Arias Met with Spanish Leaders on Multi-Purpose Agenda.

Costa Rican president, Óscar Arias, visited Spain recently, meeting with the country’s royal family and King Juan Carlos de Borbón in Madrid. Among their discussions, Arias asked the Spanish king for more financial aid and tourism focus on Latin America and, in particular, Costa Rica.

In addition to President Arias and King Juan Carlos, Costa Rican chancellor, Bruno Stagno, Minister of the Presidency, Rodrigo Arias, Costa Rican Ambassador to Spain, Melvin Sáenz, Secretary of Ibero-American Cooperation, Trinidad Jiménez, and Spanish chancellor, Miguel Ángel Moratinos Cuyaubé joined the meeting. Together, the politicians discussed several current issues, among them, Costa Rica’s $56 million debt to Spain.

On the topic of aid and investments, the group could only decide that Spain would continue looking for ways to help middle-income countries like Costa Rica. In truth, Spain invests almost half of its funds in Latin America. For most other European countries, those investment funds are destined for African nations.

When the topic rolled around to tourism, King Juan Carlos expressed interest in sending more Spanish tourists to visit Costa Rica. Costa Rica’s economy is largely based on its tourism income, and has focused several recent efforts on enlarging its tourism base. Currently, Europeans make up only 17 percent of the country’s tourists, or about 323,000 yearly visitors. A good percentage of these tourists are Spanish, taking advantage of direct Madrid-San José airline flights and no language barrier.

In order to encourage additional Spanish tourism in Costa Rica, President Arias and King Juan Carlos discussed the possibility of more direct flights on Iberia Airlines. In addition, the two politicos talked about additional Spanish investment in Costa Rica hotels, a move that would eventually profit both countries, Spain as a successful investor and Costa Rica as a receiver of tourism dollars.

Discussions with Spain are not the only move that President Arias has taken towards become an even greater tourism superpower. Instead of focusing more energy on American tourists, Costa Rica has shifted some focus to its other clientele, including tourists from Europe, China, and Latin America. For example, Costa Rican Minister of Tourism, Carlos Ricardo Benavides, recently teamed up with his Panamanian counterpart, Rúben Blades, to promoted combined tourism packages between the two countries. They will market to Europeans, who have longer vacation times than Americans.

The Chinese government, which has recently established diplomatic ties with Costa Rica, has also begun to promote Costa Rica as a tourism destination to its citizens. Studies show that approximately 200 million Chinese are financially able to travel abroad, yet in 2007, only 1,545 visited Costa Rica. During 2008, and especially in 2009, this number is expected to jump, as the Chinese government promotes the area as a beautiful and politically friendly place to travel.

In addition to these larger efforts, Costa Rica has also upped its tourism appeal by wooing airlines into offering direct flights to San José. Among the recent additions are more frequent direct routes from New York, Los Angeles and Atlanta, along with a direct flight from Cordoba, Argentina in the works.

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Filed under: Travel on September 11th, 2008