The tourism sector is slowly recoveringand now in June, the first positive indicators against pre-pandemic are evident.
According to the latest report from the National Administrative Department of Statistics (Dane), in the sixth month of the year the hotel occupancy rate closed at 54.4%, while for the same month in 2021, the figure was 36.20% and in pre-pandemic (2019), the rate was 48.2%.
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This behavior fue represented by 30.7 pp for leisure travel and 19.1 pp for business. This dynamic, beyond being greater compared to the pre-pandemic period, also shows that people are traveling mostly for enjoyment, because in this month, the Dane showed that 56.5% of tourists did so for this reason, while in 2019, the figure stood at 53%.
in business, the relationship was 35.1% vs. 37.5% respectively, which shows a greater lag in Mice tourism.
This trend was evidenced above all by the city of Bogotá, which par excellence is the capital of business trips.
In the results, the report showed that although the occupation of lcapital went from 57% in 2019 to 59.3% in 2020the business motive fell, since from 57%, the business motive represented 34.6 pp, while for 2022 the participation of 59.3%, of this motive closed at 29.8 pp
“The city of Bogotá is beginning to be seen as a destination for leisure (…) The phenomenon that is happening to the city in the composition of tourism is noteworthy, since it increases the reason for leisure, but several points are missing on the Business tourism”, said Julieth Solano, deputy director general in charge of the Dane.
And it is that the sector sees that this dynamic of traveling even more is constant.
“We see some regions with the flag of recovery and reactivation. However, Bogotá has not yet recovered this growth rate, the conference, meeting or convention sector has not recovered”, said José Andrés Duarte, executive president of Cotelco.
And it is that if the dynamism of other cities is seen, the Dane showed that in more tourist cities such as Cartagena there is a much higher occupation than in 2019, which marked the result of the sixth month of 2022.
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to June, La Heróica closed at 70% occupancyand in 2019, the figure was just 52%, which would mean 18 pp in comparison.
Of this figure, Solano highlighted the significant contribution of the leisure motive, which contributed 50.4 pp this month. And in turn, as happens in other cities lowered the share of the business motive in Cartagenabecause as of 2019, this figure represented 24.2% of the total and in 2022, 22.7%.
A different case occurred in the central region where the Mice motive went from 20.9% to 23.2% of the total monthly participation in 2019. In this way, the business motive fell from 72.3% in 2019 to 72% in 2022.
Another interesting dynamic was presented on those responsible for this growth in the figures, where the Dane showed that it was thanks to the contribution in the trips developed by residents contributing 42.2 pp growth of 54.4% in the sixth month of the year.
This shows considerable growth compared to 2019, the same period of time where residents, although they contributed a greater share compared to non-residents, only contributed 34.7 pp of the 48.2% growth.
Likewise, it is important to note that Dane also carried out the quarterly survey of Travel Agencies, where it was revealed that compared to 2019, the number of employed personnel is still at -41%, which would reflect the lack of hired personnel. .
Paula Galeano Balaguera
