Tourism opens FITUR agenda with presentation to more than 200 agencies and tour operators

The Minister of Tourism, David Collado, met with over 200 European travel agencies and tour operators, airlines, and European media at an event held at the Marriott Auditorium Hotel in Madrid, which also served as the start of the schedule of activities for the International Tourism Fair, FITUR 2023, which is being held in this city. Collado emphasized that the Dominican Republic ended 2022 as one of the world’s leading countries in terms of tourism recovery compared to 2019 (pre-pandemic year) and presented to the European audience the country’s record results at the end of December 2022, the first year in history that the nation exceeded 7 million tourists and 8 million total visitors, including cruise ships.

“Europe is one of the most important markets for our country since last year we received more than 1.4 million tourists from the area. With activities like this, we hope to strengthen cooperation and alliances with each of the region’s travel agencies and tour operators, so that we can continue to grow hand in hand and reach figures never seen before in 2023,” he said. gathered during the event. Jaqueline Mora, the Dominican Republic’s deputy tourism minister, also spoke about the challenges and opportunities for 2023, highlighting the trends and projects that are being developed in the Dominican Republic to address these challenges.

“The Dominican Republic grew by 11% compared to 2019 in terms of tourist arrivals by air and we grew by 19% in arrivals of visitors by cruise ship compared to that year, for which we reached an unprecedented total of 8.5 million visitors in 2022. The world is facing growth challenges and high-interest rates, but tourism has proven to be resilient, and tourists will seek out destinations that offer better value for money, such as the Dominican Republic.”