Guatemala is to host the international event Travel Mart Latin America, which will be held in September 2015.
Competing with Ecuador and Brazil, Guatemala won the position for 2015, becoming the next meeting point for travel service providers from Central and South America and buyers from around the world. It Is expected that the contract will be signed with the organizers in June.
Competing with giants like Mexico and Brazil, Costa Rica managed to attract 40,000 health tourists in 2010 and hopes to attract more with a variety of value added medical tourism offers.
Emphasizing treatments for Parkinsons, drug addiction, alcoholism and stress, including holistic therapies, Costa Rica is aiming to maximise opportunities in medical tourism, which attracted some 40,000 visitors in 2010, according to the Council for International Promotion of Medicine in Costa Rica (Promed).
In 2013, the country will host the World Congress of Tourism Journalists and Writers.
It is hoped that as a result of the conference, more than 100 articles about what Panama has to offer as a tourist destination will be published in around 35 countries.
The arrival of more than 900 journalists at the convention will have a significant positive effect on tourism in the country, not only for the hotels, transport services and other services that will be required at the time, but also in terms of the promotion given to Panama as an international tourist destination.
This year El Salvador will attend the OAS’s Inter-American Congress. The main theme is to develop business competitiveness as a tool for tourism development.
The OAS announced the following on its website:
The XIX Inter-American Travel Congress to be held in San Salvador, El Salvador, on 29 and 30 September, 2011 will focus on the following theme "Tourism, a challenge to poverty." Other important issues, such as the importance of public-private partnerships to promote investment and development for the tourism sector, tourism and cultural heritage, social responsibility of enterprises in the tourism industry and the challenges for sustainable tourism will also be discussed in plenary sessions.