Construction of the Scarlett Martínez International Airport is 70% complete and is expected to be finished in 2013. The Costa Rican company MECO, S. A. is in charge of the construction project, at a cost of $35.9 million dollars. So far, $27 million have been executed.
The Panama Tourism Authority (ATP) will be participating in one of the most important tourist events of the year for Latin America.
The TravelMart LatinAmerica fair will be attended by top executive 'purchasers' of recreational travel products for global markets. They are representatives of hotels, airlines, cruise ship lines, attractions, resorts, tourism offices and promotional organizations across Latin America.
With fireworks and performances by a range of artists, the Festival of all Festivals ended on the grounds of Union Park at Chitré.
Thousands of people enjoyed performances by great musical artists and bands, and among these were Keny and Kiara Pérez, los Beachers de Bocas del Toro, Caliente, Ulpiano 'Mechiblanco' Vergara, and Los Rabanes.
In one year, visits to the website www.visitpanama.com jumped from 39,000 to 100,000, and 25% of the traffic is registered as coming from the United States.
Panama has consolidated its presence on the Internet as a tourist destination, as revealed by statistics. Over the past two years, the number of people surfing for information on tourism in the country has doubled. Google Adworks, one of the measurement tools created by the biggest Internet search engine, reports some 49,500 searches monthly, whereas in 2010 the average was 20,000. The majority are done from laptop or desktop computers, but the last year has seen an increased number of searches by mobile devices.
