Together with other government agencies, the Department of Tourism (DOT) is working to accommodate Chinese and Indian tourists.
According to DOT Secretary Christina Frasco in a convergence meeting with the heads of the Bureau of Immigration (BI) and the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), Justice and Information and Technology, Visa reforms are necessary for tourism bottlenecks.
Government agencies should dive into the provisions of electronic visa (eVisa) to their nationals, mentioning the possibility of countries China and India to bring in more tourists.
The necessity of sustaining and bringing in more Indian tourists is important since at least 58% of the Indian tourists are repeat travelers, based on a data by the DOT.
The DOT also noted that India ranked 8th in the list of top foreign visitors in 2022 with a number of 51,542 and has become an important market source for the Philippines.
Frasco said that the Philippines is the only country that does not provide eVisa for the Indian nationals.
Shambhu Kumara, the Indian Ambassador to the Philippines, acknowledged the opportunity for Manila to ease the visa process as Indian tourists could be looking for a new travel spot.
On the other hand, China has a record of 1.7 million Chinese tourists during the pre-pandemic and is still a coveted market to the Philippines.
Based on an advisory of Philippine consular posts in China, Only 60 to 100 visas per day can be accepted, Frasco said with citation from airlines.
Compared to an average of 508 to 2,704 Philippine visas issued per day in China, before the pandemic.
“Of our low target of half a million Chinese coming into the Philippines, we would need to issue 1,704 visas per day. If we are to target the medium scenario of a million Chinese into the country then we would need to issue 3, 409 visas per day,” Frasco said.
Frasco added that if we target 2 million Chinese coming to the Philippines, which is the desired target of the DOT, then we need to issue 6,818 visas per day for a total of 1.8 million visas in a year, which is not too far off from the 1.5 million issued in 2019.
China’s sizable population can be a big opportunity for the Philippines with the 2019 data that had 160 million Chinese tourists visiting other countries.
Frasco said that if the difficulties in obtaining visas is not immediately addressed then around $2.51 billion revenue could be lost.
“Airlines and charter operators have already approached us expressing grave concern of the present limitations. According to them, they may not be able to increase the flight frequencies that they are very much prepared to resume due to low passenger numbers and airfares and travel packages may become too expensive and therefore, not competitive,” Frasco added.
