IMMIGRATION Commissioner Norman Tansingco shared that arrival figures show that foreign tourism is on a rebound.
The pronouncement comes after the statement of Secretary Christina Garcia Frasco that the country has recorded more than four million foreign visitors from January to September 2023.
Tansingco shared that from January to August 2023, the BI has processed a total of 8,117,286 Filipino and foreign passengers.
Prior to the pandemic, the agency recorded more than 11 million arrivals during the same period, a far cry from the 2,873,423 recorded during the same months in 2022.
“We are getting there,” said Tansingco. “The significant increase in arriving passengers show that tourism and international travel is already on the rebound,” he stated.
Tansingco said that the agency also supports efforts of the DOT in making things faster and simpler for arriving passengers, to give them a great experience from the moment they arrive the country.
“We are procuring more e-gates for faster immigration processing. Through technology, we can work around the limited space that we have at the airports and improve passenger experience,” he stated.
Tansingco projected that arrivals could reach more than four million for the last quarter of the year.
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