Philippines Plans To Open Tourism Office In Moscow - Diplomat

Philippines Plans to Open Tourism Office in Moscow - Diplomat

The Philippines plans to open a dedicated tourism department alongside its Moscow embassy to tap into the booming tourist market and facilitate travels for more Russians willing to visit the country, the Philippine charge d'affaires ad interim in Moscow, Robert Ferrer, said in an interview with Sputnik

MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 08th September, 2021) The Philippines plans to open a dedicated tourism department alongside its Moscow embassy to tap into the booming tourist market and facilitate travels for more Russians willing to visit the country, the Philippine charge d'affaires ad interim in Moscow, Robert Ferrer, said in an interview with Sputnik.

"We have a tourism office based in [the German city of] Frankfurt. That is the one handling the Russian market. So we eventually, may be, we will have a tourism office also here, in Moscow, and the embassy further expands, because we already have defense attache here, we have trade attache, soon we will have a labor attache here and welfare attache ... and, hopefully, tourism attache because the Russian market is ... so big," Ferrer said.

As the countries expand business relations, there will be more opportunities for tourists, the diplomat said, adding that the Philippine tourism ministry is working on the matter.

About 36,000 Russians visited the Philippines in 2019. The number of Russian tourist arrivals dropped to about 12,000 in the first quarter of 2020, even before the coronavirus-related lockdowns.