Tourism of Puerto Vallarta registers positive indicators

Guadalajara, Jal. Puerto Vallarta – the main tourist destination in Jalisco – not only recovered the fall it had during the pandemic, but in 2022 it registered a 22.9% growth in the number of both national and foreign passengers who arrived at that destination in the Mexican Pacific.

“If we compare ourselves against figures from 2019, which was already a year that came with very interesting growth and stability for the destination, this 2022, both we and many other colleagues, are already above the figures for 2019,” he commented. The general director of Buenaventura Hotels, Abel Villa Sánchez, told El Economista.

According to the air traffic report of the Grupo Aeroportuario del Pacífico (GAP), from January to December 2019 –before the Covid-19 health crisis– the Puerto Vallarta International Airport received 5 million passengers, while, in In the same period of 2022, the Vallarta air terminal mobilized 6.2 million travelers, both national and international.

“That, coupled with road tourism, is the positive result that we have seen (…) The recovery stage is behind us and now the growth is real, having positive numbers compared to 2019,” stressed the businessman.

Based on Datatur figures as of January 1, 2023, during the week of December 19 to 25, 2022, Puerto Vallarta stood out with an occupancy of 81.8%, which positioned it in the first place in hotel occupancy nationwide.

This figure represents a growth of 3.8% compared to the same period in 2021 and positions Puerto Vallarta as the beach tourist destination with the highest number of visitors nationwide in the holiday period at the end of the year, above Cancun, which presented 79.2% and Los Cabos with 79.2% hotel occupancy.

“These figures are a reflection of the fact that the destinations in Jalisco remain significantly preferred by various market segments, this, derived from the work carried out in terms of promotion,” said the head of the Jalisco Ministry of Tourism, Vanessa Perez Lamas.

Abel Villa, who is also part of the Technical Committee of the Tourist Trust, indicated that after the pandemic, hotels focused on the market with the highest purchasing power were the first to recover.

estados@eleconomista.mx