Russian tourism increases in Cuba

The Association of Tour Operators of Russia (ATOR) assures that between January and October there was an increase in tourist trips from their country to Cuba and they want to reach 180,000 visitors by the end of the year.

Its official statistics indicate that146,300 tourists visited the island so far in 2023. These data represent an increase of 3.5 times more than in the same period last year.

Russia ranks third on the list of countries issuing travelers to Cuba. The first positions are occupied by Canada and the United States.

In May, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dimitri Chernishenko said thatRussia seeks to boost tourism to Cuba with the aim of becoming the main source of visitors to the island.

"We support the ambition of the Cuban Minister of Tourism to increase the tourist flow from Russia to 500 thousand visitors a year, which would place Russia as the leader in this sector, surpassing Canada," said Chernishenko.

A month later they traveled to Cuba more than1,200 workers from the Russian oil company Rosneft to spend vacations and get a medical checkup. This occurred in the midst of the medicine crisis in the country, where there are not enough doctors to care for the people.

From2017 the regime has been promoting the growth of Russian tourism in Cuba. They stayed in four or five star hotels and their vacations lasted between seven and ten days, which left profits for the State coffers.

In 2019, this issuing market reachedhistorical data with more than 93,700 visitors in the first seven months of the year, but with the arrival of the coronavirus pandemic the numbers plummeted again.

Since then, the regime has been trying to grow tourism in Cuba because it considers that it is the way to launch the impoverished national economy.

Miguel Díaz-Canel admitted this summer that the countrywill not reach 3.5 million tourists scheduled for 2023. They have received 1,309,000 international visitors, 20% below what was expected for the stage.

The downward trend has been noticed in flights to Cuba andseveral airlines in the United States and Spain have decided to cancel trips until mid-2024, because the routes are not profitable.