Sometimes you have to bet everything on the tourist destination, but you also have to diversify. Diversification is a lesson from the pandemic.”
Mara Lezama, Governor of Quintana Roo.
The government of Quintana Roo, through transversal work, has drawn a route to continue with diversification and compensate the impact that the pandemic brought to the tourism sector.
In an interview with El Economista, within the framework of the Tianguis Turístico, Governor Mara Lezama explained that as a result of the health crisis caused by Covid-19, a lot of labor was lost in tourism, however, the industry began to create small businesses in different branches to continue generating jobs.
“Quintana Roo has 12 tourist destinations and the most important in Latin America, Cancun; Sometimes you have to bet everything on the tourist destination, but you also have to diversify. Diversification is a lesson from the pandemic (…) We have found the opportunity to seek true diversification with full support, working across the different secretariats”, she said.
In addition, the state administration, through the Quintana Roo Secretary of Tourism, worked to grant Safe Travel stamps, in constant training in hotels, airports and with service providers, complying with all sanitary protocols.
“The pandemic brought great lessons, and I think one of the important ones is to anticipate what is going to happen, act accordingly, but always hand in hand with other instances,” he said.
The current economic model around the tourism industry, he added, focuses mainly on promotion and continuing with the axes that were developed before the pandemic, but also engaging in new ways of working.
Regarding the arrival of tourists to the state, Mara Lezama emphasized that only at Easter they expect the arrival of 1.2 million visitors, that is, more than 600,000 compared to the previous year.
“The numbers are flattering, but we cannot sit back and wait for them to continue to grow, we come to hold meetings, to seek agreements, to make twinning, to find a success story (…) We have scourges with sargassum, natural phenomena, but this Tourist Tianguis comes to help us. We take a lot of work with us that will undoubtedly be reflected in hotel occupancy, in plane seats and in the experiences of tourists from all over the world”, he assured.
challenges
Given the current economic context that the country is going through, such as inflation, the president explained that they are working on a plan around social development, mainly promoting various programs to support the most vulnerable sectors.
“If we want to continue growing, we must close the gaps and give opportunities to women and men so that they have a better quality of life,” he said.
As well as important investments in social development “so that it can help these families, these women, vulnerable sectors so that they have a better quality of life, and therefore seek diversification, unconventional trades.”
Mayan train, opportunity
For the governor, the Mayan Train project represents, in addition to diversification opportunities, social justice, since it will quickly connect the inhabitants of the state, those who live in one municipality and work in another, as well as the need to have skilled labor.
The train, he recalled, which will travel around 1,554 kilometers through different states of the Republic, in Quintana Roo it will have eight stations and three stops. The project also comes hand in hand with the remodeling of the Chetumal airport.
“It comes to bring a light of hope, work, employment, illusion of students because the railway technician career will be opened. It comes to bring many benefits, but above all in this new agreement for the well-being and development of Quintana Roo, which is the new way of governing, narrowing the inequality gaps, ”he said.
