Where is the transparency ? Who is the hotelier ?

Doubling the number of tourists would be so easy if only we could convince an airline, any major airline, to start nonstop direct service from the principal South American cities. If that could happen we would be busy year round, instead of only from December to May.

now that is genius for you. we already have 70,000 rooms, operating at 14% capacity. just what we need..another 30,000. do these guys have sh*t for brains?

dreadlocks,=3***s

And here many just be number two in the nomination of ridiculous ideas of the year...
Do these people ever look at research or any available numbers?

Number one the 10% of corruption money to the poor.

Cruise lines, like Carnival, Royal carribean should have more ships stopping at Montecristi, Azua, Puerto Plata, Samana Bay, Santo Domingo, Punta Cana. The island should and can be a year round destination. More creativity, lower taxes, less stealing please. The Chinese and the indians would love it here. That is until they get robbed and capped. Hahaha!!!

yes, Yucahu. cruise ships, everywhere, every day. in 10 years, you will be importing coral reefs.

You are all nutz especially comrade Dread who wants to drive all the developers into the sea with his pitchfork ....14 percent what are you smoking.....and Juan B why would South Americans c,ome here?and please dont say the shopping or the beaches...Cruise Ships also find little to offer except sun and sand and better provisioning prices of produce if the qualify continúes to improve

"You are all nutz especially comrade Dread who wants to drive all the developers into the sea with his pitchfork ...."

Well we all already know you have trouble with 1+1, so for you to understand that with 14% vacancies leaves you with... ??? Do you have it? that's right 86% EMPTY ROOMS. And you want to have more built? Why? if the country fails to have more than 50-50? Maybe some people like empty resort and hotel but most come to play, have fun and meet people... Not to sit in an empty bar or restaurant.
With a customer return rate very low already you think more empty rooms will help?
What business school did you go to?

dreamkiller or fieldofdreams?? built it and they will come.... yeah.... right!

Not There ....you believe Dreads math LOL ....14percent maybe in POP in Sept the worse monta of the year through out the Carribbean....but in Dec there will not be enough lift to get all the turistas who want to come...you like Dread the Red know nothing of tourism here or any where else

fieldofdreams "you believe Dreads math LOL ....14percent maybe in POP in Sept"
Dread didn't say it "the Dominican official said" or "Tourism minister Francisco Javier García"

Chinese eye Dominican Republic as tourists, investors
Economy - 10 September 2012, 2:43 PM
“We currently have around 70,000 rooms, only 14 percent operating at capacity, ensuring growth and opens the door for Chinese entrepreneurs to invest with confidence in Dominican Republic’s tourism industry,” the Dominican official said.

The question is not Dread's maths - you can do it yourself. The question is "why build more empty rooms for a sector already in decline?

First rule of business .. supply and demand..
With demand at 14% would the right thing to do be build more supply??

Two out of towners talkiing nonsense....Fact...DR. Largest tourism market in the Carribbean and still growing ........14 percent LOL

dreamkiller is a waste of time. the guy is just a miserable old undesirable, who has been banned at least 6 times, but does not have the good sense, not the decency, to pack up, and leave. nobody takes him seriously, but he still thinks he has some use here. he cannot debate with facts, only silly, adolescent ad hominems. dreamkiller, if you have a problem with the facts, go take it up with the people who published them. now that stillhere showed him the press release, instead of being a real man ,and admit his mistake, he still believes he is right. a waste of oxygen.

If 14 percent average occupancy rate were true .... What could we possibly do Dr. Krugman whip out your Magic 8 Ball and tell us .....we are in the crapper and your beloved Caricom islands are in high clover

if 14% is not right, then go and tell the Minister of Tourism that he is wrong. it is as easy as that. he is the one who said it. we know that you are the expert on tourism. maybe you could advise him.

C'mon guys stop pretending to be naive, we all know 14% occupancy rate is absurd and not true, I saw the article when published here and I inmediately spotted the mistake, obviously another typo or lost in the translation or bad reporting issue like the hundreds published here frequently, not necessarily a mistake by the dept of tourism but if that was the case they obviously made a mistake. Simple math, the Punta Cana area has more than half of DR's hotel rooms and its occupancy rate has been consistently over 80%, that means that if even the rest of the country had 0% occupancy rate (impossible), the result for the country would still be over 40%. 14% vacancy rate is more likely, meaning an 86% average occupancy rate which would probably justify building more rooms (no country has 100% occupancy rate all year round), how many ? that's another issue and subject to feasibility studies per area.

This will probably help:

bancentral.gov.do/estadisticas.asp?a=Sector_Turismo

I don't know the exact figures, but I have seen many almost deserted resorts and hotels all over the country. 14% occupancy seems quite credible to me.

So if its bad news it must be mistake, a typo or mistranslation, but its good news its gospel truth? (Gospel truth is in fact a contradiction in terms)

Roy, you've been in DR long enough, time for you to visit the PC area, not just POP or Palenque, the East is where the game is being played and where most of the hotel rooms are, then come back with an objective opinion for once.

Dread ...."now go home and get your shine box "

Juan>...If that could happen we would be busy year round, instead of only from December to May..."

You're right. Problem is, Juan, that most of us out here are being fed that, the balance of the year - being June to November - is so called "Hurricane Season" there. The average turista is uneducated in the art of "looking that up". LOL. Instead they flock to places like Mexico, California, Florida, and Padre Island, where it is - Ohmygosh - "Hurricane Season".

Go figure. We can all be expert surfers on Utube, and fluent in flinging off cutsie emails, but - HEAVEN FORBID - we just can't seem to wrap our heads around clicking on the National Hurricane Center for updates on how the weather is developing on any given day, or what it will be weeks in advance for that matter.

