Latin America at the 2002 ITB

Berlin._ The Berlin 2002 International Tourism Fair, one of the world’s major events of its kind, promoted Latin America as one of the top tourist destinations under the sun.

The fair, which successfully closed on Wednesday, showed off ample and assorted pavilions tricked out by the Latin American nations in search of European tourists.

The 1,260-square-meter Brazilian pavilion is the fair’s largest compared with the exposition surface allotted to the other Latin American countries. Mexico, with 650 square meters, is the runner-up in this category.

The Brazilian pavilion presents 50 tourist enterprises from that nation and runs a large-scale slideshow depicting the South American nation’s natural beauties.

Wilma Santos, a representative of EMBRATUR –a section of the Brazilian embassy charged with tourist promotion- told the press that her firm is embarked on an aggressive promotional blitz aimed at snaring European tourists for the country.

Mrs. Santos underscored the need to count on an increasingly higher lump sum to pour into the country’s promotion overseas and added that future prospects in that regard are looking good.

Mrs. Santos revealed that Brazil banks on a standard pavilion for its presentations in fairs and tourist events everywhere around the world. So, she said, the pavilion is always the same year after year.

Mexico’s pavilion, opened during the official inauguration by the country’s Secretary of Tourism Leticia Navarro, comprises 45 national enterprises in 650 square meters.

For this year’s edition, the Mexican exposition surface was decorated to resemble a colonial town’s arms square. There’s also a pyramid imitation and another one for the Papantla kites with rag dolls.

The Ecuadorian Minister of Tourism, Rocio Vezquez Alcazar, said the concept followed to assemble her nation’s pavilion at the international fair was to express that the country has tourist destinations to offer all around the com