(UPDATES) PRESIDENT Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has institutionalized the use of the Electronic Travel Information (eTravel) System for all inbound and outbound international passengers and crew members to ensure efficient travel procedures in the Philippines.

The President, through Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin, signed Administrative Order (AO) 24 on Aug. 27, 2024, as part of the government's goal to promote transparency by adopting simplified measures to reduce red tape.

"There is a need to institutionalize the use of eTravel System as the government's one-stop electronic travel declaration system for all international inbound and outbound passengers and crew members for the purpose of ensuring efficiency in the conduct of border control, health surveillance, and tourism statistics analysis and other travel-related procedures," the President said in his order.

The system is a digital single data collection platform for passengers arriving in and departing from the Philippines, which should be used for border control, health surveillance and economic data analysis.

Under AO 24, the President created a technical working group (TWG) on the eTravel System that will study and adopt measures that will further adopt the new scheme, including its usage, management and operation, subject to existing laws, rules, and regulations.

The TWG shall be chaired by the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) and co-chaired by the Bureau of Immigration (BI) with the Department of Tourism (DoT), Department of Migrant Workers (DMW), Department of Transportation (DOtr), Bureau of Quarantine (BoQ), and Bureau of Customs (BoC) as members.

The President ordered all relevant departments, agencies, bureaus and offices to provide full support to and cooperation with the TWG to ensure effective implementation order.

"Thereafter, the funding requirements necessary for the continued implementation of this Order shall be included in the budget proposals of said agencies, subject to the usual budget preparation process," the President said.

The DICT, BI, DoT, BoQ and BoC launched the eTravel System, the unified and integrated digital data collection platform, in December 2022 to streamline various travel declaration procedures for international inbound passengers.

The system was expanded in April 2023 to cover all international inbound and outbound passengers and crew members arriving and departing from the Philippines.

AO 24, released to the media on Saturday, takes effect immediately following its publication in the Official Gazette or a newspaper of general circulation.