China, HK arrivals down 40%

Friday, February 24, 2012

AS tourists from Korea and Singapore grew, Chinese and Hong Kong visitors to Cebu dropped in 2011.

According to figures from the Department of Tourism (DOT) 7, some 1.9 million foreign and domestic tourists came to Cebu last year, over 800,000 of which were foreigners.

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Korea dominated the foreign tourist market, with 45.18 percent or 376,524 of the total tourist arrivals. The number grew 47.82 percent from the previous year, which reached 255,834 Korean tourists.

Chinese and Hong Kong tourists, who are ranked fourth and seventh in the number of foreign tourists coming to Cebu, dropped in numbers from the previous year.

Chinese tourists decreased 27.41 percent from 34,265 in 2010 to 24,873 last year while Hong Kong tourists dropped 41.10 percent from 22,237 in 2010 to 13,098 in 2011.

The violent hostage taking involving Hong Kong tourists in Manila brought fears that the industry would be hurt by the negative publicity.

Singaporeans

Drops in visitors from European countries United Kingdom (41.10 percent), and Germany (3.93 percent) were also noted.

Still, Cebu benefitted from a rise in tourists from Singapore, Canada and Australia.

Singaporean visitors, who comprised 1.41 percent of the tourist arrivals, rose 38.54 percent from 8,487 to 11,758.

Visitors from Canada grew 21.59 percent from 8,540 to 10,384, making up 1.25 percent of the total visitor count. Australians comprised 2.65 percent of the total visitors and grew 20.63 percent from 18,321 to 22,100 visitors.

Other countries in the top 10 include Japan, United States, United Kingdom and Germany.

If broken down by region, East Asian countries dominated the number of visitors to Cebu at 577,793.

Europeans followed with 79,937, majority of which came from Germany and Russia.

Neighbors from the Asean region comprised 21,010 visitors while those from South Asia made up 6,116. Visitors from the Middle East reached 7,480, Americans reached 8,872 and those from the Oceania continent made up 23,997 travelers.

Overseas Filipino workers made up 10,245 of the visitors to Cebu. A total 17,178 OFWs visited the provinces of Central Visayas, 15.41 percent lower than the 20,307 who traveled to the region in 2010.

Overall, 833,441 foreign tourists arrived in Cebu in 2011, a 17.65 percent increase from the 708,400 who came in 2010.

In the domestic front, Cebu benefitted from 1,088,797 million visitors.

In Central Visayas, which includes the provinces of Cebu, Bohol, Negros Oriental and Siquijor, total foreign travelers reached the one million mark, growing 15.94 percent from 870,637 in 2010 to 1,009.398.

Domestic travelers grew 3.59 percent from 1,492,357 million to 1,545,932 million. Total growth in tourists was at 8.14 percent or 2,555,330.