las últimas semanas... meses?

Tourism is one of the primary sources of foreign income for the seven countries that are part of the Central American region: Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama. Central America is located at the heart of the American continent and comprises a region of 522 thousand 378.3 square kilometers which, in 2009 generated $5.4 billion in tourism revenues despite a 20% drop attributed to the economic crisis. Tourism is vital to the economy of Central American countries. Income generated from tourism helps overcome the extreme poverty faced by many Central Americans through job creation, increasing the standard of living through development, as well as a method of achieving sustainability.

The first part of this paper will introduce Central America as a region and explore how tourism has grown over the last two decades. It will also identify the key tourism trends and review academic literature written about the region.

The second part will profile the patterns of tourism development in each of the Central American countries and identify common issues across the countries.

Finally, the third part will examine Australia as a potential source market to the region and evaluate opportunities of the Australian market. It will also examine the problems which tourism wholesalers in the city of Melbourne face in linking with Central American tourism providers.