Iberia, Guatemala Join Hands for the Sake of Tourism

The Guatemalan government and Spanish air company Iberia Airlines agreed to establish a joint strategy in an effort to pump up the outflow of European tourists into the Central American country.

Guatemalan President Oscar Berger, who attended the signing ceremony at the headquarters of the Guatemala Tourism Institute (INGUAT), underscored this accord will make a substantial contribution to the development of national tourism, one of his administration’s top goals.

For his part, INGUAT Chief Alejandro Sinibaldi noted the objective of this agreement is to get a toehold on the European market, one of the potentially growing segments. “The challenge here is to lure an increasingly larger amount of those travelers to this region,” he said.

Tourism is Guatemala’s number-one income source. Last year, the local leisure sector received some 880,000 foreign vacationers who spent over $600 million. INGUAT officials hope to crack the one-million-tourist plateau this year.

The Spanish consortium –flying to over a hundred airports in 40 countries and with a payroll of 25,000 employees- will ink similar agreements with Costa Rica and Panama in the near future, Mr. Sinibaldi concluded.