The Executive Council of the World Tourism Organization is meeting in Punta Cana 16-18 May 2023 for its 118th session. This is the first time the World Tourism Organization’s Executive Council Meeting is held in the Dominican Republic.
The WTO says the meeting “comes at an extraordinary moment for the Dominican tourism industry.”
On the program is an Institutional Forum on Sustainable Tourism on Tuesday 16. The assembly will also discuss “New Narratives in Tourism,” focusing on new ways of approaching advertising and connecting with future visitors.
Other topics to be covered are the Redesigning Tourism for the Future and a status report on the establishment of UNWTO regional and thematic offices. There will be private sessions of the Executive Council.
Panelists will discuss the recovery of hotel occupancy and the arrival of important direct investments in new projects that have turned tourism into one of the engines of the Dominican economy.
Minister of Tourism David Collado said that the sargassum problems in the Caribbean will be discussed during the conclave in Punta Cana.
The meeting takes place at a time that WTO says tourism is on track for full recovery. International tourism is well on its way to returning to pre-pandemic levels, with twice as many people traveling during the first quarter of 2023 than in the same period of 2022.
The second UNWTO World Tourism Barometer of the year shows that the sector’s swift recovery has continued into 2023. It shows that:
• Overall, international arrivals reached 80% of pre-pandemic levels in the first quarter of 2023
• An estimated 235 million tourists traveled internationally in the first three months, more than double the same period of 2022.
• Tourism has continued to show its resilience. Revised data for 2022 shows over 960 million tourists traveling internationally last year, meaning two-thirds (66%) of pre-pandemic numbers were recovered.
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Diario Libre
Noticias SIN
16 May 2023