Nicaragua celebrates World Tourism Day

Arquimedes Hernández | Sep 28, 2013

Nicaragua joined the celebration of World Tourism Day, with the V National Rural Community Tourism forum and with a local crafts fair in the viewpoint of Apoyo Lagoon located in the town of Catarina. The fair will be open to the public until September 28th. All these events are organized by the Nicaraguan Tourism Institute (INTUR) and the Nicaraguan Network of Rural Community Tourism. The 2013 global theme of World Tourism Day: "Tourism and Water: Securing our common future"

The celebrations of World Tourism Day began in the early 2000s, every September 27th, the date of the founding of the World Tourism Organization (WTO). This, upon request of the states members that make up the organization, highlighted Ana Carolina Somarriba WTO representative for Central America. Somarriba also emphasized the need and responsibility of tourism as an economic sector, with the protection, care and conservation of water resources.

For this year, the site of the celebration of World Tourism Day are the Maldives, located in the Indian Ocean, south-west of Sri Lanka and India in South Asia. The event is intended to share experiences worldwide that are collected and promoted in the tourism sector, said Somarriba.

Mayra Salinas, INTUR INTUR] Executive President, used the event to raise awareness that Nicaragua is ranked globally as an attractive and interesting tourist destination, thanks to the work with the private sector in the international positioning process. This translates into positive results, since starting August, the country has received a visit from 822.172 (eight hundred and twenty-two thousand one hundred seventy-two) tourists, adding the visit of the cruise ship passengers who are counted in 26,341 (twenty-six thousand three hundred forty-one) people, said Salinas.

The official also said they are working on the project "Gold Trail", which recreates the route that was used in the days of the California gold rush for the transfer of the precious metal by water bodies in our country, in addition , she said that currently they are working on the design process and conceptualization of the route and taking the first steps for preparation. The novelty of this project will be that visitors would see see and recreate what was done around the transfer of gold through Nicaragua, said Salinas.

To the inaugural event of the V National Forum Community Rural Tourism, attended INTUR Executive President Mayra Salinas, the executive vice president of INTUR Anasha Campbell, Deputy Nasser Silwany, vice president of the Tourism Commission of the National Assembly, Reinaldo Acevedo Nicaragua, Catarina mayor, Harold José Ramos, president of the Nicaraguan Network of Rural Community Tourism and Ana Carolina Somarriba WTO representative for Central America.

Translated by Cynthia Cordero