Tourism sees more visitor arrivals following E-visa system
The Department of Tourism (DOT) expects more international arrivals as President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. looks forward to the implementation of the E-visa system as part of the government agenda on digital transformation.
"With the President’s directive for the implementation of the E-Visa system, we anticipate more international arrivals into the Philippines especially that this will bring the Philippines shoulder to shoulder with our ASEAN neighbors that have already implemented E-Visa systems," Tourism Secretary Christina Garcia Frasco said during the post - State of the Nation Address (SONA) in discussions in Pasay City on Tuesday.
"With the digitalization of the requirements for entering into the Philippines, we have also seen that has increased convenience for our travelers coming into the country," she added.
During his SONA, Marcos noted that with the E-Travel system and the piloted E-Gates that will soon be a standard fixture at airports, to further facilitate ease of mobility during departures and arrivals, "the implementation of the Philippine E-Visa will be next in our (government's) digital transformation agenda."
"We welcome the President’s programs that have been the result of collaboration between our government agencies including the Bureau of Immigration as well as the DFA and of course the DOT," said Frasco.
"We anticipate that with these programs that foster a more convenient and seamless entry into the Philippines, we will further improve the Philippine tourism experience," she added.
Frasco explained that the tourism success is not only seen or calculated through "the warm bodies that come upon our jurisdiction but rather more importantly, as far as visitor receipts because it is the tourism spending that allows the economy to roll as fast as it should".
"What we are seeing is that the Philippines has already recovered over one hundred percent of its visitor receipts from its 2019 numbers and also exceeds the 94 percent global average of recovery as far as visitor receipt is concerned," she said.
"With this upward trajectory of the performance of Philippine tourism under the Marcos administration, what we anticipate is that in the same way that we were able to exceed our targets as far as visitor receipts are concerned for 2023 that we would be able to achieve the same feat for 2024," she added. Robina Asido/DMS
