Tourism Industry Stakeholders Try to Recuperate Employees

A key factor that contributed to the rebound of the tourism industry is the rise in local tourism. CEO of the Ministry of Tourism, Nicole Solano, says that an integral part of why the industry was able to quickly bounce back is because a lot of businesses recognized the important role that local Belizean tourists play in the dynamics of the industry. However, while businesses have reopened and people are travelling again, the industry is still facing challenges with employment. CEO Solano explains that it has been difficult trying to regain former tourism employees who had to seek employment in other fields.  

Nicole Solano, CEO, Ministry of Tourism and Diaspora Relations: “We have seen the return of the majority of the tourism hotel plant as well as tour operators, tour guides, everybody has come back. Our biggest challenge would be employees within the tourism industry. A lot of them have moved to work in different sectors because when tourism was shut down for COVID they had to obviously find work so what we’re doing right now is to try and make sure that we can attract more and more employees within the tourism industry and train. So training is on the top of the priority list to make sure that we can have enough human resources and a big human resources pool from which our operators and hotels can pick from.”