What’s even more surprising is that Monreal traced the decline of tourism in Cuba back to 2017, three years before the world was hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. This analysis reveals a disturbing reality: tourism in Cuba was already in a state of decline long before the pandemic hit.
1/6 The “Tourism” chapter of the 2022 Cuban Statistical Yearbook offers information that allows us to appreciate two processes: a) there is no post-pandemic “recovery” of tourism compared to the previous level, and b) the erosion of tourism began in 2017, much earlier of the pandemic pic.twitter.com/weFIxMZksX
— Pedro Monreal (@pmmonreal) October 2, 2023
Monreal pointed out that tourism from the five main European emitters experienced a drop of 29.1% in the two years prior to the pandemic, between 2017 and 2019. This translated into a decrease of almost 307 thousand visitors in that period. For example, the number of Canadian tourists visiting the island decreased by 12.9% between 2015 and 2019, which was equivalent to a loss of more than 180,000 visitors.
In 2022, Cuba received less than half (47.5%) of the Canadian visitors it had received in 2019, further underscoring the lack of recovery in the tourism sector.
Emitters that grow
However, there are two types of travelers who have increased their visits to the island in recent years: Americans (although their number began to decrease in 2022) and the Cuban emigrated community. In 2022, 234,000 more Cubans residing abroad arrived than in 2015.
Monreal concludes that reaching the pre-pandemic level of 2019 visitors will be a considerable challenge, especially for the United States, and will be more feasible for Russia and Europe, with Canada somewhere in between. The Cuban community could play a role in the recovery, but there are still obstacles to overcome.
These grim data shed a stark light on Cuba’s tourism industry, which has been in decline in recent years, despite the Havana regime’s unsuccessful efforts to revive it. Continued investments in hotel construction, despite seven out of ten hotel rooms going unused, reflect the disconnect between reality and the regime’s objectives. Ultimately, the initial goal of receiving 3.5 million visitors this year seems unattainable, and the actual figure is probably between 2.5 and 2.9 million tourists.
1/6 The disproportionate investment associated mainly with tourism averaged 40.75% annually of total investment between 2019 and 2022, but total rooms decreased 7.7%. The investment was reflected in more 5-star rooms and expansion of the tourist poles pic.twitter.com/PkqNrQCUiM
— Pedro Monreal (@pmmonreal) October 3, 2023
