The president of the Dominican Republic Hotels & Tourism Association (Asonahores), Julio Llibre, says that the country needs to work on getting tourists to stay longer and spend more. As reported in Diario Libre, he says data shows that the average spending of tourists has only increased by US$27.69, and that average length of stay has increased by 1.26 nights since 1993. He said this is a matter of concern because tourism is the engine of the Dominican economy. Llibre said that improvements in tourism could not just be measured by number of arrivals and that length of stay and spending were important variables. He said that the sector’s development plan should not be for the DR to be defined as a cheap destination in the Caribbean. The Asonahores president said the country needed to aspire to getting tourists invest in the DR and spend more. He said that each cruise ship passenger had to be motivated to spend more in the country and that the focus ought to be on quality, not quantity.
Llibre made the statements when attending the inaugural of the next board of directors of the Santo Domingo Cluster. The new board is effective April 2012 to April 2014. The members are Freddy Ginebra, general coordinator; Carlos Rodoli, general secretary; David Marmol, treasurer; and the members Luis Marino Lopez, Vielka Guzman, Justo Garcia, Association of Hotels of Santo Domingo, Ministry of Tourism, Ministry of Culture, Ministry of Environment, and Municipality of Santo Domingo.