The Department of Tourism in Cordillera Administrative Region (DOT-CAR) said visitor statistics are not merely numbers, but translate to economic gains, uplifting the lives of the people.
Jovita Ganongan, DOT-CAR director, said during the “Kapihan sa Bagong Pilipinas” at a hotel here on Wednesday that the region received 1,983,511 tourists in different destinations across the six provinces and two cities in 2024.
The number is higher than the 1.68 million in 2023 and 1.28 million in 2022.
Ganongan said that based on the average daily expenditure of a foreign and a domestic tourist of PHP7,000 and PHP4,000, respectively, the region received PHP10.72 billion in receipts from tourism.
“This is just a one-day computation but a tourist spends an average of two to three days in a destination. The economic contribution of tourism is seen from the jobs generated and the opportunities created from tourism,” she said.
“The arrival and the expenditure of tourists in a place translates to opportunities for the residents. Tourists require a bed to sleep on and a place to eat food. They also look for souvenirs to buy for their friends and loved ones. All these opportunities translate to livelihood activities which in turn creates local jobs.”
Indirect livelihood opportunities are also created in producing souvenir items.
Ganongan said that Ifugao, Kalinga and Mountain Province are top destinations for Europeans while Baguio City is preferred by the Americans.
French visitors topped the foreign arrivals in 2024 with 8,829; Americans at 5,325; and Germans, 4,706.
Ganongan added that with the robust tourism in different regions, the government also invests in terms of infrastructure.
She said a total of 376.33 kilometers of tourism road infrastructure projects were built at the cost of PHP11.47 trillion from 2012 to 2024.
Under the current administration of DOT Secretary Cristina Garcia-Frasco, giving importance to rest areas with decent comfort rooms had also benefited the region with at least four already constructed in the Cordillera —one in Mountain Province, two in Ifugao, and one in Baguio City.
“The government through the DOT is not just investing in infrastructure but also in the capacity building and human resource development to further boost the Filipino brand of service for domestic and for foreign tourists,” Ganongan said. (PNA)
