Meet Taiwan, Taiwan’s Meetings, Incentive Travel, Conferences, and Exhibitions promotion program, continues to solidify its presence in the Southeast Asian region with $1.46 billion in revenues in 2017 from $1.42 billion in 2016.
At least 290,000 foreign visitors came from the Philippines in 2017, a 68-percent increase from the previous year.
The Philippines comprised 13 percent of the total 2.18 million tourist arrivals in 2017 from Southeast Asia, said Jessie Tseng, executive director of Meet Taiwan.
The increase in the number of tourists could be attributed to the visa-free policy implemented by the Taiwan government starting in November 2017, after seeing 90,000 Filipino tourists flocked to Taiwan in the last quarter of the previous year.
Tseng added reforms in economic policies would entice Filipino businesses to avail of their MICE opportunities in Taiwan.
“The Taiwanese government spares no efforts to attract more MICE visitors from the Southeast Asian region under the country’s Southbound Policy,” said Tseng.