The DOT expressed optimism regarding foreign tourism traffic to the Philippines due to a 9.13% year-on-year growth in tourist arrivals in January.
On the sidelines of the 2025 Travel Tour Expo held Friday, Tourism Secretary Christina Frasco made a comparison with last year, citing growth in inbound tourism during 2024.
As per data from DOT, 626,900 tourists visited the country in January, an increase from 574,439 in January 2024. With this optimistic outlook, Frasco expressed confidence that such trends will continue to materialize.
The PTAA observed that profound changes have induced shifts in travel aspirations and tourist behavior in recent years, with fast-growing preferences for experiential vacations and for destinations principally aligned with culinary experiences, in which the Philippines excels substantially.
Domestically, Boracay retains its status as the “most favorite” spot among tourists, followed by Siargao, Bohol, and Siquijor.
Besides other promotions, the DOT will work to further increase the ease of travel to the Philippines for these foreign tourists, particularly those from its key markets. A further example of the ways in which this will be achieved will be through a course currently being run to train more tourism call center agents who speak South Korean, and the possibility of setting up more agents to deal with languages such as Mandarin.
The agency plans to establish first-aid stations in important tourist locations, such as La Union, Boracay, Bohol, and Palawan.
In 2024, total visitor arrivals to the Philippines comprised 5.94 million, including 510,000 overseas Filipinos.
