TOURISM: Cuba Touts Itself as a Safe Destination

By Patricia Grogg Reprint | | Print |

Patricia Grogg

HAVANA, Feb 19 2002 (IPS) - Cuba is touting itself as a safe place to visit, in a major publicity offensive aimed at shoring up its tourism industry, which was hit hard by the after-effects of the Sep 11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington.

This Caribbean island nation of 11 million has stepped up its efforts to target eco-tourists, those interested in water sports, and people who need a place to hold seminars or other international meetings, while promoting safety as the key attraction.

“This is a special attribute that distinguishes us, and society as a whole and tourism-related businesses and agencies in particular must work hard to protect security in Cuba and our image as a safe place, especially in today’s conditions,” Deputy Minister of Tourism Marta Maíz said at a recent meeting held to discuss the current conditions facing the industry, the island’s top foreign-exchange earner.

For the past few months, publicity promoting international fairs and the advertising campaigns of tour operators and foreign hotels involved in joint ventures with Cuban state enterprises have focused on the “tranquillity and safety” offered by this socialist nation.

“Stressed out from the world crisis? Need refief from everyday anxieties? Give yourself a break in Cuba, the safest country in the world!” says Cubalinda, the only independent U.S.-owned agency with representation in this country.

Marcel Pincheira, a tourist from Chile, said that although the label “the safest country in the world” was a bit of an exaggeration, he agreed that Cuba was a pleasant, calm place to visit. “Cubans are friendly, they like to chat. I feel very good here,” he said.

Pincheira was reluctant to go abroad in the wake of the Sep 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York and the Pentagon in Washington. But a friend convinced him that Cuba was a good place “to go on vacation with the entire family.”

This year, Cuba is focusing its efforts on drawing tourists from Europe, Canada, Brazil and Mexico.

Among the new offers figure special tourism packages for people visiting Cuba on the occasion of international cultural events like the Havana Book Fair, the International Ballet Festival and the Festival of New Latin American Film.

Agencies will also continue offering special rates for those participating in the more than 400 international events scheduled this year in different parts of Cuba.

According to official statistics, 1.8 million foreign tourists visited Cuba last year, just 0.3 percent up from 2000, a tiny increase that put off, for the second year in a row, the target of rising above the two million visitor threshold.

But the number of visitors from Canada, Cuba’s main source of tourists, rose 13.9 percent between 2000 and 2001, the inflow of Mexicans grew 13.8 percent, while arrivals from France and Britain were five and four percent up, respectively.

However, the flows of tourists from Germany, Spain and Italy, among the leading sources of visitors to Cuba, shrank significantly.

Last year “was atypical, with very strong performance in the first half of the year and very poor performance in the second half,” said Pablo Morillas, vice-president of Gran Caribe, which operates 45 hotels in Cuba with a total of just under 11,000 rooms.

In 2001, Gran Caribe posted gross receipts of 210 million dollars, with a 62.7 percent occupancy rate, compared to 209 million dollars in 2000.

Local authorities in Cuba say the international crisis in tourism is the worst and longest-lasting in memory. It has been felt especially hard by island nations that are heavily dependent on air traffic.

Up to September 2001, the number of arrivals to Cuba was growing at an average monthly rate of 8.7 percent. But arrivals plunged 23.1 percent in October, 26.4 percent in November and 13.6 percent in December.

Authorities in the most dynamic sector of the Cuban economy and President Fidel Castro himself have warned that this year will be equally difficult, not only for this country but for the entire Caribbean basin and other regions.

“Tourism didn’t fall with respect to the previous year, but we have to see what happens this year. January was bad, and arrivals were down. I can only imagine how everyone else is doing,” said Castro early this month.

The World Tourism Organisation (WTO) projects a return to normal growth rates in the second half of this year, when the confidence of tourists is restored and business travel picks up again.

Global tourist flows fell 1.3 percent in 2001, with respect to 2000, according to WTO figures.

The gross earnings generated by tourism in Cuba rose eightfold from 1990 to 2000, from 243 million dollars to 1.95 billion dollars, with average annual growth of 23 percent.

The tourism industry’s share of the total revenues in Cuba’s balance of payments climbed from 4.1 percent in 1990 to 43 percent in 2000, and the industry eclipsed sugar as the country’s biggest foreign exchange earner.

The number of visitors soared from 340,000 to 1,774,000 in the same period, growing at a yearly average of 18 percent.

Canada, Germany, Italy, Spain, France, Mexico, the United Kingdom and Argentina are Cuba’s main sources of tourists. However, Argentina’s economic collapse has led to a major drop in the flow of visitors from that Southern Cone country in the past few months.

Since 1996, Cuba is one of five Caribbean island nations that receive upwards of one million tourists a year. The others are Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, the Bahamas and Jamaica.

In 1990, only three percent of the tourists visiting the Caribbean came to Cuba, compared to nine percent in 2000.