Proexport Schedules Meeting of Tourist Information Points

Tuesday, 20 October 2009 00:00

A group of 50 people belonging to the Tourist Information Points network in Colombia will participate in the II Meeting of Tourist Information Points Network (TIPs) organized by Proexport through its Vice Presidency for Tourism and the Center for Information and Counseling in Foreign Trade – Zeiky – that will take place at Las Lomas Hotel in Rionegro, Antioquia, from October 21 to 23, 2009.

Between January and October, 2009, a total of 30,858 visitors used the services provided by Tourist Information Points.

Nubia Stella Martínez, Vice President for Tourism at Proexport said that TIPs are an important information tool for international tourists who visit Colombia, since they can find complete information and maps, provided by Proexport and the Tourism Promotion Fund, to locate their destinations.

“The local tourism authorities should supervise and look after the proper functioning and quality of this service. Otherwise, the tool will not fulfill the strategy for which it was created,“ she said.

Objectives of the Meeting

• To consolidate and strengthen the national TIP network,
  
• To generate a sense of belonging on the part of the country’s tourist information officers, thus promoting national destinations from the TIPs,
  
• To strengthen the knowledge of the work team by showing the tourist offer of each region,
  
• To achieve integration and empathy between regions and the team of tourist information officers,
• To strengthen the services provided and visitor assistance.

TIPs in Colombia

At present, Colombia has 26 Tourism Information Points in the following destinations:

TIP in Colombia

• Armenia, Café Triangle (2),
  
• Barranquilla (2),
  
• Bogotá (2),
  
• Bucaramanga (1),
  
• Cali (2),
  
• Cartagena (7),
  
• La Guajira (1),
  
• Manizales, Café Triangle (1),
  
• Medellín (4),
  
• Pereira (2),
• Popayán (1),
  
• San Andrés (1),
  
• Santa Marta (2).

Inquiries at TIPs

The inquiries at Tourist Information Points during the first semester of 2009 may be broken down as follows:

• Cartagena – 14,878 (48,2%),
• Bogotá – 5,716 (18,5%),
• Armenia – 2,091 (6,8%),
• Manizales – 1,865 (6%),
• Santa Marta – 1,830 (5,9%),
• Popayán – 1,328 (4,3%),
  
• Barranquilla – 1,172 (3,8%),
  
• Medellín – 789 (2,6%),
  
• La Guajira – 589 (1,9%),
  
• Cali – 494 (1,6%),
  
• San Andrés – 67 (0,2%),
  
• Bucaramanga – 39 (0,1%).