How insecurity has impacted tourism in mexico

Summary

In 2010, there was a slight increase of 5.3% making Mexico the tenth most visited country in the world with 22.4 million visitors. However, tourism to the border area decreased by 10% compared to the previous year, due to fear of insecurity. Even with the recovery in growth, Mexico did not reach its 2008 levels, with a drop in profits in foreign currency of 8.5% or 1.8 trillion dollars in 2010.

Tourism continues to be the third most important recipient of foreign currency in the country, despite the fact that, according to official figures, the foreign traveler represents only around 20% of the total number of passers-by in Mexico.

The foreign exchange generation of the tourists who visit Mexico reached in the accumulated of the year until November 2012 to 11,285 million dollars, 7.1% higher than the same period in 2011, while the number of visitors in that period amounted to 6.8 % million travelers.

Abstract

In 2010, there was a slight increase of 5.3% making Mexico the tenth most visited country in the world with 22.4 million visitors. However, tourism in the border area decreased by 10% compared to the previous year, by the fear of insecurity. Even with the recovery in Mexico did not increase their levels of 2008, with a decline in foreign exchange gains of 8.5% or $ 1.8 billion in 2010.

Tourism remains the third largest recipient of foreign exchange in the country, even though, according to official figures, the foreign traveler means only about 20% of the walkers in Mexico.

The foreign exchange earnings from tourists visiting Mexico came in the full year to November 2012 to 11,285,000 dollars, which is 7.1% higher than in the same period of 2011, while the number of visitors in this period amounted to 6.8% million passengers.

According to the World Tourism Organization, tourism includes the activities carried out by people during their trips and stays in places other than their usual environment, for a consecutive period of less than one year and greater than one day, for leisure purposes, for business or for other reasons.

Arthur Bormann (Berlin, 1930) defines tourism as the set of trips whose object is pleasure or for commercial or professional reasons and other similar ones, and during which the absence of the habitual residence is temporary, the trips made are not tourism to move to the workplace.

Walter Hunziker - Kurt Krapf, 1942 say that "Tourism is the set of relationships and phenomena produced by the displacement and permanence of people outside their home, while these displacements and permanence are not motivated by a lucrative activity".

The term "tourismism" emerged in the 1960s. But it was the Yugoslav Živadin Jovičić (geographer in his academic training), the scientist considered "father of tourism", who popularized it when he founded the magazine of the same name in 1972.

Jovicic considered that none of the existing sciences could carry out the study of tourism in all its dimensions (neither geography, nor economics, nor sociology, etc.), considering that their contributions are unilateral. This would allow the creation of an independent science, tourismism.

Tourism in mexico

Tourism in Mexico is an important economic activity for the country and is one of the largest in the world, ranked tenth worldwide in terms of international tourist arrivals, with 21.5 million visitors in 2009, and is the First destination for foreign tourists within Latin America.1 Revenue from foreign tourists reached USD 11.27 billion in 2009, and Mexico captured 15.25% of the American tourism market segment in terms of foreign tourist arrivals, placed second on the continent, behind the United States1. In 2005, tourism contributed 5.7% of national income from the export of goods and services, and represented 14.2% of direct and indirect jobs in the Mexican economy.2 Tourism contributes 8.2% of national GDP; 45% of this activity is oriented to the coastal zone.

Mexico's tourist attractions are the ancient ruins of Mesoamerican culture, colonial cities, and beach resorts. The temperate climate of the country together with its historical cultural heritage, the fusion of European culture (particularly Spanish) with Mesoamerican culture also make Mexico an attractive tourist destination worldwide. The vast majority of foreign tourists visiting Mexico come from the United States and Canada. The next most important group are visitors from Europe and Latin America. A small number of tourists also come from Asian countries.

In the 2011 Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index (TTCI) classification, which measures factors that make it attractive to make investments or develop business in the travel and tourism sector of a specific country, Mexico ranked 43rd worldwide, being the first classified among Latin American countries and the fourth in the American continent.

Insecurity in Mexico

The reason why the development of the sector worries, knowing that it is an important engine in the economy due to the benign connections that are generated directly and indirectly by tourism; It is because Mexico came out of the list of the 10 best tourist destinations in the world, a list in which it came to occupy the seventh place and in which it now stands at number 13.

Problems such as the lack of planning that allows the sector to develop, environmental damage, low quality of services, little or no exploitation of comparative advantages, economic crises in key countries for the sector, among many others, are ridiculously overshadowed by the issue of the perception of security.

