Cuba will be soon exporting eight brands of rums other than Havana Club, the island nation’s landmark spirit, as a result of its top-quality distilling, Belkys Acosta, chief of Exports and Sales for Cuba’s Ministry of Food Industries, said in a press conference a few days ago.
The new rums entering the international market are Santiago de Cuba and Cubay from Cuba-Ron; Legendario and Arecha produced by the Beverage and Soft Drink League; Mulata and Bucanero from Tecnoazucar, and Varadero and Caney distilled by CIMEX.
Panama’s Copa Airlines is heralding discount airfares for Central America flights of up to 40 and 55 percent off –depending on the end destination- in an effort to boost up tourism in the region, a spokesperson for the air company revealed today.
“Copa Airlines continues to put its smart money on tourism and economic development for the region as it seeks to become the best carrier in Central America,” explained Jorge Garcia, Copa’s marketing deputy director.
Trinidad will inject 10 million dollars into BWIA and exchange 30 million dollars in debt for equity in the latest bailout of the airline, and it will also provide Eastern Caribbean $6.3 million dollars in loans to Caribbean governments that hold shares in LIAT airline to assist that cash-strapped carrier.
The debt-for-equity swap could result in Trinidad´s government increasing its 33.5 percent share in BWIA. The government will ask private shareholders to participate in exchanging debt for shares, but may do it alone if they refuse, Trade and Industry Minister Ken Valley said.
Panama’s leisure industry generated $805 million worth of revenues in 2003, up an eye-popping 126 percent gain from 2002, the Panamanian Tourism Institute (IPAT) informed today.
Over the past five years, Panama has added 39 new hotels to its stock of accommodations, a figure that is keeping local tourism authorities red hot about the prospect of welcoming nearly a million foreign travelers in 2004.
Cuba-based tourist group Cubanacan has made it big in the eastern travel destination of Holguin with a whopping 36 percent increase in revenues and 54 percent more gains in the first quarter of the ongoing year compared to the same span of time in 2003, by far the best year ever for the island nation´s third-largest tourist circuit.
Stays in that destination were up more than 18,000 while hotel occupancy hovered around 90 percent. In Holguin, Cubanacan relies on over 1,200 accommodations, most of them clustered in Guardalavaca, its premier spot, with 1,180 rooms in all.