Central Visayas – Region 7 tourist arrivals up 2.13%

Tourism arrivals in Central Visayas increased by 2.13 percent in the first seven months of the year compared to the same period last year, according to a report by the Department of Tourism (DOT) 7.

Central Visayas recorded 2,146,806 in tourism arrivals, DOT said. Local arrivals grew by 3.05 percent to 1,318,027, while foreign arrivals increased slightly by 0.95 percent or 822,046 compared to the same period in 2013.

Cebu welcomed 1,580,124 arrivals, up by 2.74 percent. Local arrivals increased by 4.96 percent to 889,608 while foreign arrivals dropped by 0.22 percent from 686,332 to 684,832.

Korea remains the region’s top market despite its drop in arrivals by 4.35 percent or 308,159 from 322,162 arrivals in 2013. Arrivals from Canada also declined by 28.24 percent from 19,656 to 14,106 this year.

The rest of the region’s top source markets registered growth.

Japan came second with a 6.65 percent growth in arrivals from 115,457 to 123,137.

Arrivals from the US grew by 13.17 percent to 79,946 while China grew by 8.04 percent from 36,061 in 2013 to 38,959 this year.

Australia, on the other hand, logged 28,248 arrivals, up by 8.52 percent. Arrivals from the United Kingdom posted the highest growth at 35.67 percent from 15,260 to 20,704. Germany grew 6.22 percent, France at 5.81 percent and Singapore at 17.34 percent.

Visitor arrivals nationwide for the eight months of 2014 reached a total of 3,267,542 up by 2.72 percent over its last year’s 3,180,903.

DOT reported that P144.40 billion was generated from inbound tourists for the first eight months of the year.

The top five visitor markets in terms of expenditures were Korea at 41.60 billion, the United States at P28.46 billion, Australia at P8.93 billion, Japan at P7.41 billion and China at P6.46 billion.

The visitors spent a daily average of P4,160.08 in August 2014, while visitors stayed for an average of 10.73 nights, the DOT said.