BORACAY – Nearly 300,000 tourists have visited the world-famous Boracay Island since its reopening in September last year after quarantine restrictions were eased.
A total of 282,583 tourists have visited between September 2021 and Feb. 13, 2022, data from the Malay, Aklan tourism office showed.
The biggest wave of tourists entered in December 2021 (113, 596 tourist arrivals), then in January 2022 (35,799).
In October 2021, tourist arrivals reached 32,452 – five times the 6,702 tourists which visited in September 2021.
The island also welcomed a total of 20 foreign tourists after the Philippines opened its borders to fully vaccinated international leisure travelers starting Feb. 10 this year.
The foreign tourists were from Belgium (one), Germany (four), South Korea (one), United Kingdom (three), and United States (11).
So far this February (as of Feb. 13), the island has recorded 26,691 tourist arrivals.
From January to December 2021, 330,622 domestic tourist arrivals have been recorded. The big chunk of these was from the National Capital Region (179,294) followed by 57,358 Western Visayans and 56,163 visitors from Region IV-A (CALABARZON).
Aklan’s economy is hugely dependent on tourism in Boracay Island.
Since the pandemic started in 2020, global travel was hampered and many tourism-dependent businesses were hit hard./PN