North American Stayover Visitor Arrivals to Curacao on the Rise

While the Curacao Tourist Board (CTB) reported little change in the total number of visitor arrivals for the month of July, a fall in arrivals from South America (Venezuela) has been compensated by the other three regions which recorded firm growth in July 2015.

Together the European, North American and Caribbean regions created a well-balanced spread of visitor arrivals in July with respectively 11.68 percent, 20.54 percent and 9.11 percent growth.

The total number of stay over arrivals remained stable with no significant change, with 36,871 recorded for the month. Last year, arrivals were counted at 36,849 visitors.

Visitor arrivals from the European region showed a good performance with 11.68 percent more visitors in July 2015. The region provided a total of 17,026 stay over arrivals compared to the 15,245 recorded in July 2014.

The main producing country, The Netherlands recorded a 15 percent increase with 13,990 in July 2015 compared to 12,136 in 2014. Traffic from Germany resulted in 7 percent fewer visitors. A total of 1,024 visitors were registered. Last year Curacao recorded 1,099 German visitors.

The North American region was up by 20.54 percent from 4,592 stay over visitors in July 2014 to 5,535 stay over visitors in July 2015. The United States with 4,749 stay over arrivals recorded a 9 percent increase. Traffic from the United States is developing positively since the start of direct flights by JetBlue from New York.

Canada keeps recording exponential growth since a year-round service from Toronto was launched. This month was no exception, an increase of 256 percent with 786 stay over arrivals was registered. Last year, July registered only 221 stay over visitors. This increase is directly attributable to the year-round service from Toronto with Air Canada rouge.

The South American market recorded a 21.24 percent decrease in July 2015, with a total of 8,923 stay over arrivals compared to 11,329 in 2014. The strong demand from Venezuela has been reversed after the positive performance during the first quarter of 2015. The impact of the new government regulations reflected in the visitor arrivals from Venezuela.

As of April 10, the Venezuelan government established new foreign currency restrictions that further limited the availability of access to dollars required for travel. July registered a 34 percent decrease from Venezuela. A total of 5,256 visitors were counted in July 2015, compared to the 7,907 visitor arrivals of last year.

Through close monitoring of the situation in Venezuela over the past months, the CTB expected a downturn in arrivals and prepared to step up marketing efforts in growth markets like the US, Canada, Holland, Germany and Colombia. Through such market diversification the CTB managed to achieve the stabilization now seen in the month of July.

Traffic from Colombia grew by 71 percent in July, a total of 1,400 visitors were counted. The CTB continues the focus in its marketing efforts to deliver better results from Colombia. With the elimination of the Colombian visa requirement as of July 1, the forecast for the second half of this year is optimistic.

Source: The Curacao Chronicle