Less than half of the hotels in the country are operating and their occupancy closed the first quarter below 10%, which is attributed to the measures imposed to fight the coronavirus pandemic

After the closure of tourism businesses for more than 8 months last year, the first three months of 2021 were a challenge for the sector due to sanitary measures to face the new variants of SARS-CoV-2 .

The Panama Hotel Association, whose members have 22,000 rooms out of a total of 32,000 in the country, confirmed that less than 50% have resumed operations.

Some such as RIU, Plaza, and Hard Rock have denied the definitive closure of their operations and assure that they are waiting for the best moment to reopen.

To increase the arrival of tourists, the International Promotion Fund has signed alliances with at least six airlines and with tourist reservation and promotion platforms.

The Fund estimates that the agreement with the hotelbeds.com platform will generate $20 million in foreign exchange for Panamanian tourism this year.