After nearly 100,000 Mexican tourists visited Costa Rica in 2018, this year the authorities plan to intensify the country's promotion in Mexico's main cities.
According to the latest estimates, this year about 508,000 Mexicans would be considering vacationing in Costa Rica.
A decline of 4.6% in the flow of visitors has been attributed by tour operators to the fact that in recent years the country did not have sufficient international promotion.
An article on Prensa.com reports that "according to the National Migration Service and the Comptroller General's records, 2,432,641 visitors were registered last year, down 4.6% compared to 2015."
Companies in the sector expect to generate $660 million in revenue this year, mainly driven by an increase in tourist spending.
In addition to an increase in the number of visitors to the country, companies in the sector also expect a rise in the average daily expenditure of tourists, which at the close of the third quarter registered anincrease of 8.5% compared to the previous quarter.
A $20 million contract has finally been approved for the company VML Inc. to develop a marketing and communication strategy to promote the country internationally.
The implementation of the international tourism promotion campaign will take place between 2016 and 2018, and will consist of a comprehensive promotion strategy, both online and using traditional advertising, public relations and trade marketing (activations) to promote Panama internationally.
After three years without any tourism marketing, the authority for the sector has announced that $10 million will be spent on international promotion, aside from the $5 million already being tendered in a domestic campaign.
The uneven internal and external promotion of tourism in Panama could have seen better days. The general manager of the Tourism Authority of Panama, Gustavo Him, announced in a statement that there will be a budget of $10 million for the international promotion, in addition to the $5 million for domestic tourism promotion.
The Central Rail Summit 2015 will be held in El Salvador, from May 13th to 15th, where it is expected that 15 corporations from the Florida Caribbean Cruise Association will be involved.
The Salvadoran Chamber of Tourism (CASATUR) hopes to have the participation of 30 union members who will be publicizing various tour packages offered by shipping lines.
In the first half of the year $218 million came into the country, 10.3% more than the $197.5 million generated in the same period in 2013.
Details from the Nicaraguan Institute of Tourism (Intur) show that "... Between January and June Nicaragua received 650,008 foreign visitors, representing a growth of 7.1% compared to the same period in 2013, when the country received 607.155 tourists. "
With the signing of an agreement with the tourism wholesaler El Corte Inglés, 600 agencies in Europe and Latin America will promote the country as a tourist destination.
From Monday, 600 agencies which are part of the Spanish tour operator El Corte Ingles, distributed in Europe and Latin America, began promoting El Salvador as one of their destinations.
With the European crisis and the fall in the number of visitors from that region, the Guatemalan Tourist industry is promoting itself in emerging countries and others where there are travelers with high purchasing power.
Pedro Pablo Duchez, director of the Guatemalan Institute, Inguat, spoke at the opening of the Travel Market, saying,
"We have identified that European tourists have restricted their trips and are traveling inside Europe which is why we need new spaces for promotion ....
Guatemala's hotel sector is concerned about lack of inclusion of the tourism category within the country’s investment promotion policies.
The first version of the National Competitiveness Agenda excludes the tourism sector, confirmed Jaime Day, director of the National Competitiveness Program, who said it would be added in the new version of the agenda.
From 5 to 7 December 2012 the 18th interactive edition of the fair will take place in Panama in which tour operators from Central American and the Caribbean meet with buyers from Europe and the U.S.
MITM is a two-day interactive exhibition of, which is now 15 years old, providing market-oriented incentives, meetings and events, where tourism companies and travel agencies from the Americas and the Caribbean meet, in the form of pre-arranged individual appointments, with buyers from Europe and the U.S. to organize and set up incentives trips, meetings, conferences, congresses and events. Buyers are invited to participate in MITM after a rigorous selection process.
The Ministries of Tourism in Central America have announced their intention to form a regional strategy to promote tourist destinations in the isthmus.
Reinforcing some intentions expressed in previous ministerial meetings, the government sector is proposing offering tourists the region "in one trip."
An article in Prensalibre.com reports that the chief executive of the Nicaraguan Institute of Tourism (Intur), Mario Salinas, said: "We are going promote on the website, in European tourism fairs, two, three, four, five countries (as a destination), and not promote Panama or Nicaragua only, we will encourage (them to come and see) Central America. "
Tourism statistics are growing, and in order to ensure further growth it is necessary to focus on markets other than the traditional markets of the U.S. and Europe, specifically in Latin America.
The flow of tourism in Panama has been growing significantly in recent years, the U.S. and Europe being the major emitters.
However, the situation experienced by the economies of the U.S.