Argentina expects 700,000 cruise passengers for next season

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The next cruise season in Argentina will have an estimated 700,000 tourists. The estimate was made known at the Seatrade Cruise Global fair being held in Miami.

On Wednesday at the fair, which will last until Thursday, more than 120 arrivals to the Port of Buenos Aires have already been confirmed.

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In this context, according to the Argentine Ministry of Transportation, more than 350,000 passengers are expected, with at least a dozen cruise ships that will arrive for the first time at the Buenos Aires port complex.

In addition, Ushuaia – in the extreme south of the country – expects at least 250 thousand passengers, with 535 confirmed calls, while Puerto Madryn already has 41 calls and an estimated 65 thousand visitors, with several ships arriving for the first time.

Accordingly, estimates project that almost 700 thousand tourists will arrive at the various federal ports of Argentina, with more than 600 calls, during the next cruise season.

The Minister of Transportation, Alexis Guerrera, who follows the work meetings from Buenos Aires, pointed out that “a cruise season that took place in the context of a pandemic and, anyway, we had a positive process of recovery in the federal ports thanks to the joint work with different areas of the State that managed to generate incentives and promote the arrival of more than 200 vessels”.

“In this next season, with bonuses and facilities that generate certainty to the cruise industry, we are normalizing the volumes to pre-pandemic levels, and we expect an exponential growth of calls and receiving almost 700,000 domestic and foreign tourists in our federal ports, which means a boost for the tourism sector, more jobs, more opportunities and more development for the Argentine provinces”, added the national official.

Meanwhile, from Miami, the deputy controller of AGP, Patricio Hogan, said that “we seek to implement measures that provide greater certainty and possibilities to cruise ships that want to tour our country, and facilitate the arrival of new ships to Argentine ports”.

“We are working to boost the reactivation of the cruise industry, one of the greatest contributions to tourism by nautical means, and the arrival of foreign tourists and foreign currency to various parts of our country,” he added.

Within this framework, it was announced the implementation of discounts in the tariff chart of the Trunk Waterway, favoring the entry of cruise ships to the whole country and promoting their presence in all Argentine ports.