Three new tourist projects will be built in Cancun at a price tag of $3.5 billion. Mexican President Vicente Fox laid down the first brick of the Riviera Cancun, a megabuck project that includes a 36-hole golf course and as many as 3,778 hotel rooms. According to estimates provided by the National Tourism Development Fund, this huge investment will create 5,000 new full-time jobs in hotels, let alone 9,500 part-time posts for other workers.

The Caribbean travel industry is ready to cash in on the sweet aftertaste left by the meeting on Professional Roles and Opportunities for Investment in Tourism (PROFIT 2004) that recently came to a close in Jamaica’s Montego Bay. With this view in mind and bent on fostering foreign investment in the Caribbean leisure industry, the Caribbean Hotel Association (CHA) signed an agreement with the United Kingdom’s Federation of Tour Operators (FTO), with the French Agency for International Development of Enterprises (UBIFRANCE), and the Spanish Foreign Trade Institute (ICEX).

Mexican President Vicente Fox announced the creation of a $2.6 million fund aimed at rescuing Cancun‘s beaches from the claws of longstanding deterioration and neglectfulness. The money, that will be complemented with funds from the Department of Environmental Protection, local authorities and businesspeople, will be mostly used to move three million cubic meters of sand from Isla Mujeres to Punta Cancun and Punta Nizuc.

The Cintra Consortium, owner of Mexico’s major airlines, is sketching out the fusion of two of the country’s top carriers –Mexicana and Aeromexico- to sell the resulting company to the private sector as the two airlines keep on inching back in the black in a piecemeal fashion. The Cintra Consortium raked in $127 million during the third quarter of the ongoing year after taking a screaming $168 million nosedive in 2003.

Patricio Sepulveda, vice president of the International Air Transportation Agency (IATA) for Latin America and the Caribbean, warned airlines will lose as many as $5 billion this year as a result of spiking oil prices. "Even though it´s $5 billion in losses worldwide we´re talking about, we´re confident there´ll be $3 billion worth of profits by the end of the year," Mr. Sepulveda was quoted as saying during the 13th Assembly of Airport Councils (AC) that took place in Trinidad & Tobago.

Air France is now ready to raise airfares for mid-range and long-haul flights in an effort to offset additional spending the company has incurred in the face of galloping fuel prices. France´s flagship air carrier issued a press release to inform a 3 percent surcharge in plane tickets for long-haul flights and 2 percent for mid-range trips. The price raise affects flights departing from France.