Q & A with Estefania R. Escobar, Representative of Cuba’s Ministry of Tourism in Russia and Eastern Europe
Cuban travel authorities are looking forward to closing 2011 with a much larger uptick of visitors from Russian, compared to last year’s figures, thanks to Autentica Cuba (Authentic Cuba), a campaign that got underway in 2010 to promote sun-and-beach destinations, the keys and cities, history, sport and arts, let alone reflect the Caribbean nation’s lifestyle.
Q & A with Gaston Isoldi, General Director of La Cumbre and Chief of Development and Business at Reed Travel Exhibitions for Latin America
La Cumbre 2011 ended up in Las Vegas last September with over 220 exhibitors and 203 buyers. For 2012, when the event returns to Orlando after eight years, organizers are looking forward to seeing these numbers increase by 15 to 20 percent. Such uptick must be mainly based on larger presence of Latin America at the exhibition hall and the stepped-up attendance of buyers from North America, Latin America and Europe.
This year, InterContinental Hotel Group (IHG) has also sponsored La Cumbre fair, held in Las Vegas. Within the framework of this important event, we had the chance to interview Mr. Tony Ruiz, recently appointed sales general director for Latin America and the Caribbean, who talked about the group’s new strategy to boost sales in Latin America, keeping up with their hotel expansion in that region.
A week to go into an undefined strike called by the SEPLA Union for every Monday and Thursday and beginning Sept. 22 –the union represents the Air Europa pilots- Globalia President Juan Jose Hidalgo sat down with Caribbean News Digital for an exclusive interview in which he’s aired his standpoints on this issue and other hot topics related to Spain’s travel and tourism industry.
Among many other services related to communications for tourism, the Travelbiz.ie portal releases a digital newsletter twice a week that reaches 6,000 travel agents in Ireland and North Ireland, as well as tourism offices, airlines and other companies from Europe and the United States. With Mr. Benson, a great connoisseur of the industry and specifically of the Irish tourism sector, we talked about the characteristics and current trends in the market.
Worldwide known as one of the women who has worked the hardest for the development of tourism in the Dominican Republic. Mrs. Thomas operates the golf and MICE segments, among others, and has been ITB Berlin representative for the Caribbean since the 1980s. First madam president of the Dominican Association of Travel Agencies (ADAVIT is the Spanish acronym) in 1982, and first woman to hold the same position at the Latin American Tourism Conference in 1985.