RESORTS AND HOTELS EXPRESS SATISFACTION WITH 2011
By the end of November of last year had 852.347 visitors arrived in Mauritius, confirming that by the end of the year data are not yet available the island will have an anticipated overall arrival summary of around 940.000 visitors for 2011. This will represent an increase of about 4 percent compared to 2010 and put the goal of 1 million visitors within reach for 2012, subject to favourable economic conditions around the world of course and subject to getting more airlines to fly to the island or increase either frequencies or size of their aircraft used on the route.
According to the chairman of one of the islands hotel associations, quoted in the information sent to this correspondent tourist arrivals have increased before however cautioning that it still does not fill the hotels with the number of rooms available.
The Mauritius tourism sector has been vocally advocating for the government to review their aviation policy vis a vis access to the island by more airlines, but it was learned that the events in neighbouring Seychelles, where the national airline is presently being gutted as part of a massive restructuring has scared the Mauritius government, fearing apparently that opening the skies, as the Seychelles did, would equally result in a demise of Air Mauritus, once foreign carriers had gained the upper hand and cornered the islands source markets with fares Air Mauritius would not be able to match.
Watch this space to find out during 2012 what decisions will be taken and which airlines will gain greater access to the Mauritius skies or if the government in Port Louis will stick to its guns and continue to protect their national airline as they did in the past.
