BACOLOD CITY — Tourist arrivals in Negros Occidental including its capital Bacolod City, increased by 7 percent in 2017 hitting 1.72 million by the end of December.
Figures released by the Negros Occidental Tourism Division (NOTD) as of Tuesday showed that in 2017, the arrivals comprised of 1,609,066 domestic, 114,686 foreign, and 381 overseas Filipino visitors.
In 2016, tourist arrivals in Negros Occidental reached only 1.61 million, with 1,510,161 domestic guests, 103,042 foreign visitors, and 1,117 overseas Filipinos.
Bacolod posted a total of 831,687 arrivals last year, also higher than the 799,224 in 2016.
Cristine Mansinares, provincial supervising tourism operations officer, said majority of the tourists visited the cities of Bacolod, Sipalay, San Carlos, Kabankalan, Cadiz and Talisay, and municipality of Murcia.
These places have beach resorts and nature offerings aside from festivals such as Bacolod’s MassKara, San Carlos’ Pintaflores, Kabankalan’s Sinulog and Cadiz’s Dinagsa which draw big crowds every year.
Mansinares said the increase in the province’s tourist arrivals could also be attributed to its hosting of meetings, incentives, conventions and exhibitions (Mice) in the past year.
She added that increase in visitors was noted during months with long weekends.
In July last year, Negros Occidental was identified as the second most visited place in the country by Filipino domestic travelers, based on the results of the 2016 Household Survey on Domestic Visitors (HSDV) released by the Philippine Statistics Authority and Department of Tourism.
Behind first placer National Capital Region, Negros Occidental outranked Pangasinan, Cavite, Quezon, Bohol, Cebu, Camarines Sur, Laguna, and Leyte in the list of top 10 most visited places.
The HSDV, conducted every two years since 2005, is aimed at gathering data on domestic and outbound travels mainly for policy making purposes.
It is also undertaken to measure the volume of domestic and international visitors, identify the travel patterns of the household members age 15 years old and above, and estimate the extend and economic contribution of domestic and international visitors in the country. (Erwin Nicavera/PNA)
