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Here's another destination place to add to your travel itinerary.

Puerto Princesa on Palawan Island has started welcoming domestic tourists with minimum health and safety standards in place.

Visitors are required to take the RT-PCR test before traveling with 48 hours validity. The negative result should be emailed directly by the Department of Health (DOH)-accredited testing facility to the City's Incident Management Team (IMT).

A confirmation booking from a DOT-accredited accommodation establishment and travel agency for guided tours is also required. Likewise, visitors are asked to use the StaySafe.ph system as a contact tracing application.

“We are keen to discover and develop other tourism products to encourage visitors to stay longer or to entice repeat visits,” said Department of Tourism (DOT) Secretary Bernadette Romulo-Puyat.

“We have great confidence in the city's future as there is vast potential to further develop its nature-based, farm, and sun and beach tourism products.”

Tourism frontliners are part of the sectors prioritized for the vaccination program assured Puyat.

She also said that the DOT will continue to extend technical assistance on product development, marketing, and promotions, and to conduct skills training programs.

Popular for its pristine beaches, Puerto Princesa is also home to the Subterranean River National Park - the UNESCO World Heritage site is known for its limestone karst mountain landscapes, forest formations, river channels, and rich biodiversity.

Puerto Princesa shares 50 percent of the tourist arrivals in Palawan and in the region, making it the biggest contributor to its economic growth, according to the DOT.

Palawan logged a partial number of 157,051 tourist arrivals, 71,889 of which were visits to Puerto Princesa in 2020.