2024-02-13 17:46:26
A few hours before the start of the Round Table program in which the Minister of Tourism, Juan Carlos García Granda, was scheduled to attend, the Cuban economist Pedro Monreal asked a very direct question. “Could the Ministry of Tourism report on the linkage indices of tourism in Cuba that justify the ‘locomotive?'” he wrote from the social network image of the matrix.
Monreal, like the majority of Cubans, ignores why the Government continues to consider that tourism is “the locomotive of the Cuban economy” when there is not a single piece of data to support it, which is why he asked that numbers be made available that illustrate how much Development of other sectors provokes investments in tourism and vice versa. Of course, if the Cuban tourist authorities have the accounts, they neither provided them nor will they, although they repeated, already in the broadcast, the mantra.
“Tourism cannot advance or survive without the national economy. There we include everyone who participates in some way, providing supplies and services so that operations and investments can take place,” said María del Pilar Macías, general director of Operations and Quality of the Ministry of Tourism, which accompanied García Granda and provided some generic figures.
According to their accounts, 69% of the sector’s purchases are made from the national industry. “We see the production chain with a greater vision. It is possible to sell, but what the sector needs is also satisfied.” The official assured that there are 259 tourist facilities linked to 1,111 “productive forms”, among which are 379 private producers “who have even designed their cultivation to guarantee hotel facilities, that is, they think about tourism.”
Its assessment is positive, since it also avoids imports and their costs. “You get it faster and you don’t fall into the issue of shipping companies, which to get to Cuba must practically go around the world and that delays a lot,” she stressed. Among the novelties of these “chains” is the development of recycling industries, an issue that was previously ignored but that is becoming important for international hotel companies, such as Meliá or Iberostar, subject to environmental commitments.
“We started a program to replace overused plastic. There is also a productive chain and we have industries responding, such as Ciego Montero, in the production of soft drinks”
“We started a program to replace overused plastic. There is also a productive chain and we have industries responding, such as Ciego Montero, in the production of soft drinks.” The same thing happens, he said, with the dispensers that will replace cans and bottles, reducing the use of plastics and waste. “Los Portales made its line for concentrated soft drinks and Bucanero expanded for dispensed beer,” she explained.
The Government seems interested, possibly due to the prospect of being part of the network of Smart Tourist Destinations – with Cayo Largo del Sur as the first declared goal – in meeting the sustainability objectives required to achieve the seal. For this reason, he also presented last night on television a rural tourism plan to transform agricultural farms into agrotourism ones.
The goal is, in any case, to reactivate a sunken sector, since, as García Granda himself recognized, “at a global level, the tourism industry is recovering, with a tourism boom in countries like Spain, Europe and the Caribbean. “. He does not feel like a failure, despite the bad data for the Island – which closed 2023 with 2,436,980 international visitors, 42.8% less than in 2019 and 31% below its aspirations – since, he said, ” “No other country develops its tourist activity under the same conditions as Cuba.”
The minister summarized the list of harms of the embargo, including the most recent measure to suspend the ESTA (visa exemption program) of those who have traveled to Cuba since 2021, although the only one of the affronts cited that seems to have repercussions based The data is the ban on cruises from the US. The rule was approved by Donald Trump’s administration in June 2019 and maintained by Biden’s, preventing, according to García Granda, the arrival of at least 1.2 million tourists. The figure is exaggerated considering that in 2018, an excellent year for the sector on the Island, approximately 850,000 Americans were received through this means, although the hole in the accounts is real.
The rest of the burdens are found, the minister explained, in the lack of resources that prevent adequate promotion, as well as the availability of fuel – including that for internal flights or boats for excursions. Despite everything, the country invested money in improving airports, as reflected in a note published this Wednesday in Granma which does not specify the amount used in the actions undertaken, which range from track improvements to safety devices or facilities.
“The low occupancy rate indicates not only a great excess of capacity. It is also a monumental waste of investment”
“The official statistics indicate an inconsistency between the very high relative weight of investment associated with tourism that has a low employment rate and that coexists with the low and decreasing weight of agricultural investment in a country with food insecurity,” Monreal reproached. in their network analysis. The accounts, summarized in a graph that clearly reflects the disproportion between spending and drop in influx, are overwhelming. “The low occupancy rate indicates not only a great excess of capacity. It is also a monumental waste of investment. What is the rationality of having invested billions of pesos to continue increasing an excessive hotel supply?” insists the economist.
By 2024, the Government plans to have 3.2 million tourists and relies especially on the recovery of air frequencies. The minister indicated that “air connections have been established with 32 countries through 50 airlines, with an average of 579 weekly frequencies. In 2019, there were 764 weekly frequencies, although a large part of them corresponded to flights from the United States. Joined”. If these numbers are true, Cuba now has 24.21% fewer frequencies than in 2019, compared to the drop in tourism by 42% compared to the same year.
Later, however, he pointed out that the improvement in the number of travelers is due to the increase in flights “despite having only 47% of the frequencies that were in 2019.” There doesn’t seem to be anyone who can calculate the Leontief index for Monreal.
________________________
Collaborate with our work:
The team of 14 intervene is committed to doing serious journalism that reflects the reality of deep Cuba. Thank you for joining us on this long path. We invite you to continue supporting us, but this time by becoming a member of our journal. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.