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Ghio Ong - The Philippine Star
January 29, 2026 | 12:00am
ASEAN’S BIGGEST TRAVEL EVENT AT MACTAN EXPO: The Philippines officially opened the Asean Travel Exchange, the biggest travel event for Asean member countries, at the newly opened Mactan Expo, an iconic convention center that is close to the beach, built by property giant Megaworld at The Mactan Newtown in Lapu-Lapu City, Cebu. TRAVEX, which will run until Jan. 30, is one of the major events under the Asean Tourism Forum being hosted in Cebu, and is attended by tourism ministers, industry organizations, senior officials, exhibitors, business delegates and media from Asean countries.
STAR / File
MANILA, Philippines — With tourism still perceived by many as a numbers game, the Department of Tourism appealed to its counterparts in Southeast Asia to “move forward not as competing destinations but as a unified region.”
“The future of tourism in our region will not be shaped by any one country alone. It will be shaped by how well we align our strategies, our standards, our innovations and, most importantly, our resolve to ensure that tourism remains a force for good,” Tourism Secretary Christina Garcia Frasco said in a statement read by Undersecretary Verna Buensuceso.
Buensuceso led the 63rd ASEAN National Tourism Organizations Meeting in Cebu City on Monday, which gathered senior tourism officials from ASEAN and other partner countries.
Ahead of several meetings to be held this week, she called on her fellow tourism officials to pursue discussions that would yield “outcomes that support sustainability without sacrificing growth, that accelerate digital transformation while protecting trust and safety and that keep communities at the heart of the tourism economy so that the benefits of travel are felt not only in arrivals but in myriad opportunities.”
The undersecretary also highlighted ASEAN’s potential as a collective tourism destination.
“When we talk about ASEAN, we also look at it as a single destination for tourism, so the idea is to really strengthen the ASEAN product, to strengthen our connections with various markets and also to look into how we can be easily connected to our other markets outside ASEAN,” she said, adding that more tourists coming into ASEAN would also mean higher revenues for economies of its member-states.
Based on the tally from the Bureau of Immigration, the Philippines welcomed a total of 6,484,060 foreign tourists – composed of 5,940,975 foreigners and 543,085 Filipinos living overseas – in 2025.
By comparison, other ASEAN nations welcomed larger numbers: Malaysia received over 38.2 million visitors, Thailand over 32.9 million and Vietnam over 21.1 million.
With the Philippines hosting both the ASEAN Summit and the ASEAN Tourism Forum in Cebu this year, member-states are expected to meet with tourism officials from Australia, India, China, Japan, South Korea and Russia.
Beyond tourism, the ASEAN bloc is also raising its voice on global matters.
During a high-level open debate at the United Nations Security Council on Monday, ASEAN called on the council to act swiftly to uphold peace and security, as the world grapples with complex and crosscutting challenges, including pervasive threats to the rule of law.
“ASEAN underscores the importance of the Security Council acting in an efficient, consistent, transparent and non-selective manner, particularly in the application of international law, in order to uphold its credibility and effectively safeguard international peace and security,” the regional bloc said in a statement read by Philippine permanent representative to the UN Enrique Manalo.– Pia Lee-Brago