These people are the graduates of Dumbass 101. Maybe you're better off without them - in particular - stumbling around your beaches demanding their next cerveza and flipping singles at you with contempt.

tomito, you know what is absurd? some guy in an internet site disputing tourism figures issued by the Minister of Tourism, himself. you can barely spell the word, but you have now become the latest member of the sabelotodo round table, knowing more than the people who preside over an enterprise.

says dreamkiller

Written by: dreamkiller, 18 Sep 2012 3:35 AM
From: Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas), Guayacannes on the beach
Dread ...."now go home and get your shine box

at least i work. in your case, you are just a lowlife scam artist, who wandered through the caribbean islands, trying to sell them bilge water, calling it fine liquour. they found out you were nothing but a grifter, and ran you out of town. now you spend the rest of your miserable, insignificant, useless life trying to run them down. people do not like it when losers try to make fools of them. GO HOME, unless someone is looking for you there.

Dread, those are not the actual figures, just what was wrongfully stated and or reported or translated, it does not make sense, simple math. Not defending the Dept of Tourism idiots either. If the 14% occupancy rate average figure was accurate, that means the area with more than half the hotel rooms in the country, the PC area numbers would be even lower, but I know you know better than that.

tomito, if the figures were incorrect, the Department of Tourism would have issued a correction. they have people employed to check each and every press release that comes out, regarding their activities. they cannot allow people to print false information, unchallenged.

Dread, that would probably be the case in a perfect Ministry of Tourism scenario, since when a DR government institution has displayed such level of efficiency or even close to it ? And again, that's assuming that it was in fact a statement by the Ministry of Tourism and not some typo, bad reporting or lost in the translation issue like the hundres published here on a regular basis. But the answer is simple go check the Central Bank statistics, I posted a link above, however I know you know better, with a 14% occupancy rate average there would be no flights going to the PC area, much less any big resorts open for business., don't tell me you too are relying on Roystone's visual assessment of the Palenque and Najayo beach "resorts".

Yes!!! Example, Sheraton's Four Seasons is ready for the October inauguration.

* starwoodhotels.com/fourpoints/property/overview/index.html?propertyID=3684

And, HOTEL @ plaza coral punta cana will be inaugurated in November 2012!

* facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=472427689457867&set=a.459601124073857.113926.100000719190603&type=3&theater

8-)

Mas pa'lante y las manos ya están obrando!

For your information, tomito, I have stayed in resorts in Juan Dolio, Carbarete, Las Terenas and La Romana, and visited many other resort locations on both the Atlantic and Caribbean coasts.

Roy, again, I noticed you did not mention the Punta Cana area, PC is where the game is being played, go there then come back with an objective opinion (name the resort in PC/Bavaro).

Roy, again, I noticed you did not mention the Punta Cana area, PC is where the game is being played, go there then come back with an objective opinion (name the resort in PC/Bavaro).

So one resort town, Punta Cana, defines the entire country's tourism industry? I rest my case.

Red neck mental case

Roystone, when that town has about 60% of all the hotel rooms and tourists in the entire country, the answer is YES !

If you didn't realize that by now, then it shows how little you know about DR tourism.

Tomito, RoyStone:

Not only 60% of the rooms, also over 64% of visitors landing in the Dominican Republic. I'll be uploading pictures of the "rotonda" where Autovia del Coral, Bulevar Turistico, Cap Cana entrance, Punta Cana Village/International Airport meet!

Even bigger investments in progress now than 6 to 12 months ago...

Punta Cana has it all!!!

8-)

For those touting the success of Punta Cana I would mention that Cap Cana is in the tank - the place is faliing. The Golf course is on the market for $4M and no body in thier right mind would touch it. And the Punta Cana Resort Hotel has shut down one large building of rooms on the beach ( has been closed for 4 years or more) and over 50% of its occupancy number is airline crews! They own the airport and they "get" the airlines crews. A number of the airlines refused to stay at Punta Cana Hotel and Resort because the rooms did not meet their minimum standards. PCRC has been forced to upgrade the facilities in an attempt to get the airline crews (paying wholesale rates) back at the hotel. The resort was / is in such bad shape this is why they are building the new Starwood and the Coral PUnta Cana hotels. Cheaper to build new than repair and upgrade the current infrastructure. Believe nothing you hear, and only 1/2 of what you see. Smoke and mirrors re: Tourism number

thanks for the posting, BigBoss. cheaper to tear it down, and start all over. can you say "Puerto Plata"?

If we could only get rid of those Jamaican trouble makers who are always whining and complaining then POP could start its Revival

you mean like how all the caribbean islands got rid of a lowlife grifter who tried to scam them with rotgut liquor, disguised as champagne?

Cap Cana is indeed dead. Sanctuary looks like a real sanctuary, fishing lodge is dead, Eden Roc, they try to build op more rooms now and try to improve, its beautiful, but I guess it is all to expensive. Its a pitty because Capa Cana is beautiful

Big Boss Hoss: Cap Cana and PCRC are not the whole Punta Cana area, now those airline crews must be bringing empty planes right ? According to you, PCRC is building two new hotels (cheaper to build new than to upgrade), Do you think Frank Rainieri and his associates would be building 2 new hotels If they thought no tourists would come ? Maybe you know something he doesn't, now let me tell you as you may well be informed, the guy is the pioneer in the area and if it wasn't for him, maybe that area would be nothing more than a Yola terminal for illegal trips and drug shipments to Puerto Rico, he founded the first private international airport in the world, so the guy knows a thing or two about tourism.