7 News Belize

First Quarter Tourism Figures Show Stagnation
posted (April 28, 2015)
2014 was very strong for both cruise and overnight tourism when record numbers were realised. But, the first quarter of 2015 shows numbers for the overnight tourism sector going down ever so slightly - a very worrying start to the year for the BTB and tourism interests. Now, we stress, it is down very marginally, less than half of one percentage point - but it is worrying because the quarterly figure comes after a succession of years in which growth was shown consistently in every quarter.

So, what's causing it? Well, according to a BTB release, you should blame it on the weather. The release says, quote, "There were severe snow storms that took place frequently during this period, resulting in cancellation of flights that affected travel from Canada, as well as the Central and Eastern United States, including Connecticut, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New York City." End quote. And while that is perhaps plausible, the other side of that coin is that there are now more flights from more destinations to Belize than ever before - and the cost of air fares is trending down due to lower fuel costs - which should attract more travellers.

The last month of the quarter, March is the only one that showed a modest 1% growth in arrivals.

Cruise Tourism meanwhile has showed strong growth so far in 2015 with a 16.6% increase in January and 15.8% in March. February was down slightly, due to weather related cancellations.

Tourism statistics for the first quarter of 2015 show that overnight arrivals remained steady while cruise arrivals grew significantly over the same period in 2014.

Still, the BTB is optimistic, concluding, quote, "2015 will see increase in arrival numbers over 2014."

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