Tourism receipts, or expenditures by international inbound visitors, including payments to national carriers for international transport, reached P694 billion based on arrivals recorded by the Bureau of Immigration (BI), Tourism Secretary Christina Garcia Frasco said Tuesday.

“According to the BI, the total number of foreign arrivals into the country was at 5.940 million in 2025, and if you add to the overseas Filipinos, which are at 543,000 plus, that total is 6.48 million arrivals in 2025,” Frasco said during a luncheon with members of the media.

BI figures were higher than the 5,865,319 foreign visitor arrivals in 2025 recorded through the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) eTravel system.

Frasco acknowledged a discrepancy between BI data and the DICT eTravel figures.

“We saw this already last year. So, what we did was that a technical working group was formed, composed of the DoT, the BI, and the DICT, to examine the discrepancy. What we have found is that first, some arrivals were not registered in the eTravel by virtue of the exemptions to the requirement of filling out eTravels. Exempted are the diplomats, as well as employees of foreign governments,” she said.

Other individuals exempted from filling out the Philippine eTravel include members of international organizations and delegates to certain official events.

“What we found also with our meeting with the BI is that there are certain cruise passengers and chartered flight passengers who were not inputted in the eTravel. Based on the records of eTravel, there were only 30,000 cruise passengers in 2025, but in the records of BI, there are over 50,000. So there is a discrepancy, and these discrepancies are also present in the previous years. So, we traced back as far as 2023,” she said.

Frasco said the discrepancy amounted to 618,000 arrivals in 2025, 486,000 in 2024, and 212,000 in 2023.

“We want to make sure that our reporting is complete and accurate in terms of foreign arrivals in the country, which is why we are aligning the data from the BI and the DICT’s eTravel. Because if we only use the eTravel, some foreign arrivals are not logged because of the exemptions,” she said.

Meanwhile, the Department of Tourism (DoT) reported that South Koreans topped foreign tourist arrivals in 2025 at 1,345,967, followed by Americans (1,311,845), Japanese (469,003), Australians (354,722), and Canadians (330,765).

Frasco said the tourism sector’s performance in 2025 reflects the collective efforts of frontliners, local governments, private enterprises, and communities under the administration of President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr..

“Whatever gains we have made this year are only made possible because of the hard work of our tourism workers and stakeholders,” Frasco said.

“Despite challenges beyond our control, they remained resilient, innovative, and committed to service, ensuring that tourism continues to generate jobs, livelihoods, and opportunities for millions of Filipinos,” she added.