300,000 tourists visited CV in January

CEBU, Philippines - Central Visayas, which is considered the tourism gateway of the country, attracted more than 300,000 local and foreign tourists in January 2012, according to the Department of Tourism.

According to data released by the DOT Planning and Statistics office, the region recorded a total of 255,834 local and foreign visitor arrivals compare to January 2011 with only 214,118, which posted a 19.48 percent growth rate.

Of this figure, 141,487 or 12.01 percent were domestic tourists while 114,347 or 30.23 percent were foreigners, according to DOT-7 planning and statistics staff Renelyn Villegas.

Among the four provinces in the region, Cebu was the favorite destination with the most number of 101,631 arrivals and 95,951 foreigners. But Negros has the most number of travelers from domestics with 27,194 compare to Bohol with only 11,432 domestic arrivals.

However, Bohol was listed second in foreign arrivals with 11,499 compared to Negros with only 4,993. The province of Siquijor had 1,904 foreign and 1,230 domestic visitors last January.

The DOT data also shows that Koreans continue to dominate the total volume of foreign tourist arrivals with 42,421 visitors as of January 2012. It was followed by Japan with 16,138 visitors and China with 13,799.

DOT-7 Regional Director Rowena Montecillo said that tourist arrivals from China jumped up to 374.03 percent, from 13,799 in 2012 to 2,911 visitors in 2011.

Montecillo credited the recent increase of Chinese tourist from the recent Chinese New Year.

The Philippines is banking on its “It’s More Fun in the Philippines” campaign to meet its target of attracting 4.6 million foreign visitors this year. — (FREEMAN)