Europa Press, via 14ymedio, Madrid, 26 April 2018 — Cuban authorities have corrected the tourism figures released recently and revealed that, far from the announced 7% increase in tourists, there has, in fact, been a decrease of the same amount. The fall has been attributed to the effects of Hurricane Irma, although the goal of reaching five million tourists in 2018 remains, according to the Cuban Ministry of Tourism, as reported by the Cuban News Agency.
In the first three months of the year Canada remained the main source of tourists, followed by Cubans living abroad, who showed an increase of almost 21% over the previous year.
For their part, American visitors occupy the third position, with 1.52 million arriving in the first quarter. That figure represents a decline due to the restrictive measures promulgated in September by President Donald Trump, according to the authorities.
“The Americans constituted only 56.6% of the same period in 2017,” explained the Ministry’s commercial director, Michele Bernal, at a press conference reported by Reuters.
In this quarter, the remainder of international tourists came mostly from France, the United Kingdom, Italy, Spain and Germany. Last year Cuba received 4.7 million international tourists, an increase of 16.2%.
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