According to the Ministry of Tourism, 125,117 foreigners entered the Andean country in January 2023, 93 percent more than in the same month of 2022.
In April this year, however, the increase was 13 percent compared to the same month last year, with a record 105,800 foreigners entering the country through various routes.
The President of the Association of Receptive Tourism Companies of Ecuador (Optur), Rafael Martínez, told digital newspaper Primicias on Saturday that the sector’s expectations for the rest of the year were not positive.
According to Martínez, between April and May they received cancellations for the summer season (June-September) and even for the winter season, which runs until March 2024, especially from tourists from the US and Europe.
Martínez sees the main reason for the cancellations in the uncertainty and secondly in the political instability that the country is experiencing.
Coastal destinations have been hardest hit, with 90 per cent of flights cancelled. Then come the Andes, where 50 percent of flights have been canceled despite being an adventure tourism destination. And to a lesser extent, the Amazon with 20 percent, explained the representative of the Ecuadorian tourism union.
Currently, prison riots, robberies, assaults, murders, kidnappings, extortion and other crimes that the government attributes primarily to drug-trafficking gangs are on the rise in Ecuador.
Analysts and citizens warn of the need for investments both to strengthen public forces and to promote social development.
Last Thursday, Security Minister Wagner Bravo reiterated that the government is preparing an executive decree on the use of legitimate force to fight crime throughout the country.
Bravo announced that President Guillermo Lasso will sign the document upon his return from his trip to the United States, a country he traveled to this Wednesday afternoon for a medical procedure.
lam/nta