Hotel occupancy in Cuba only increased by 9.4% in 2023 compared to the previous yearsays the Office of Statistics and Information (ONEI), which omits relevant data and contains errors in its latest report on selected indicators of tourism in Cuba.
According to ONEI Between January and December last year, 13,725,120 of 2,436,980 overnight stays (nights) were recorded international visitors with an income of 118,136,923 Cuban pesos.
“It draws attention to itself very low utilization of 25%, The Lack of information in foreign currency and the error in a graph,” noted economist Pedro Monreal in a thread on his account on X.
The analyst explained this The figure of 25% of international tourism occupancy refers only to “tourist facilities”.. “It is higher than the 15.6% rate in 2022, but it is very low and it is data that needs to be taken into account in 2022.” question the country's high hotel investments“he added.
Monreal pointed out that the ONEI report contains an error with the corresponding colors in the columns of graph 4.1. and called it “a minor issue that probably indicates the report was rushed.”
“The topic that has attracted the most attention and motivated a rapid informal exchange between several business colleagues is this Absence of data in foreign currencies in an activity that is an important source of this. It is not that difficult to provide this information,” he said.
“The most interesting part is this strange way the official exchange rate (1×24) seems to be handled in the statistics. The revenue of more than 118,000 million CUP would be equivalent to 4,922 million dollars, but this figure is not credible as foreign currency revenue from tourism,” he opined.
In the economist's words: “If the 1×120 rate were adopted, the 118 billion CUP would correspond to a gross income of 984.5 million dollars from tourism, a more realistic figure, but one that remains.” It is unclear how official Cuban statistics will be disclosed“.
In 2023, investments in Cuba increased by almost 10 billion pesos, although not to improve public health, nor to increase agricultural production and alleviate hunger.
Investment in hotels and restaurants increased by almost 120%, while public health fell by 30%. The funds allocated to this sector doubled in 2023, when it spent more than double what was intended for agriculture, livestock and forestry (only 1,855 million pesos), in a country without food and its prices in principle promote inflation.
The low number of tourists to Cuba meant that the hotels managed by the regime remained open in the first half of 2023 and seven out of ten rooms remained empty.
According to economist Emilio Morales Among the causes of the decline in tourism to Cuba is the worsening of the multisystem crisis that the country is experiencingwhere in practice “not even dollars can make food live.”
The expert also mentioned the situation of oppression, power outages, lack of transportation, lack of fuel and medicine, as well as few leisure opportunities and poor service. “None of this makes you want to go to the island on vacation,” he mused.