At this year’s Dominican Annual Tourism Exchange (DATE) conference tourism officials announced several developments for the future of the country. Fausto Fernandez, Deputy Minister of Tourism for International Cooperation, opened the event with several updates about Dominican Republic’s overall tourism health and news in each major sector within the country, the Ministry of Tourism reported.
There has been a 3.9% increase in 2017 for overall tourism to the country. This surpasses the 1.7% growth for the Caribbean, which received a total of 30.1 million visitors in 2017. Dominican Republic accounted for 21% of all Caribbean travel with 6,187,542 million tourists. The United States remains the largest source market for Dominican tourism with 2,073,963 million visitors in 2017, and Canada followed with 837,000.
The first quarter of 2018 has reported stronger than ever numbers with a 7.7% growth in the first quarter that is one of the highest year-on-year growths on record.
Dominican Republic’s hotel occupancy rate for 2017 was equally above average at 77%. Properties in Punta Cana-Bávaro reported 82.8% occupancy, Romana-Bayahibe 82%, and Boca Chica-Juan Dolio 71.4%, followed by Samaná 67.6%, Santo Domingo 62.4%, and Santiago 56.9%.
According to Fernandez, this is in large part to the new hotel rooms that became available in 2017, bringing the existing number of rooms to 77,259. The growth does not stop there. Dominican Republic will add 15,000 new rooms and update 6,000 existing rooms in 2018.
Punta Cana International Airport (PUJ) continues to be the main point of entry into Dominican Republic with 3,643,488 international tourists received in 2017. This is followed by Santo Domingo’s Las Americas Airport (SDQ) with 1,348,014; Santiago’s Cibao International Airport (STI) with 548,081 and Puerto Plata’s Gregorio Luperón International Airport (POP) following closely with 472,705.
Arrivals to the DR by cruise ships increased by 37% in 2017 compared to 2016, representing over 1.2 million visitors. Since Amber Cove’s inauguration in Maimón, 15 minutes south of the city of Puerto Plata, an average of 5,000 cruise visitors arrive weekly to the area. The reconstruction of Puerto Plata city’s cruise port is expected to begin in 2018, increasing cruise ship visitations to the area.
Numbers show that tourists are continuing to look for vacation experiences beyond the beach and are showing greater interest in multi-destination travel – 80% of all visits to Dominican Republic’s protected areas are by foreigners, proving that visitors are increasingly looking to explore beyond their hotel. In 2017, Saona Island welcomed 700,000 visitors as part of day-trips from resorts in Punta Cana, while the Colonial City saw an increase with 500,000 visitors.
This year’s DATE conference was held from April 11-13 at the Barceló Bávaro Convention Center in Punta Cana.
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Ministry of Tourism
24 April 2018
