MANILA, Philippines — Even if tourist arrivals in the Philippines increased by 7.43 percent from January to October this year, the Department of Tourism (DOT) said yesterday it will not reach its 7.4 million target for 2018 due to the six-month closure of Boracay. Tourism Secretary Bernadette Romulo-Puyat said she is seeing about seven million to 7.2 million tourist arrivals by yearend. The number of tourist arrivals declined by .5 percent in August and was down by one percent in October. DOT spokesman Undersecretary Benito Bengzon said Boracay is receiving some 80,000 tourists per month, which means that it lost around 480,000 tourists during the six-month closure. Based on the DOT report, China was reported to have the highest increase of tourist arrivals in the Philippines this year with 1,059,788 in 2018 or 30.71 percent higher than the 810,807 in 2017.

Source: Philippine Star December 14, 2018 00:00 UTC