Tourism

The tourism industry plays an ever increasing role for the economy of the Philippines. According to the Department of Tourism (DOT) some 1.992 million foreign visitors visited the Philippines in 2000, and the country accumulated a total of 2.1 billion U.S. Dollars in foreign exchange. Most of the international tourists are from North America and East Asia (Japan, Korea, Taiwan, and China) but more and more are visiting from, Australia, Europe and even Central and South America. In 2004 the tourist arrivals were 2,291,347; in 2005 2,623,084 were recorded; while in 2006, they reached 2,843,335. Base on this statistics, the number of visitors to the archipelago is increasing at the rate of 14% a year. If the actual trend in tourist arrivals continues, the potential for tourism to attract investment, create jobs and add to GDP growth rate of the country is enormous.