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Caribbean one of the subregions most affected by standstill in tourism Published on Friday, December 26, 2008 Email To Friend    Print Version (ECLAC) The Caribbean and Central America will be the subregions most affected by the stagnation in tourism caused by the financial crisis. About 75 percent of tourists to the English-speaking Caribbean, over 40 percent of those visiting Central America, and more than 75 percent of tourists to Cuba and the Dominican Republic come from developed economies in recession, says the report Preliminary Overview of the Economies of Latin America and the Caribbean 2008, recently published by ECLAC. The World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) estimates that in 2008, tourism will grow between 2 and 3 percent, very distant from the 6.6 percent reached last year. In 2009, it is expected to expand even less, somewhere between 0 percent and 2 percent. Tourism began experiencing a strong deceleration between June and August 2008 due to the increasing deterioration of real income and consumer expectations, the volatility of exchange rates, and restraints on consumer loans due to the financial crisis. In Latin America and the Caribbean, tourism is one of the economic activities that has flourished most in recent years, and its importance has increased as a generator of value-added and income, says the ECLAC report. In the Caribbean, tourism related exports compose about 20 percent of GDP, while in Central America, it is an average 5 percent, but reaches nearly 10 percent in the Dominican Republic, Cuba and Costa Rica. Tourism expenditures in the English-speaking Caribbean -with the exception of Guyana, Surinam and Trinidad & Tobago- are equivalent to 15-41 percent of GDP. As a proportion of total exports of goods and services, expenditures are even greater, given that tourism is the main source of income and the motor of these economies. In the first eight months of 2008, the arrival of tourists to Central America and South America continued rising by 9.4 percent and 7.2 percent, respectively. However, in the Caribbean it grew only 3 percent. Between June and August, demand for tourism services in the Caribbean has come to a standstill due to the lower number of visitors to the Bahamas, Barbados, Bermudas and Puerto Rico, four destinations visited mainly by United States and European travelers. In Mexico, arrivals increased 4.8 percent during the same period, followed by a drop in the flow of tourists. Lower inflation and currency depreciation in several Latin American and Caribbean nations could partially compensate the impact on regional tourism caused by the financial crisis. Competitive prices and the exchange rate in tourism destinations may play a significant role in sustaining the activity. Investments in recent years in several countries have placed them in a better position to compete for the decreasing demand for tourism services expected in the near future, adds the ECLAC report.   Reads : 530 Back... Comments: No comments on this topic yet. Be the first one to submit a comment. Back... Send us your comments!   Send us your comments on this article for publication in our Readers' Forum or as a Letter to the Editor. All fields are required and in the interest of openness and transparency we will no longer accept anonymous submissions. We therefore request that all submissions include a name for publication, regardless of content. We will in special circumstances protect a writer's identity only after we have established good cause for anonymity, otherwise we will not be able to publish the submission. For your contribution to reach us, you must (a) provide a valid e-mail address and (b) click on the validation link that will be sent to the e-mail address you provide.  If the address is not valid or you don't click on the validation link, it will be a waste of your time typing your submission because we will never see it! Your Name: Your Email: (Validation required) Comments: Enter Validation Code *