Cuba Seeks To Use Tourism Boom To Boost Other Economic Areas

Tourism is one of the main sources of income for the Cuban economy. (EFE)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, 20 May 2017 — Cuba seeks to take advantage of the recent rise of tourism, one of the locomotives of the island’s economy, to boost other areas and local services, in which the tourism sector invested more than 310 million Cuban convertible pesos in 2016.

This figure represents approximately 64% of the operating expenses incurred by state tourism companies, compared to 160 million CUC spent on the import of food and other products from abroad, some 26% of total expenditures, according to an article in the newspaper Juventud Rebelde.

Last year Cuba bought cutlery, crockery, linens, office supplies, cleaning supplies, disposable products and furniture, as well as preserved fruits and vegetables, sausages, dairy products, jams and beers, given that domestic supplies could not meet the demand.

To confront the boom of foreign visitors to the island, which this year is expected to surpass the 4 million tourists received in 2016, the country plans to build 224 new hotel facilities by 2030

During a forum of the fourth National Business Fair, happening in Havana and ongoing until Thursday, leaders of Cuban Light Industry said they had already made “a group of micro-investments to expand capacities” and offerings for the tourism sector.

The general director of the National Company of Select Fruits, Juan Carlos Rodríguez, stated that by 2017 some 60 local companies will guarantee 128 agricultural products and anticipated that they will engage in more efficient agrotechnical practices to produce prioritized and high demand crops such as fruits and vegetables.

To confront the boom of foreign visitors to the island, which this year is expected to surpass the 4 million tourists received in 2016, the country plans to build 224 new hotel facilities by 2030, said María del Pilar Macías, director general of the Ministry of Tourism (MINTUR).

The goal is to build 103,000 new rooms by that year, she explained.

In addition, MINTUR plans to refurnish and build more than 20 nautical and marine clubs, an equal number of real estate properties to house foreigners, and the same number of golf courses with almost a dozen associated hotels, some of them already underway with companies from Germany, China and Spain.