Honduras’ Tourism Minister: “Don’t visit my country!”

A vacation in Honduras can conjure up visions of spectacular destinations: the Mayan ruins of Copan, cloud forest after cloud forest filled with exotic flora and fauna, the gorgeous beaches and the dolphin filled waters off the island of Roatan.

But that’s not what tourist industry reporters saw when the country’s minister of tourism Ricardo Martinez presented a video at a recent convention in neighboring El Salvador. With a soundtrack of revolutionary music, it showed supporters of ousted Honduran president Manuel Zelaya clashing with riot police in the streets of the capital Tegucigalpa.

Martinez, who was ousted from the government along with Zelaya after the country’s June 28 coup, was apologetic but unflinching about showing the video. “I’d like to tell everyone to come to Honduras, and that it’s a tranquil place and everything is beautiful, but you think I’d be successful with that message? Of course not.”

Acting Honduran Tourism Minister Ana Abarca, appointed by the de facto government of Roberto Micheletti, and other representatives of Honduras’ de facto tourism institute were prohibited from attending the Central American Travel Market, the region’s largest international tourism tradeshow of the year. Much of the world, including the U.S. and all of Honduras’ neighbors, have refused to recognize the Micheletti regime.

Tourism was the country’s main economic motor but since the coup, says Martinez, Honduras’ tourism industry, which grew by a robust 9 percent in 2008, has plummeted 70 percent. The 7 percent tourism growth projections for 2009 are now expected to dip into the red. And the 155,000 Hondurans employed by the tourism industry are, in the words of Martinez, “suffering violently.”

Several TACA airlines flights to Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula, which used to bring hundreds of tourists to Honduras every day, have been canceled. A project to build an international airport at the Copan ruins was suspended, and charter groups from Europe are backing out. Overall, it’s estimated that Honduras’ economy has been set back 10 years over the past three months.

Despite Honduras’ string of misfortunes, Martinez remains optimistic that the country’s political situation will normalize, and that tourism will help pull it out of the hole. Several big projects, such as Carnival Cruise Lines’ tourism dock under construction in Roatan, and a $15 million golf course beach resort in the north of the country, are still moving forward –a sign, Martinez says, of future recovery.