After posting a quick blog recently about the busy streets and beaches I’ve recently been witnessing in Bocas, I decided to research some hard numbers and indeed I found very complimentary results.
The numbers for the 11 months from January 2010 thru to October of 2010 are definitely up over 2009 - 12% up, with a total of 900,000 visitors. Not so hard considering… global crash battered 2009 had one of the lowest yearly visitor totals since tourism really kicked into a higher gear in the early 2000’s. Very exciting news and it means Panama is very much on travellers’ radar and the tourism industry here in Panama is on the rebound.
Hopefully the longer 180 day tourist visa (up from 90 days), along with the recently introduced tourist health insurance card offered free of charge to arriving visitors at the Tocumen Airport in Panama City will help to continue the year over year upward trend and add another 12% for 2011.
Also good news for 2011 is the $700,000 increase in Panama’s tourism budget, putting it at $48.4 million, up from $47.7 million in 2009. And the national government of Panama also negotiated two more deals with international carriers that started late last year to bring direct flights through Tame of Ecuador and Germany’s Condor.
Tame will have a frequency of six flights per week, excluding Saturdays and cover two routes a week: Monday, Wednesday and Friday made the trip from Quito to Panama, while on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays will fly from Guayaquil to Panama.
Posted on Thursday, January 13th, 2011 at 11:02 pm
Filed under real estate project news .
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