The Philippines is opening its doors to all foreign tourists by easing entry requirements starting April 1. Starting April 1, there will be no limit on the number of international visitors arriving in the country. This was announced by the Department of Tourism on Friday, March 11, following the decision of the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) to lift the entry quota for unvaccinated passengers.

The IATF, through Resolution 164-A, has allowed arriving passengers to submit a negative result of a laboratory-based antigen test taken within 24 hours of departure, instead of the original requirement of a negative result of an RT-PCR test taken 48 hours prior to departure from the place of origin. Philippine embassies and consulates will also resume issuing visas starting April 1. ”We are now opening the country to all fully vaccinated tourists from all countries, signifying that the country’s tourism industry is well on its way to recovery,” said Tourism Secretary Berna Romulo-Puyat. ”We at the Philippine Department of Tourism thank our colleagues at the IATF for approving measures that will support the recovery of the tourism sector in the coming months.

We have high hopes that this will lead to an increase in the number of international travelers this summer,” Puyat added. IATF Resolution 164 authorizes the mutual recognition of Covid-19 vaccination certificates of the 157 countries whose citizens can enter the Philippines without a visa under EO 408. ”While our domestic tourists have been a mainstay of our recovery, we are now also happy to welcome more foreign visitors.

"The fact that we are now accepting vaccination certificates from more countries is an important measure in the recovery," she added. The Philippines once again opened its doors to foreign leisure travelers from visa-free countries on February 10.