Cuba hopes green tourism can keep it in the black

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(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-09-18 11:02

A view of huts used for accommodation at the Guama tourism resort in the Zapata Swamp Biosphere Reserve Park south of the Matanzas province in central Cuba September 17, 2009. The wetlands of Cuba represent about 4% of the island's territory and include habitats with unique and ideal vegetation for numerous organisms such as manatis, crocodiles, fish and turtles, many resident and particularly migrant birds and numerous endangered endemic species. [Agencies]

BOCA DE GUAMA, Cuba: Crocodile 0383 is too tiny to be menacing.

Three weeks old and barely the length of a candy bar, the gray and brownish-yellow beast already has all 64 jagged teeth, which glint like crushed glass in the tropical sun. Yet his bites don't break the skin and a whipping from his Q-tip-sized tail only tickles.

Though small, Cuba sees big potential in No. 0383, hoping he and thousands of other natural wonders can revolutionize a nascent eco-tourism industry.

Amid dipping tourism revenues, the government gathered top leaders from its state-run vacation industry and European and Canadian tour operators this week for a conference aimed at boosting a segment of the market that only accounts for 4 percent of all foreign visits, according to deputy Tourism Minister Alexis Trujillo.

"We will always be a sun and sand destination," he said. "But we want to diversify. Eco-tourism is the future."

Trujillo expects Cuba to attract nearly 3 percent more total overseas tourists than last year's record 2.35 million, but said that price cuts to keep demand high amid the global recession means overall revenues will fail to meet the $2.5 billion generated in 2008.

Cuba is betting environmentally conscious vacationers, who are often willing to pay premium prices and stay longer than those hankering for cheap beach getaways, can boost profits. Eco-tourists focus not only on nature - biking, hiking, bird-watching, scuba-diving - but also on the country's social and cultural charms, while trying to make as little negative impact as possible on nature.

"There's enough to see and do that's green. It can get tourists coming and keep them coming," said a US-based tour operator who has visited the island four times but asked not to be named because of possible repercussions from the US Treasury Department, which enforces Washington's 47-year-old trade embargo. American tourists are effectively barred from traveling to Cuba, though many ignore the rules.

"When the embargo is dropped and there are more US tourists," she said, "Eco-tourism could be a boon. But it needs to be managed very carefully."

A key attraction will be the national park near the Bay of Pigs where this week's conference was held - the Cienaga de Zapata, or Zapata Swamp. Cuba's equivalent of the Florida Everglades, it's the Caribbean's largest bioreserve, 1.5 million acres of mangrove-choked canals teeming with the wildest Cuban wildlife.

Just 125 miles southeast of Havana, it features more than 1.5 million acres and 354 species of birds - from pink flamingos to the bee hummingbird, the world's smallest bird - plus 130 varieties of plants, dozens of which are found nowhere else on earth. The Boca de Guama crocodile farm that's home to No. 0383 and about 4,300 other Rhombifers, or Cuban crocodiles, is also a top tourist draw - though there are so many crocs that officials simply give them identification numbers rather than names.

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