There are encouraging signs that Jalisco’s cruise line trade is picking up after more than five years in the doldrums.
The global economic crisis, coupled with the swine flu epidemic and fall-out from Mexico’s drug war, prompted many cruise liners to dump Mexican stopovers from their itineraries. Businesses in Puerto Vallarta that depend on tourists disembarking from cruise liners have been severely affected by the snub.
The future is now looking much rosier, says Jalisco Tourism Director Enrique Ramos Flores. Ports in Jalisco are set to receive 107 cruise liners this year, up from the 2013 total of 81. The figure should rise to 150 by 2015, says Ramos.It may take considerably longer to claw back to the 2008 number of 250 but Ramos is convinced that this goal is attainable.
Earlier this month, at the Cruise Shipping Miami 2014 trade show, Ramos held positive talks with the president of the Florida-Caribbean Cruise Association (FCCA), a not-for-profit trade organization composed of 15 member cruise lines operating more than 100 vessels in Floridian, Caribbean and Latin American waters. He also secured agreements with the directors of the world’s three leading cruise lines to bring more vessels to Jalisco in the years ahead.
Authorities confirm that more than 50,000 tourists disembarked from cruise liners in January and February in Puerto Vallarta – a huge tonic for the local economy. How to attract more cruise liners during the low season – June, July, August – is a much more difficult proposition, they acknowledge.