Insecurity is an issue that not only affects tourism, but is where the consequences are felt very strongly. Claiming that Mexico's departure from the world top ten was solely due to insecurity would be inappropriate, however, it is also not necessary to be a specialist to observe that acts of crime directly affect the opinion of foreign tourists and dissolve any intention to visit a place riddled with organized crime, theft, kidnapping, extortion, or any sign that represents a risk.

The departure of the top ten is not surprising, since May 2012 there was fear that Mexico would leave the top 10, however, until then the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) itself rejected that Mexico abandon the Tenth place in the ranking of countries that receive the highest number of vacationers, which could not be determined because the delivery of the data that feeds the organism's barometer did not finish on time.

Those same rumors were echoed in December 2012 when the former undersecretary of Tourism, Francisco Madrid Flores, pointed out that the country's main competitors, Austria and Russia registered growth of over 77 percent, while Mexico showed a 1% drop. In this way, Madrid Flores predicted that these results in our country could represent setbacks between two and three places within the UNWTO list.

The departure of the top ten was anticipated by the data shown at the time and reinforced with the image of insecurity that our country sends abroad.

The United States has been a country that has almost traditionally nurtured visitors to different destinations in our territory, particularly on the border. In 2000, 91.6 million travelers a year entered the country through the northern border, a figure that fell to 57.2 million tourists during Felipe Calderón's six-year term, due to the war against organized crime and the financial crisis.

But this problem encompasses cities such as Acapulco, where it was recently considered the second most violent city in the world with a rate of 143 murders per 100,000 inhabitants, followed by Caracas, which ranked third, with a rate of 119 homicides and only surpassed by San Pedro Sula, Honduras, according to a ranking prepared by the Citizen Council for Public Security and Criminal Justice AC.

Within the study called "The 50 most violent cities in the world 2012" it was indicated that for the second consecutive year, San Pedro Sula occupies the first place globally with a rate of 169 intentional homicides per 100,000 inhabitants. While those cities on the blacklist of violence were Valencia and Maracaibo (Venezuela); Santa marta colombia); Port-au-Prince (Haiti); Victoria (Mexico); Oakland (United States) and Brasilia (Brazil).

"The greatest deterioration in public security and the escalation of violence has occurred in recent years in Honduras, Venezuela and Mexico," said José Antonio Ortega Sánchez, president of the Citizen Council for Public Security and Criminal Justice.

As if that were not enough, in recent days national tourism suffered a severe blow with the news that in the port of Acapulco, a group of six Spanish tourists were raped.

Acapulco authorities reported that a group of tourists was attacked and six of them of Spanish nationality were raped. Said authorities said that the Army and the Police began the investigation to obtain the capture of the five hooded men who robbed the group of tourists, made up of 13 Spaniards (6 women and 7 men) and one Mexican, in a house in the sector of Old Bar.

The attack occurred during the first bridge of the year caused by the celebration of the day of the Constitution in which the hotel occupancy of the port was above 90% and the arrival of tourist cruises and numerous groups of European tourists was recorded.

"It is perhaps the strongest attack against tourism in Acapulco, we have not had something like this at least in recent times," Roberto Manzanares, of the Association of Hotels and Gastronomy of Guerrero, the state where Acapulco is, told AFP, which he regretted. the fact. The Mexican Foreign Ministry reacted by repudiating what happened and noting that the authorities of the two countries have established lines of communication to determine exactly what happened.

Recommendation

The Mexican Federal government is committed to promoting tourism, investing the necessary funds in the Secretary of Tourism, and creating new campaigns to attract foreigners to the country. Only time can tell if this effort will be successful in reaching the desired tourism levels. However, there is a second issue and that is investment in the tourism industry. In order for Mexico to attract foreign visitors, foreign investment must first be attracted. FONATUR has done a magnificent job creating new projects in which investors only contribute money without worrying about administrative procedures. What to FONATUR,Other similar agencies and many of the states have lacked more efficiency and effectiveness in promoting and disseminating available investment opportunities. That is why, just as the Secretary of Tourism has installed tourist promotion offices in the United States and around the world, FONATUR and the other public and private agencies involved in attracting investments should do the same.

The United States cannot and will not sustain its health care system with the number of "baby boomer" that these services will require in the coming years. In addition to this, rising health costs and the more than 52 million uninsured Americans will lead the country to a tireless quest to keep its population healthy at affordable costs. The Health care reform accepted last year was a very good first step to lower costs related to long-term health care and ensure more Americans, but the reality is that medical care in the United States is too expensive to cover everyone's needs.The USMCOC believes that the United States government and private insurance companies should promote and legislate to incentivize Americans to seek treatment outside of the country, where costs can be up to 90% lower for some services.