Tourism is Nicaragua’s top hard-currency maker

For a second year in a row, the leisure industry has led the pack of Nicaragua’s premiere sources of hard-currency money. Until August this year, the Nicaraguan Tourism Institute has tabbed a 9.8 percent growth in the number of foreign arrivals compared to the same span of time in 2002.

Desiderio Campos, head of the institute’s Operations & Investment Assessment Division, admitted to the local press that his country’s infrastructure is really poor and scarce.

Mr. Campos explained that most tourism investments have been focused on the South Pacific region, with greater emphasis on the provinces of Rivas and Granada, located at 111 and 45 kilometers respectively from the nation’s capital.

Nevertheless –he went on to say- investments are scattered all across the country except in the self-governing North Atlantic region.

There are as many as 1,800 investment bids in Nicaragua’s infrastructure embracing hotels, lodging facilities and restaurants, among other projects. One of the programs that’s getting a big leg up right now is the Puesta de Sol Marina.

Mr. Campos said one of the things hurting the country’s leisure industry in the regions is Nicaragua’s scant and rundown road network.

Among the major sources of income for Nicaragua in terms of tourist activity, the arrival of cruises that dock in San Juan del Sur (Rivas) is one standout.

Official stats have it that the nation’s tourism churned out $116.4 million in 2002, a figure that accounts for almost a fifth (19.5 percent) of Nicaragua’s exports that peaked $596 million last year.