Tourist arrivals to the Philippines grew 7.8 percent in January this year as compared to the same period last year.
Latest statistics from the Department of Tourism’s Tourism Research and Statistics Division show that there were 293,803 tourists that came to the country last month.
Of this number, the Koreans still remain as the top tourists in the country with 69,522. This figure, however, dropped by 1.7 percent.
Japanese tourists to the Philippines also declined with only 34,432 or 1.5 percent. American tourists rose though by 5.1 percent more with 58,486. The number of Chinese tourists also increased to 38.1 percent with 13,691 arrivals. Overseas Filipinos holding Philippine passports but are permanently residing abroad who visited the Philippines increased 16.3 percent to 14,465.
Other foreign visitors came from Canada, Taiwan, Australia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Great Britain, Germany, Malaysia, among others.
The figures also indicate these foreign tourists spent some $ 394.04 million in the country, which is 24.23 percent more than the $ 317.19 million that was spent in the same month in 2007.
The DoT is setting its sights in attracting tourists from Taiwan and China this year.
In 2007, the country was able to attract 3.1 million foreign visitors.