BEIJING, China—The renewed friendship between China and the Philippines under the administration of President Duterte will spurred a great momentum—a healthy and steady growth in the country’s tourism industry, said China National Tourism head for International Relations Yan Xu.
He said the Philippines has become one of the hottest travel destinations for Chinese outbound travelers especially during this summer travel season in China.
Since January 2017, he said the total number of Chinese who visited the Philippines reached 389,000, a 36.3 percent increase compared to the same period last year.
This was confirmed by a Department of Tourism report in Manila which showed that China posted the largest jump in visitors arrival at 36.3 percent with 388,896 Chinese tourists in the said period.
This made China the third largest tourism market of the Philippines.
The DoT said the Philippine tourism industry appears to be benefiting from the warming of diplomatic relations with China, which had promised to send one million tourists this year.
It emphasized that substantial increases in the number of Chinese and Taiwanese visitors to the Philippines helped power tourist arrivals in the country to some 2.88 million in the first five months of this year.
Visitors from Taiwan grew by 21 percent to 108,643, landing the country in the sixth spot among the top source markets for tourists for the Philippines.
For the market to hit 1 million, Chinese arrivals in the Philippines have to average some 87,301 every month, from June to December 2017. Looking at past data, however, arrivals from China reached their peak at 85,948 in January, but generally slowed down each month, falling to 73,649 in May.
Yet, the 1-million commitment from Beijing made during Duterte’s state visit to China in March boosted the confidence of DoT officials to meet the target goal in terms of Chinese tourists.
But Yan expressed belief that if the bilateral relationship between the two countries keeps enjoying this steady and healthy development and with the joint efforts of the tourism authorities of both sides, the goal will be met in the foreseeable future.
Yan also assured that the Marawi conflict in the Mindanao region will definitely not in fact a big deal for Chinese travellers to the Philippines although it will water down to a certain degree their willingness to visit the country.
“We strongly believe that such individual incidents does not represent the overall safety condition in the Philippines,” Yan told visiting Filipino journalists in China.
“And we do hope that the Philippine government and the relevant departments will take strong efforts to guarantee the safety and security of inbound travelers, including those from China,” he said.
Yan said, however, that for security reasons, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs and China National Tourism Administration jointly issued a safety notice which is valid until the end of this month.
He said the possibility of a flight from Hainan to Manila depends on the agreement between the aviation departments of the two sides and the business initiatives of each individual airline companies.
“To open flights depends on the current situation of the two markets. If the capacity can be guaranteed, I believe there could be more airline services that are willing to open new flights under the encouragement of the tourism departments of both sides,” noted the Chinese tourism official.
Hainan is an island province at the southernmost part of China, just across the Gulf of Tonkin from Vietnam. At present, it is undergoing heavy tourist-oriented development with various international hotel chains establishing resorts, especially in the Sanya area.
The entire island which has been declared a Special Economic Zone is now being promoted as “China’s Hawaii.”
In a separate interview, Philippine Consul General Julius Caesar Flores, who is based in Xiamen, said there are five gateways in Fujian for the Philippines-China flights. These routes are Xiamen-Manila, Jinjiang-Manila, Jingjiang-Cebu, Fuzhou-Cebu and Xiamen-Cebu.
These routes, he said, would strengthen the air linkages between the Philippines and Fujian province.
Flores said they have always put great importance of air links which contribute in nurturing relations between countries, regions and peoples and enhancing cooperation in trade, business, tourism and people-to-people contacts.
Xiamen Air Travel forms part of the Xiamen Air’s conglomerate providing travel and tour services to its passengers. Xiamen Air and Xiamen Air Travel are subsidiary companies of China Southern Airlines.
Xiamen Air is one of the Consulate General’s valuable airline partners in its economic diplomacy thrusts, including promotion of the Philippines as a tourist destination to the Fujian/China market.
Aside from Xiamen Air, other Chinese airlines that fly out of the Ninoy Aquino International Airport are Cathay Pacific, Air China, China Southern and Dragon Airlines (formerly Dragonair).
Flag carrier Philippine Airlines has flights to seven cities in China that include Hong Kong, Shanghai, Bejing, Xiamen, Guangzhou, Jinjiang and Macau.
Low-cost carrier Cebu Pacific flies to Hong Kong, Shanghai, Macau, Beijing, Xiamen, Guangzhou, Lijiang, Haikou, Zhenzhen, Xian and Ningbo in Xinjiang province.
The DoT has raised its target arrivals to 8 million this year from the original target of 6.5 million. The target for inbound tourism receipts this year remains at P407 billion, some 77 percent higher than actual receipts of P230.13 billion in 2016.