The sector stopped its fall and reached pre-pandemic levels. However, the decline in spending continues, with falls in the Hotels and Restaurants and Confectionery items.
Incoming tourism grew in the country during the first quarter of 2023 and managed to reverse the scenario of decline, even reaching pre-pandemic levels, something that was reflected in the 19.5% improvement in sales that Travel Agencies went through, according to the last report of the Chamber of Commerce and Services of Uruguay (CNCS).
However, this was not evidenced in spending, since the country entered 741 million dollars, a 4.5% that the 776 million that entered in 2019, before the pandemic. The situation is correlated with what was reported by the CNCS, which observed drops in 23% in the Hotels category and a decrease of 5.5% in Restaurants and Confectioneries.
In this way, the agencies managed to issue more tickets and reversed the scenario, to the point that half expect an increase in billing levels for the current quarter. However, the items linked to expenses present a recessive phase, and fail to start with a consistent recovery trend.
In fact, according to the survey of the cncs, 13 of 19 items registered a year-on-year drop in their real sales levels. The panorama was particularly critical in the Litoral, with sales that fell by 7.4% compared to last year, while in Montevideo they grew 1.7%.
The situation finds its correlation with the data of the Ministry of Tourism, given that Uruguay it achieved 11.6% of visitors compared to the same period in 2019, with the arrival of 1,219,198 tourists. But, despite that, spending was less than four years ago, since 741 million dollars entered the country, compared to 776 million in the pre-pandemic.
When interpreting the data, the Minister of Tourism of Uruguay, Tabaré Viera, expressed: “Argentines come more, but obviously they spend less.” For the official, the price gap and the economic situation appear as explanations.
In any case, he valued that 11.6% more visitors despite “the difficulties of competitiveness”. In this context, he did not hesitate to state that “the exchange rate difference with Argentina is a headache.”
Source: Ambito
