closely working to ensure safe and pleasant travel of foreign tourists. Source:- http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=774520&publicationSubCategoryId=63
Actually, that's a lot of tourists. I wonder if the 3.9 million last year were all true tourists, or a mixture of 'others'. If it really was 3.9 million paying tourists, where did they all go? What did they spend money on? I've realised how little I know about tourism in Philippines
In recent years I have noticed many more westerners bringing their whole family over for a holiday, I've been in the immigration queue, looked around and noticed many families with three or four clearly non Filipino kids in tow, also been in Boracay and watched similar families having a beach holiday. Hard to say though how many are real tourists and how many are business people that don't bother ticking business, I mean they are only getting this information off the landing cards, have they really got people reading those things and collating statistics? And if they have how accurate are the landing cards in the first place. Certainly I always tick box 2 on the landing card :- "Visit Friends / Relatives" so what does everyone else do? I would suggest they should define a Tourist as box 1 on "Main purpose of travel" and box 1 on "Travelling on Package Tour" as that would have been the traditional definition of a tourist in the west, I know things have changed and many folk always book flights and hotels separately on their own, but if they want a tourist industry then they should cater to the package deal market. By they way they are back to those old style landing cards again after changing them completely a couple of years ago, my last visit in 2011 was the old style both in and out.
Tourism is apparently one of the UK's largest industries, we had 30 million tourists in 2010 and Scotland (at 11%) relies on it even more than England where it's about 9% of the entire economy! We have a population of 60 odd million, the Phils is getting on for 100 million, so 4 million tourists is not exactly a wonderful performance and it is a shame because in spite of all the mess in the country it has many truly beautiful sights and has so many wonderful people.
Sounds like positive spin on this topic from the Phils Government or Tourist Agency. They don't like to say it is gloomy. I used to go to Malapascua off the North tip of Cebu Island. My wife has family there and theyb tell her it hasn't been good since 2009..... "No Guests" There are many single men still going there. A lot who work in Asia. I think they go for the Halo Halo
I'd say lot of those non filipinos with families you see in the queues at immigration are most probably there on business, moving there family across on a contract. Or they could be visiting for a holiday from the likes of singers or honkers I suppose. I can't really see someone taking their family from the UK or europe for a two hols to the phils to be honest.
Seriously Stu, a few years ago there were a lot of European couples and families wandering round Boracay, looking quite touristy, I heard German and French as well as Dutch voices, quite a few younger European and Aussie lassies travelling on their own or with friends as well. Also the surfers and divers had a fair presence too.
