Tourism Still Going Strong
By Juan Carlos Martinez
Cruises brought in 310,874 visitors to Panama in 2009 versus the 234,215 in 2008. The trend is up every year in spit of economic downturns. Panama gets a high score for attracting an increasing number of visitors. The reasons for visiting are quite varied as are the nationalities of the visitors. Some of the most common reasons for traveling to Panama are business, conventions, recreation or family visits. The number one reason is recreation.
According to statistics the access points are varied, the main access point being Tocumen International Airport and maritime ports, through the cruise industry, are the fastest growing access point. By far the favorite months to visit Panama are December and January both through the airport as well as on cruise ships and visitors generally stay from four days to a week.
Most passengers are from the US, having received 234,190 visitors from US in 2009. Second country producing visitors is Colombia with 177,224 visitors in 2009 and the third source is Venezuela with 162,581 visitors in 2009 versus 34,403 in 2008.
In the last few years tourism as a sector has started to play a bigger role in Panama's GDP and successive administrations have started to take notice. One of the goals of this administration is to increase the revenue derived from the tourism sector. To this end it is hosting Expo Turismo 2010.
Expo Turismo is an international tourism fair whose aim is to attract the big distributors and wholesalers so they can include Panama in the packages they sell to their travel agencies in Europe, North and South America.
This fair is being organized by the Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Agriculture of Panama, as well as the Chamber of Tourism. The organizers have made a big push to get the actual companies who make up the tour packages for resellers, to Panama for the fair. The invitees include convention and event organizers, tourism wholesalers and other players in the industry.
Expo Turismo will be held in Atlapa on the 7th & 8th of October of this year. Local tourism operators, hotel chains and airlines will be present at the event. There will be 162 booths and 100 of them are already sold. The event seems likely to be a success.
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