The entrepreneurs of the Mexican tourism sector reported a drop of tourists. According to them, the reasons are the smaller budget invested by the government of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador in promoting tourism.
"The lack of promotion has already been noticed in the first quarter of 2019 and that’s the high season. The damage already is done and we need to correct it,” said Pablo Azcárraga, president of the Council Business Coordinator and Tourism and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Grupo Posadas.
"We still have time to turn around the crisis. The country’s business sector is concerned. There is capital to invest, but investors will not invest if they do not see a future,” Azcárraga added in the closing session of the XVII National Tourism Forum.
According to what the director said, tourism in Mexico is in crisis because of the disappearance of promoting bodies and the insecurity in the country, which caused a drop of 1.6% in the Gross Domestic Product of the sector, and a 15% impact on profits in the first quarter.
Azcárraga indicated that with strategic plans, Mexico can increase the 40 million tourists per year to 60 million in a period of six years.
"But for that, we have to move poor ideas to cool ideas and set priorities. Grow in other parts of tourism like the cultural or medical sectors and use all the advances in technology. Tourism is now the sector that generates the most jobs," he explained.
The entrepreneurs agreed that the elimination of the Mexican Tourist promotion Council, MTPC is a serious mishap for the sector.
According to the representative of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, Alejandra Garcia, "the tourism sector has been punished with the budget. When the MTPC disappeared, all its budget went for the Maya train project, and that is quite worrisome."
"In the end, every peso of the MTPC became four pesos with the contribution of the state, hoteliers, transporters, financiers,” added Barrios.
While the tourism forum concluded, the tourism secretary, Miguel Torruco, began formally the process of decentralizing its department when moving to the city of Chetumal, capital of the state of Quintana Roo, the office of the Undersecretary of Planning and Tourism policy.
The measure has been criticized by the entrepreneurs of the tourism sector for not having any real impact on the promotion of tourism, while the unions have shown its refusal to move to Chetumal.
The president of the National Trade Union of Workers of the Tourism sector, José Carlos Navarro Valencia, stated that they have not been informed of the transfer and that its members refuse to relocate.
