Over the decades, tourism has experienced sustainable growth and expanding diversification to grow into one of the fastest emerging economic sectors in the world. Modern tourism is closely linked to development and embraces a growing number of new destinations. These dynamics turned tourism into a key driver for socio-economic progress and represents, at the same time, one of the main income sources for many developing countries.
The Philippines recognizes this fact and considers tourism as an important contributor to the growth of the economy. According to the Philippine Statistics Authority, the contribution of the tourism industry to the domestic economy has risen steadily in the past five years. This phenomenon was made apparent in 2015 when the Philippine travel and tourism industry contributed a total of P1.43 trillion to the local economy. This is equivalent to about 10.6 percent of the country’s gross domestic product, according to the latest report by the World Travel and Tourism Council.
The anticipated growth in international visitor arrivals and domestic travel movement is expected to bring about a corresponding increase in capacity requirements and demand for new products, facilities and services, thus paving the way for local and foreign investment opportunities.
This is an excerpt from an article originally published by Philstar.
