Tourism Chiefs Warn on Infrastructure
By Catherine Keogan, thebeachtimes.com

National tourism industry leaders warned this week Guanacaste’s phenomenal growth would slow unless the Costa Rican government was prepared to invest in infrastructure.

“Guanacaste’s tourist development is growing faster than any of the other nine tourist units in the country,” confirmed Alberto Lopez, Executive Director of the National Chamber of Tourism (Canatur).

“However, according to research done by Canatur, approximately 40 per cent of tourists trying to make reservations in Costa Rica were rejected, due to a lack of available hotel rooms,” he said.

“If a tourist hears that once, he might call back a second time, but he won’t call a third time. He’ll go somewhere else.”

Mr Lopez was speaking at a tourism trade show, Expotur, held in San José, where more than 200 delegates from North and Central America gathered to promote the tourist industry.

Costa Rica received 1.4 million visitors last year, said Susan Orozco, Media Relations Manager with the Instituto Costarricense de Turismo (ICT), a figure that represents very rapid growth around the country, particularly in Guanacaste.

“The number of airlines coming into Liberia has increased not only tourism, but the number of people who come to live and invest in the area,” she noted.

Manny González, General Manager of the Flamingo Beach Resort in Guanacaste, confirmed that his hotel saw an unprecedented 90 per cent occupancy rate in its first quarter this year.

There are an estimated 36,000 rooms available in Costa Rica, and Canatur formulated a plan to add 2,000 rooms annually, to accommodate a projected increase of 6.6 per cent in visitors yearly.

However, in the first three years of the plan, a total of only 2,500 rooms were added, leaving the country short about 3,500 rooms.

The shortage is even more acute in Guanacaste; according to an estimate by Hubert Gysemans, President of the Guanacaste Chamber of Tourism, 2,000 rooms are needed to meet demand in this province alone.

Mr Lopez maintains that this is the result of a lack of financial subsidy for foreigners and nationals by the government, either in the form of incentive programs or small business loans.

Added to this is the lack of investment into infrastructure, such as the improvement of roads and telephone lines, he added. Much of the responsibility for maintenance, and new infrastructure, is falling to the private sector.

“These are the kinds of efforts, investments into infrastructure, that the Nicaraguan and Panamanian governments are making,” said Mr Lopez. “In Nicaragua, they are planning, and already have, better highways than we do.”

Better employee training is also a priority, he noted, to ensure that the estimated 85,000 positions that tourism creates directly, as well as an additional 500,000 indirectly, are filled by qualified personnel.

“The primary business in Guanacaste has always been cattle-ranching or agriculture,” said Mr Lopez, “but this is changing rapidly, and people are going into the tourism industry without proper training.”

He feels that the National Institute of Learning (INA) should establish a branch office in Guanacaste, to address the particular needs of the region in this regard.

There are fears that other Central American countries may be poised to step in, where Costa Rica falls short of its ability to accept and meet the needs of potential visitors.

“Ecotourism has grown very fast,” says Ms Orozco, “and countries like Nicaragua and Panama can watch us, and learn from our mistakes.”

Ramón Miranda, Director of Corporate Sales for Grupo Papagayo which developed the Giardini Papagayo resort in Playa Panama, agreed.

“Unless we get more input from the government, there’s going to be chaos,” he warned. “We should be more ready to receive clients. The airports are overburdened, the roads and bridges are not ready. The high season in Guanacaste is also the peak of the dry season, and many times we have no water, we have to bring in water trucks from Santa Cruz.”

“The government did not anticipate the kind of growth in tourism we’ve seen, and they are leaving all of the development to private enterprise. I fear if other countries like Nicaragua or Cuba, perhaps, in the future, become more aggressive in attracting tourism, that Costa Rica will become just another country in the firmament of destinations in Central America, instead of the leader it is today.”