Travel Industry Marches at White-Heat Pace in Latin America

Destinations from Canada to Argentina are pleased with their tourism growth but are also aware that they will need to fight to maintain it. The way forward should be focused on strengthening tourism and media relationships, capacity sharing and especially branding of destinations, as was underscored by the Regional Conference on Tourism Communications (TOURCOM) for the Americas, which concluded in Rosario, Argentina.

More than 600 delegates attended the event, which rounded up the World Tourism Organization´s (UNWTO) regional conferences on tourism communications, following the First World Conference TOURCOM, held in January 2004 in Madrid.

“TOURCOM is part of a longstanding effort by UNWTO to change perceptions of our sector of the economy, to strengthen relationships with that important group of decision influencers in the media and to reform our own ways of doing business in the fast moving field of modern communications. It also gives an opportunity to showcase the region to the rest of the world,” said the special advisor to the UNWTO Secretary-General Geoffrey Lipman in his opening address.

The conference focused on long term changes in tourism communications. American journalists –who represented a third of all participants- discovered that they “are an integral part of the tourism sector, not only as observers, while they should maintain their autonomy and critical approach”.

All participants agreed that the situation of American tourism is favorable, yet the TOURCOM showed where there are leakages and holes in cooperation.

The media in the Americas are satisfied with the amount of information they receive from the governments, but warned that these should be more balanced, sincere and most of all, that both the public and the private sectors should facilitate more support to their associations and organize more press trips.

The Conference was jointly organized by the Argentinean Government and the UNWTO Press and Communications Department. Next TOURCOM conferences will focus on sub-region, such as Central Asia and Eastern Europe (Georgia next October) and Central America and the Caribbean (next year).